Days after his non-denial denial of having called fired U.S. Attorney David Iglesias to pressure him to indict a Democrat before November's elections, New Mexico Senator Pete Domenici has suddenly remembered that, well, ok, he did call Iglesias.  Only he definitely didn't pressure him or anything.

Domenici also said he had told the Justice Department that U.S. Attorney David C. Iglesias should be replaced, but said that occurred prior to the call about the criminal investigation of Democrats.

"In retrospect, I regret making that call and I apologize," Domenici said in a statement. "However, at no time in that conversation or any other conversation with Mr. Iglesias did I ever tell him what course of action I thought he should take on any legal matter. I have never pressured him nor threatened him in any way."

So then why deny it, if the call was so blameless?  Couldn't be because it was a possible ethics violation, could it?

Stanley Brand, an ethics lawyer who served as House counsel in the 1980s, said Iglesias's allegation could result in internal congressional ethics probes. "It's going to precipitate a huge problem," Brand said, warning also of a potential review by the Justice Department.

At Talking Points Memo, David Kurtz analyzes Domenici's admission.

Well, when a U.S. Senator--a senior Senator from your own party, no less--calls you about a case, you can be damn sure it's not a social call. Here's what Domenici says transpired on the call:

I asked Mr. Iglesias if he could tell me what was going on in that investigation and give me an idea of what timeframe we were looking at. It was a very brief conversation, which concluded when I was told that the courthouse investigation would be continuing for a lengthy period.

What timeframe "we" were looking at? The royal "we." It's just us Republicans here, old boy. Notice too that Domenici's version of events doesn't preclude him having abruptly hung up the phone, as Iglesias claims.

Domenici is up for re-election in 2008; his recent bizarre behavior had already made it seem likely he'd be weakened if he ran again, and there was speculation about whether he'd do so.  A public scandal and possible ethics investigation has to figure into his thinking about that.  Meanwhile, the firing of Iglesias and 6 other U.S. attorneys continues to gain steam as a story, with House Judiciary Committee hearings coming up on Tuesday.

• Damn.  As usual, what Digby said:

  This hideous face of the Republican Party has been obvious to those of us who have been paying attention for a long, long time. It is the single most important reason why our politics have devolved into a filthy grudge match.

  For a long time liberals were paralyzed or indifferent as the GOP demonized liberalism as the root of every problem and pathology in American society. We were derided as unamerican, treasonous and evil. After the congressional harrassment of the 90's, the partisan impeachment, the puerile coverage of campaign 2000 and the resulting installation of a Republican president under very dubious circumstances, Democrats of all stripes heard both the Republicans and the media smirking at our outrage and telling us to "get over it."

  And all of this was his was after Bill Clinton had moved the party to the center, had governed as a bipartisan compromiser and the Republicans impeached him anyway. Clearly, the Democratic party was blind if they didn't take the Republicans at their threatening words.

• As Republicans prepare themselves to be the party of no, the Carpetbagger Report offers this

  Advice for Dems: this is an opportunity. Start asking Republicans: "Do you agree with Grover Norquist that the next two years should be nothing but gridlock?"

• The AFL-CIO blog's Bargaining Digest Weekly tells what's going on in labor struggles around the country.
• The DMI Blog looks at the fallout from sub-prime mortgages.
• Sick of the 2008 presidential race already?  You've got reason:

  In one measure of news interest, campaign stories have consumed 95 minutes of attention this year through Feb. 27 on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts. That's more time than in the comparable periods for the previous four presidential election cycles combined, according to the Tyndall Report.

  Presidential politics was so far off the radar in January and February 1991 that the three newscasts together spent less than a minute on the upcoming campaign.

  (And no, acknowledging that one might get sick of it doesn't mean we're going to stop covering it around here.)

• John Amaechi seems really cool.
• And be sure to check out the Restoring Our Constitution dkosopedia page. (MissLaura again)
• Across the pond, MI5 is training supermarket checkout staff to "detect terrorists".  For real.  (Plutonium Page)
• As for the War on Terror™ in the US, are we prepared to deal with a nuclear terrorism attack?  Nope.  (Plutonium Page)

Previous editions of Blogs Off the Beaten Path have addressed the question fairly broadly, asking people to suggest any small blogs they particularly value.  Today I want to get more specific, thinking about blogs focusing on elections and horserace stuff.  These blogs and resources help us understand how to assess candidates and campaigns, when to get excited and when to get worried, and what's going on behind the scenes of what we read in the traditional media.  

