No Laughter Allowed?

But wait! John Dickerson dissents:

"I wanted to raise my hand and ask, 'Your Honor, may I approach the bench?'

"I was at the Scooter Libby trial to cover it, and all of a sudden, I found myself in the middle of the case. In his testimony today, former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer told the courtroom--which included me--that when I was a White House correspondent for Time magazine, he had told me that Joe Wilson's wife worked at the CIA.

He did? . . .

"I have a different memory. My recollection is that during a presidential trip to Africa in July 2003, Ari and another senior administration official had given me only hints. They told me to go inquire about who sent Wilson to Niger. As far as I can remember--and I am pretty sure I would remember it--neither of them ever told me that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA. In a piece I wrote about a year ago, I figured that the very reason I'd never been subpoenaed in the case or questioned by any lawyers was that I'd been given only vague guidance and not the good stuff.

"So, what to do now that I'd heard Ari's testimony? Should I stand? Should I shout a question at Ari? Should I walk from the press section into the witness box? Call a press conference? Get a lawyer?"

Or just blog it?

Finally, Bush is confronted on the "ic" factor--why did he refer to the "Democrat Party" in his State of the Union?

" 'That was an oversight,' Bush said in an interview Monday with National Public Radio. 'I'm not trying to needle . . . I didn't even know I did it.' "

Mitt Romney has been very, ah, creative in his fundraising, the Wall Street Journal says:

"Because he doesn't hold federal office, Mr. Romney became subject to the federal rules only after he set up a presidential exploratory committee earlier this month. Until then, his team took advantage of a little-noticed gap between federal and state law. While most states limit political donations, about a dozen don't. Mr. Romney's political team set up fund-raising committees in three of those: Michigan, Iowa and Alabama. During that time, his political action committees raised $7 million."

In the Iraq debate, I'm seeing more and more talk about how we didn't need to lose Vietnam, as in this piece by Fred Barnes: