What White House Staffers Make

"Mukasey said because Cheney is discussing discussions the President had with his closest advisers, executive privilege applies. But when pressed, Mukasey admitted that 'in the abstract' the Vice President usually isn't shielded by executive privilege when it comes to a transcribed FBI interview. So why did the President assert executive privilege for this interview? Wexler is the first person to ask. Mukasey responds by dodging the question. Instead, he starts talking about a media shield law."

Iraq Watch

Amit R. Paley writes in The Washington Post: "President Jalal Talabani said Wednesday that he would veto a measure governing provincial elections scheduled for this year, making it all but certain that the balloting will be delayed until 2009.

"The announcement was a setback for both the Bush administration and the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, which hailed a preliminary election law passed earlier this year as evidence of political progress in Iraq. The ongoing disagreements over the polling have instead highlighted the sectarian fissures that still divide the country."

Indian Nuke Watch

Sue Pleming writes for Reuters: "U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Thursday the Bush administration would push the U.S. Congress hard to agree to a civilian nuclear deal with India before President George W. Bush leaves office.

"India said this week it would go ahead with its nuclear deal with the United States after the government survived a parliamentary vote of confidence. The pact would give India access to nuclear fuel and technology."

The agreement is a sweetheart deal for India. See my March 2006 column, Did Bush Blink?. Bush directed his negotiators to give in to India's demands that it be allowed to produce unlimited quantities of fissile material and amass as many nuclear weapons as it wants. Critics say the agreement would reward India for its failure to comply with the Non-Proliferation Treaty and could lead to a regional nuclear arms race.

White House Crime Watch

Emily Bazelon, Kara Hadge, Dahlia Lithwick, and Chris Wilson write for Slate about which Bush administration officials could be prosecuted in Nuremberg-style war-crime prosecutions.

"What kind of lawbreaking has happened on President Bush's watch, among his top and mid-level advisers? What hasn't? Who is implicated and who is not? Despite the lack of oral sex with an intern, the past seven years have yielded an embarrassment of riches when it comes to potentially prosecutable crimes. We have tried to sketch out a map of who did what and when, with links to the evidence that is public and notes about what we may learn from investigations that are still pending. . . .

"[A] truism of criminal prosecution is that it's easier to go after the coverup than the crime. For that reason, we think the likelihood that, say, Alberto Gonzales gets nicked for lying to Congress or that someone gets nailed for destroying the CIA tapes is higher than the chance that John Yoo ever goes to court for suggesting that an interrogation tactic is torture only if it causes pain on the level of organ failure. Or that David Addington or Gonzales--or Dick Cheney or President Bush--ever gets nailed for urging or accepting that advice. Whether that is fair or right or just is for you to judge."

Here's the annotated chart Slate put together, with a Venn diagram representing coercive interrogation, wiretapping, Justice Department hiring, Justice Department firing and CIA tape destruction. Interestingly, Gonzales is the only player who figures in all five alleged-crime categories.

In a blog post for NiemanWatchdog.org, where I am deputy editor, Saul Friedman calls for news organizations to assign a police reporter to the White House. "I wonder if it isn't time for the mainstream press to treat the president as it would any suspect of a crime, in this case, war crimes, which are punishable under American law. After all, we've seen endless stories about all sorts of crimes and suspects. The Washington Post, for example, just ran a multi-part series on the unsolved murder of congressional intern Chandra Levy and the possible suspects. The press still excels at police reporting, my first job in journalism."

Poll Watch

Mark Murray reports for NBC News on the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll: "[T]he Republican Party's brand is in tatters. President Bush's approval rating is at 30 percent, up two points from last month's poll. Also, for the 25th consecutive survey, more view the Republican Party negatively (48 percent) than positively (31 percent). By comparison, the Democratic Party has a 43-37 percent positive-negative rating."

More Popular on the Wall

Daniel Libit writes for Politico: "He's poison in the polls, despised by Democrats, radioactive even to some Republicans." And yet: "For many senators, a picture of themselves with the commander in chief is like a dark blue suit -- not exactly stylish, but always in style no matter the season. . . .

"More than a quarter of the public [Senate] waiting rooms, 27 in total, feature a picture of Bush. That's 22 Republicans, four Democrats and one independent. Thanks to some offices with several Bush photos, a total of 79 Bush images are on display."

Bush Library Watch

The Austin American-Statesman editorial board writes that "sitting presidents secretly raising money for their legacy libraries can be trading favors for sizable contributions. One solution is to prohibit presidents from soliciting money for their libraries while in office. Another would be to require public disclosure of contributors to presidential libraries, which are administered by the National Archives and Records Administration, a federal agency. . . .

"Of course, Bush could announce that all contributions to his library will be disclosed. He expects to raise $250 million for the building and another $250 million for administration and endowment.

"That would be the right thing to do. It would establish a new standard of openness for raising library funds and show that Bush cares about the reputation of these repositories of history. And it might take a bit of tarnish off Bush's controversial library. But don't look for something that out of character to happen anytime soon."

Cartoon Watch

Mike Luckovich and Jeff Danziger on Bush's binges; Chan Lowe and Paul Berge on time horizons; Steve Sack on White House pardons.