In this as in all areas of blogging there are a few big names, which you almost certainly know: MyDD, TPM Election Central, Political Wire.  But there's also a lot to be gotten from less-trafficked blogs, which is the point of this series.  Daily Kos readers may well be familiar with Swing State Project, since it's run by our own DavidNYC, but for those who aren't familiar and are interested in elections, it's a focused, empirically-oriented site that follows races at all levels.  SSP recently made the transition to Soapblox, so it now features diaries.

Close readers of the Daily Kos front page will by now be familiar with The Right's Field, since both Trapper John (who introduced me to it) and I have been linking it frequently.  This excellent blog is covering the Republican presidential field from a liberal perspective - it's really one-stop shopping if you want to find out what's going on with the other guys.

Senate 2008 Guru diaries at Daily Kos, but the blog is definitely worth reading if you're interested in, well, the picture for the Senate in 2008.  One particularly valuable resource at this site is a list of declared and potential candidates for seats that will be up for election that year.

Donkey Rising covers a range of elections, polling, and strategy issues.  If you're interested in state-level races, the National Conference of State Legislatures blog The Thicket is a nonpartisan look at races and legislation in the states.

If you're interested in elections - maybe you want to start blogging on a race or races yourself, or just know better how to evaluate them - there are also a few important resources you should be familiar with in doing your own research.  Pollster.com not only has polling data, it explains relevant polling issues and has some really nifty graphs.  These days when you see front page posts here on specific elections, if you look at the bottom you'll see a link to the Race Tracker wiki.  If you have information about a race, go register and add to the wiki.  If you're looking for information about one, go find it.  You should also be making yourself familiar with PoliticalMoneyLine, which has information on individual contributions, PAC activity, candidate fundraising, independent expenditures, and more.  For more in that vein, search at FEC Electronic Filings.

Whatever level of race you're interested in, there's lots of information to be had, and not just from a few blogs we've all heard of.  What smaller election-oriented blogs or election information sources am I missing that you want to spread the word about?

Via Think Progress, Brit Hume's deep thoughts on the Walter Reed scandal:

HUME: I think it tells you a lot about the effect of the last election and the political atmosphere in Washington. This is an administration which is known or had been known for sticking by people even when they were embattled. The idea that conditions at Walter Reed hospital, a hospital that is on its way out of business, had deteriorated, that’s probably one of the reasons they wanted to put it out of business. This is unfortunate. It looks terrible, which is the problem. The problem is that it looks as if this administration, which has sent troops into harm’s way, is now neglecting them when they’re injured and need care and help. But make no mistake about it, this was a — there was a potential political firestorm on Capitol Hill began to brew about this. The administration did what it did to try to get it over with, and it may well have succeeded.

Just another shining example of a Republican supporting the troops.  

And so it begins.  After giving Muqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi Army plenty of advance notice, the long anticipated and long feared security sweep of Sadr City has begun:

Hundreds of U.S. soldiers entered the Shiite stronghold of Sadr City on Sunday in the first major push into the area since an American-led security sweep began last month around Baghdad.  [...]

The move into Sadr City came following negotiations with political leaders in the neighborhood.

And while we can only hope that all goes well for both our own soldiers and for the people living there, one has to wonder if anyone will ask how this report squares with what the administration said when the new way forward, a.k.a., the escalation, was announced:

Well, the Iraqis are going to be in the lead here, and the United States in support roles...As the senior administration official said, of particular interest for the Iraqis is taking the lead in places like Sadr City.  [...]

He has said that the commander will be free to go after those who act outside the law wherever they are in Baghdad. Maliki has made that very clear. That would include Sadr City.

So except for U.S. forces being in the lead and the necessity of negotiating before going in, everything is happening just like Bush promised.

Inside The Fold: The Full Sunday Lineup

In The Comment Section:

(Video) Novak Freaks OUT

(Video) Sy Hersh and CIA: Afghanistan On The Brink Of Failure.

(Video) Sunday Romance - The Heat Of A Chemical Reaction

(Video) Jack Cafferty – "McCain Is Pathetic"

Raise your glass in toast – Arthur, thank you for your service.  CHEERS!  

After missing Ann Coulter's vile remarks in his first story on the CPAC conference, Adam Nagourney follows up with responses from three Republican presidential candidates.

Of the major Republican candidates, only Mr. McCain did not attend, but he denounced her remarks on Saturday morning. "The comments were wildly inappropriate," said his spokesman, Brian Jones.

Mr. Giuliani said, "The comments were completely inappropriate and there should be no place for such name-calling in political debate."

