What White House Staffers Make

* Staci A. Wheeler, the White House's director of fact checking, is -- at $60,000 -- either being paid way too little or way too much, depending on how you want to look at it.

* And yes, the invisible Karl Zinsmeister is still on the books as Bush's chief domestic policy adviser.

Hagin's Last Day

Mark Knoller reports for CBS News on yesterday's departure of the longtime deputy chief of staff for operations: "Hagin has served in the job from day one of the Bush Administration. There's no staffer who's been in the same senior level post longer than him. And there's no one at the White House whose been more intimately engaged in the moment-to-moment operations of the Executive Office of the President.

"He was the one who modernized the communications system at the White House. He brought 21st century technology to the Situation Room (see above image) and renovated the worn and tattered Press Briefing Room. . . .

"In his West Wing office around the corner and down the hall from the Oval Office, [see my now entirely out of date West Wing floor plan] Hagin was packing mementoes of his White House years. On the wall was a painting of Pres. Bush's landing aboard the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln on May 1, 2003.

"It was Joe Hagin's idea that Mr. Bush -- a one-time pilot in the Texas Air National Guard -- fly to the carrier 'Top Gun'-style aboard a Navy S-3B Viking warplane.

"The flight went fine but he now confides 'it was a little nerve-racking on the landing.' It seems the plane came close to missing all of the four cables meant to catch the plane's tailhook. It snagged the last one by inches. . . .

"It was on the deck of the Lincoln that President Bush delivered that now controversial Address to the Nation in which he announced -- prematurely it turned out - that 'major combat operations' in Iraq had come to an end. On display in the background was a banner proclaiming 'Mission Accomplished' -- which some took as a declaration that the war in Iraq was over.

"Hagin says it was referring to the end of the Lincoln's mission overseas -- not to the war. And to this day, Hagin remains 'surprised' by the criticism of the flight and the banner -- but still regards Mr. Bush's visit to the ship as 'historic.'"

Bush and the GOP

David M. Herszenhorn writes in the New York Times: "The House approved far-reaching government assistance on Wednesday for the nation's housing market, including broad authority for the Treasury Department to protect the nation's two largest mortgage finance companies from collapse. . . .

"The White House, citing an urgent need to restore market confidence in the two mortgage giants, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, said President Bush would sign the measure despite his opposition to the inclusion of nearly $4 billion in grants for local governments to buy and refurbish foreclosed properties. . . .

"The House approved the bill 272 to 152, with just 45 Republicans joining 227 Democrats voting in favor.