Ha ha, you wish. But he is making a “statement,” and it just might be a farewell to Alberto … or a pledge to send another 100,000 school-age troops for a Children’s Crusade in the Middle East. Who really knows?

Meanwhile, Watergate legend and current White House counsel Fred Fielding has sent a very special letter to Leahy and Conyers, offering the usual unsworn midnight interviews with Rove, Harriet, etc., but only if the Senate and House operate with the lights off and everybody wears Jar Jar Binks’ masks and the Medallion of Secrecy is waved over each doorway during the backwards-masked Pig Call.

Read the whole dumb thing, after the jump.

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Ok, so the White House fired eight US Attorneys for sketchy political reasons. Everyone caught up? It seems, in hindsight, like a remarkably stupid decision, especially now that the congressional Dems are firing up the subpoenas and calling for Alberto Gonzales’ head. (Justifying torture? We’ll let that slide. Fire a lawyer, though, and you’re in deep shit, Mister.) MORE »

Fred F. Fielding, who helped a lot of Reagan Administration criminals not go to prison forever, is the new White House counsel. MORE »

* Democrats bring their families and boisterous energy to the Capitol as Nancy Pelosi cracks the “marble ceiling” with the swearing in of the 110th Congress. [WP, WP, NYT]
* Jim Webb tolerates Dick Cheney long enough to formally become a Senator. [WP]
* “White House scrambles to complete its new war policy package in time for the president to unveil it in a speech to the nation next week.” [WP, NYT, WSJ, USAT]
* Sweet, sweet Rick Santorum abandons Senate “Candy Desk.” [WSJ]
* Harriet Miers gets out before the investigations begin. [WP, NYT]
* Civil liberties groups have panties in a bunch over warrantless mail opening provision. [WP, NYT]
* Joe Biden still supports the terrorists, still hates America. [WP]
* William “Renton” Rehnquist spent most of 1981 having drug-induced paranoid freakouts. [WP, NYT]
* DC voting rights legislation will be addressed after the 100 hours, so basically it’s back to never. [WP]

* Harriet Miers looks forward to spending time with her friends Rose, Blanche, and Sophia. [Think Progress]
* Some say “improper social ties.” Others say, “Oil companies get geeky GS-12s laid in exchange for over-lucrative government mineral rights.” [TPM Muckraker]
* Charlie Rangel takes his office back from that “son of a bitch” Dick Cheney. [Raw Story]
* “By next week we must start preparing the nation and our military for war with Iran.” [Blogs for Bush]
* 6,000-year-old remains of world’s first politician discovered. [Q and O]
* CQ in COI! Totally on the take from pro-business CoC! [The Tortellini]
* Tonight’s list of parties you really want to crash and send us pictures from. [National Journal]

White House Counsel Harriet Miers, the second-most incompetent person ever nominated for the Supreme Court (this isn’t Clarence Thomas, people, have some perspective), has resigned. This is shocking news to the people who remember that she still had a job of relative power and importance. MORE »

Yes, the “remorseful proponents” of the Iraq Invasion are finally aware of the Hell they’ve helped create — except for David Frum, who’s been on talk radio all day whining about his quotes being “out of context” — but who are the neo-cons really blaming for the atrocities? MORE »

We were going to write a scathing intro about the importance of Wonk’d and our deep sadness at the paltry sightings we’ve been getting lately, until someone sent a nice juicy George Bush tip this morning. So there’s that, plus a haggard Ken Mehlman, an indiscreet Harriet Miers, a myopic (in more ways than one) Tom Friedman, Mr. Mayor-for-Life, and your favorite “member” of Congress, below the fold.

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New York, LA, New York, LA — no one gives a shit about DC until their tangentially-related-to-public-service movie has to premiere, then all of a sudden Cleveland Park is where it’s at. At least a solid Demi Moore sighting came out of the screening of The Guardian last week, but she’s not even in it. And while Demi is gone already, some people just never leave, as evidenced by the above photo of (the back of) Tom DeLay duck-walking down H St. Others that were Wonk’d this week: Marion Barry needs his ride pimped, Harriet Miers shops for pimp threads, and the prince of darkness is overheard on his cell phone asking, “Is Bob Novak gonna have to choke a bitch?” All these and your third favorite Ghostbuster, after the jump.

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Forget Kansas — what’s the matter with Texas?

Most guys get in trouble for talking smack about their ex-girlfriends. But down in the Lone Star State, if you say a few nice things about your ex-girlfriend, you can get in trouble too. This is most likely to happen if you’re a judge, you said those things in 120 interviews with the media, and your ex-girlfriend was seeking an appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court at the time.

Remember Nathan L. Hecht, the Texas Supreme Court justice who rushed to the aid of his erstwhile paramour, White House Counsel Harriet Miers, during her disastrous SCOTUS nomination? Well, now he’s being dragged before the Texas State Commission on Judicial Conduct. The Commission is tsk-tsking him for trying to be a good ex-boyfriend, claiming that his public statements about Miers violated the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct, which forbids judges from “advanc[ing] the private interests of the judge or others.”

More details, after the jump.

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