McCain and Giuliani came in fifth and second, respectively, in the CPAC straw poll.  In something of a surprise, Mitt Romney made inroads with conservatives who had been inclined to doubt what the AP refers to as "his record of inconsistency on some social issues," and won the straw poll.  

One of the conservatives whose support Romney drew, of course, was Ann Coulter.  The two spent some quality time together before she went onstage to call John Edwards a "faggot."

(Photo by Lauren V. Burke, WDCPIX.com)

Asked by Nagourney about Coulter's remarks,

Kevin Madden, a spokesman for Mr. Romney, said: "It was an offensive remark. Governor Romney believes all people should be treated with dignity and respect."

Can we therefore expect him to refuse to be further associated with someone like Ann Coulter, whose entire career as a prominent conservative is based on the notion that people who disagree with her should be treated with contempt, disrespect, and vituperation?

I'll be looking for him to refuse her support of his candidacy just any minute now.

Diaries up for rescue tonight:

• gmoke's Conservatives Talk Energy brings a first-hand report from CPAC on the organization's panel that discussed energy.
• Mark H's Marine Life Series: Fins 101 discusses the purpose and design of various kinds of fins.
• james richardson's Maybe it is a War after all postulates that the religious right's insistence that there's a war on Christianity may in fact be correct - only they declared it and they are waging it.
• Captain Future's Apollo, blue-green alliance and hope for the future reports on the Apollo summit that focused on energy, which brought promising plans for alliances with states that not only will help clean up the environment but will also stimulate local economies if implemented.
• badger's Fools to do your dirty work looks at the series, Dirty Work, which examines workers and the working conditions associated with a lot of manual labor in this country.
• Two solid round-ups on offer tonight thehim's Drug War Roundup - The State Department, The Senlis Council, and the War in Afghanistan and Frederick Clarkson's Rescued! Posts on the Religious Right from All Over.
• macdust's War does not boil is an eloquent essay that speaks down-home truths about the fecklessness of Bush's strategy and assumptions.
• mkfox's Forgotten Founding Fathers: Tadeusz Kosciuszko looks at the revolutionary war hero who was an engineer, responsible for fortifying Philadelphia from attack.
• Michael Connery's Youth Train(ing) announces an intriguing training program aimed at long-term building youth activism infrastructure.
• webranding's Walter Reed Mess: We Ain't Talking Rocket Science Here offers the most common sense approach to part of the Walter Reed debacle seen yet.
• vpltz's GOP Leadership In Texas Did Nothing When Notified About Sex Scandals At Youth Prisons reviews the timeline in a case where the Texas Youth Commission has been allowed to operate despite a report pointing to molestation of its clients - and Gov. Rick Perry has known about it since November and has refused to take action.
• vassmer's Use Vegetable Oil for Your Car? PAY UP OR ELSE! follows the trials and tribulations of a Illinois resident ingenious enough to use vegetable oil to power his car - who then gets hit with a tax bill by the state, which he fights.

gloriana brings Top Comments of the Day.

Add your favorites from the past 24 hours and use as an open thread.

Alberto Gonzales just has too much on his plate to bother with responding to a Democratic Congress, according to Novak:

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has indicated he is too busy to answer letters from Democratic congressional leaders about his firing seven U.S. attorneys involved in probes of public corruption, though a lower-level Justice Department official rejected their proposals.

Rep. Rahm Emanuel, House Democratic Caucus chairman, had written Gonzales two letters suggesting that he name Carol Lam, fired as U.S. attorney in San Diego, as an outside counsel to continue her pursuit of the Duke Cunningham case. Asked by Melissa Charbonneau of the Christian Broadcasting Network about this column’s report that Gonzales did not respond, Gonzales said: "I think that the American people lose if I spend all my time worrying about congressional requests for information, if I spend all my time responding to subpoenas."

That's a novel approach to government. Personally, I think the American people lose if they have an Attorney General who believes himself to be above the law. That's just the kind of attitude than can get an Attorney General impeached.

• James L. at Swing State Project suggests that it may be possible to pick up a Senate seat and a House seat in Virginia in 2008.
• In a bit of an upset over Giuliani, McCain narrowly won the South Carolina straw poll.
• National Journal has the 2006 vote ratings showing how liberal or conservative the voting records of all members of Congress are.  You can search for your own members' records, or those of presidential candidates.  (Some information is subscriber-only, but lots is available to everyone.)
• The New York Times has three important stories on global warming: Warm Winters Upset Rhythms of Maple Sugar shows a very specific effect of global warming, U.S. Predicting Steady Increase for Emissions has some broad predictions, and Evangelical's Focus on Climate Draws Fire of Christian Right looks at the continuing evangelical battles over whether global warming is a significant religious issue.

