Wonkette

Meet Dale Cardwell. He was on the teevee in Atlanta, as a “news reporter.” Now he’s running for the U.S. Senate against Confederate Sen. Saxby Chambliss. And that’s why Cardwell spent a week sleeping on a scaffold atop a 320-foot-tall tower … you know, so people would take him seriously. [46 News Atlanta]

• Iran already has a nuclear weapon, American military already in country, world fucked, etc. [The Agonist, Think Progress]

• Halliburton is totally fine knowing you hate them, as long as the soldiers keep chowing those so very profitable cheeseburgers. [Americablog]
• Fired Air America talk show host Mike Malloy is now a “l33t hax0r” who wants the “bastard pod-people running our Air America” to rot in hell. [Hot Air]
• Michigan Republican Mike Rogers is totally cool with anal rape jokes, sodomizing strangers. [Livingston Daily]
• Senator Saxby Chambliss knows deep down in heart that the south will rise again, but is still pissed about the last time. [Raw Story]
• Nevada congressional candidates say the darnedest things. [Political Wire]

• Heard on the Hill: Senator Saxby Chambliss (R-GA), in a closed Senate Armed Services Committee meeting: “We need better intelligence. If we had better intelligence in the Civil War we’d be quoting Jefferson Davis, not Lincoln.” (The Senator’s office disputes the word “we.”) … Chris Matthews to George Allen: “Matthews continued, ‘I’m not going to call you Sen. Ma….’ He paused a beat, then continued his joke with, ‘Caucasian.’” [Roll Call]
• Yeas and Nays: The Congressional Softball League fracas continued on into last weekend’s championships… Senator John Kerry chatted with Tim Robbins at Olives Restaurant. [Examiner]
• Reliable Source: Confused readers, possibly mistaking Amy and Roxanne for Rich Coen, wonder why Reliable Source would cover Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes. [WP]
• Lowdown: Bruce Willis is not eager to call himself a Republican. [NYDN]
• Washington Whispers: George W. Bush uses and gives out personalized Sharpies… Self-described former “geeky [congressional] page” is performing one-woman play in the Rayburn building. See just how geeky here. [USN&WR]

Having finally recovered from Prom, Chatology returned to her perch on the couch to sit through 3.5 hours of bone-grindingly obvious talking points. We’re used to butt-punishing workouts, but this is not our favorite among them. That said, a surprisingly sexy Sunday morning. ALSO: Can’t get enough of that wacky Bush impressionist? We can.

Top Topics:
• Michael Hayden, spook or just creep? Rep. Pete Hoekstra makes news by negation: Hayden “is the wrong man at the wrong place at the wrong time.” McCain is more loving.
• ‘06 sickness/Congressional “culture of corruption,” with Republicans showing Reaganesque — which is to say, delusional — optimism.
• Goss’s departure: Not did he jump or was he pushed but rather, “Pushed, shoved, or run over with a truck and stomped on the face?”

Quotes to live by:
• Saxby Chambliss on Hayden: He is “just a class individual” (as someone who questioned the patriotism of a paraplegic, he knows class!)
• George Stephanopolous makes right wing bias hunters’ heads explode: “That was not one of the top four pieces of legislation that Speaker Pelosi…ah, I don’t know why I have that stuck in my head today…”
• Chris Wallace masters the obvious: “I don’t have to tell you, you are the chairman of the intelligence committee.”
• George Will teases the Kennedy story: “One reason this story touched all of this city’s erogenous zones…”
• Bill Kristol looks on the bright side: “I’m looking forward to getting more sex into this scandal.”
• David Brooks auditions to be Maureen Dowd: “This has more layers than a Tom Clancy novel.”

Your full-on weekend chat soup after the jump.

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We received an amusing item today about the great lengths Saxby Chambliss goes to to ensure that no ethical impropriety occurs when his lobbyist son comes to lobby him: MORE »

As you may have heard in our Morning Roundup, the seven member subgroup of the Senate Intelligence Committee received their first White House briefing on the Bush’s domestic wiretapping nonsense. The Washington Post article on the briefing contained one section that immediately gave us a case of the WTFs.

Members of the Senate subcommittee — which, along with Roberts and Rockefeller, includes Republicans Mike DeWine (Ohio), Orrin G. Hatch (Utah) and Christopher S. Bond (Mo.) and Democrats Carl M. Levin (Mich.) and Dianne Feinstein (Calif.) — will not be able to share what they learn with the other eight members of the intelligence panel, according to rules the White House has proposed.

That is the foofiest fucking idea we’ve ever heard! How can a debate about intelligence priorities take place if the entire committee isn’t on an equal footing? Are the non-committee members going to have to sit in smaller chairs, too?

Here is how we imagine the future of the Senate Intelligence Committee:

[sorry, only super special Wonketteers can read after the jump]

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