Race tracker wiki: VA-Sen

There are a handful of Democratic (and formerly-Democratic) politicians that many among the netroots would like to see, let us say, "brought home" to the real Democratic Party, if not replaced outright through the primary election process.

Joe Lieberman, of course, was replaced by Connecticut Democrats, only to be returned to office by Connecticut Republicans. And in the coming election cycle, California Congresswoman Ellen Tauscher has attracted the eyes of Democrats who actually like Democratic policies and wonder why her 58%-for-Kerry district doesn't deserve some more.

But Virginia political blog Not Larry Sabato brings you an extraordinary opportunity to effect the same kind of change this year, and to do it on the state level:

It's been less than a year since Harris Miller convinced a group of African American elected officials to launch the most personal, egregious and misleading attack that I can remember in a Virginia Democratic Primary.  You'll remember that normally respectable elected officials like Henry Marsh participated in this attack with quotes like this:  "I cannot accept Jim Webb's views and statements on affirmative action, and when these views become widely known, not only in the African-American community but among Democrats in general, I think his candidacy will have rough going gaining support among the rank and file. And I can tell you that without that support, he will have no chance against George Allen come November."

Even a year later it still stings.  What was even worse was how well it worked.  Miller carried over 80% of the vote in some African American precincts as he successfully labeled Webb an outright racist.

Well, we know how that one turned out.

Now, here's the good news:

But there was one elected official who was willing to stand up and say this attack was wrong.

There was one leader in the African American community who put their reputation on the line to ensure this attack would not stick.

That  one person is probably the reason the Democrats control the United States Senate today.

It was Delegate Donald McEachin.

Good on you, Mr. McEachin. You have news for us?

Now he is preparing the challenge to Senator Benny Lambert in a Democratic primary.

Challenging who?

The same Lambert who campaigned with George Allen and George W. Bush will now want to be re-elected to the Virginia State Senate for another four years in the Democratic Caucus.

The same Benny Lambert who allowed his name to be used to refute charges of Allen using the n-word, Allen stuffing a dear's [sic] head in a black family's mailbox, Allen painting racist graffiti on his high school, and Allen using a racial slur during a campaign rally this year.  No matter what the charge was against Allen, he always had the same response.  "I have been endorsed by State Senator Benny Lambert".  Unbelievable.

I think you know what to do.

And if you don't, go read Not Larry Sabato and find out.

With the Conservative Political Action Committee gathering winding down this weekend, you might think that calling John Edwards a 'faggot' would be the signature event of the conference.  But while that clip will probably result mostly in more undeserved attention for the right's favorite harridan, there's another message from this week's events that is interesting for what it has to say about how these people view themselves.  And where better to go for that view than the Fox News of papers, the Washington Times.  After noting the ability of Giuliani to obscure his feelings over all the things that conservatives have been decrying for the last decade (unlike Santa's pal, this Rudolph spreads fog), Rev. Moon's paper notes the one thing that really brought the crowd down.

 In interviews afterward, some attendees said Mr. Giuliani lost momentum when he heaped lavish praise on Abraham Lincoln.

That's right.  Conservatives can put up with differences on abortion, gay rights, and whether or not its okay for your mistress to live at the White House.  What they can't stand is talking about Abraham Lincoln.  What's bugging them?  

While many conservatives regard the Civil War president as the spiritual founder of the Republican Party, others deeply resent him as a man who ruthlessly suspended constitutional rights and freedoms in order to militarily challenge the South's belief in its right to secede.

A note to the constitutional scholars on the right.  If it's personal rights you're worried about, the constitution specifically allows suspension of habeus corpus in cases of rebellion or invasion.  But of course, that can't be what's bothering conservatives, or they wouldn't be so eager to support Bush's usurpation of those rights without justification.  It's the last part of the quote that's at the heart of the matter: conservatives are still not over the Civil War.  Excuse me, the War of Northern Aggression.

When the one thing you can say at a conservative gathering that causes you to lose support is praise for Abraham Lincoln, you know the conservatives aren't just busy working themselves out of the political mainstream, they're breaking all ties with the Republicans.  And they're not shy about telling them so.  

 "Rudy thought he was addressing a Republican audience," said Mike Long, chairman of the New York State Conservative Party. "Mitt understood this is an audience of people who are conservatives first."

So maybe Mitt can be the candidate of the Conservative Party once someone else locks up that position with the Republicans.