House Ethics Committee Holds a News Conference  —  SPEAKER: U.S. REPRESENTATIVE RICHARD "DOC" HASTINGS (R-WA),  —  HOUSE COMMITTEE ON STANDARDS OF OFFICIAL CONDUCT  —  U.S. REPRESENTATIVE HOWARD L. BERMAN (D-CA),  —  HOUSE COMMITTEE ON STANDARDS OF OFFICIAL CONDUCT  —  U.S. REPRESENTATIVE JUDY BIGGERT (R-IL)

Monologues dialogues.  —  David Brooks's column yesterday began this way (TimesSelect link): … Today, we get the letters to the editor.  Gotta defend the iconic monologues, you know.  The first letter says Brooks "misses a key point, and that is power":

White House aide to Rove resigns  —  WASHINGTON - A key aide to presidential political strategist Karl Rove resigned Friday after a congressional report listed hundreds of contacts between disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff and the White House.  —  Susan Ralston, special assistant to President Bush …

Kean calls for Hastert's resignation  —  WASHINGTON (AP) — New Jersey Republican Senate candidate Tom Kean Jr. on Friday called for House Speaker Dennis Hastert to resign over the congressional page cybersex scandal, making him the first major candidate in his party to do so.

Pelosi says she would drain GOP 'swamp'  —  WASHINGTON - Franklin Roosevelt had his first hundred days.  —  House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi is thinking 100 hours, time enough, she says, to begin to "drain the swamp" after more than a decade of Republican rule.

THE PARTISAN STRAITJACKET....David Ignatius: … That's not going to go down well in the blogosphere.  And yet, I don't think this is the sort of instinctive centrism that marks, say, David Broder.  It's more about temperament.  —  And tactics.  If Democrats win in November …

Rice, in Baghdad, Insists That Iraqis Are 'Making Progress'  —  Wearing a helmet and a flak jacket and flanked by machine-gun-toting bodyguards to defend against insurgents, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice came here Thursday, insisting that there were new signs of progress in Iraq …

MAKE SCHOOLS SAFE FOR KIDS, NOT CRIMINALS: In a new podcast for the Independence Institute's iVoices.org, I offer a shorter version of an argument I made in detail in a cover story of The Weekly Standard: the only realistic gun control policy which would stop school shootings …

In Border Fence's Path, Congressional Roadblocks  —  No sooner did Congress authorize construction of a 700-mile fence on the U.S.-Mexico border last week than lawmakers rushed to approve separate legislation that ensures it will never be built, at least not as advertised, according to Republican lawmakers and immigration experts.

Angels and Intelligence Estimates  —  Lost between the Foley tsunami and the Woodward hurricane is the storm that began the great Republican collapse of 2006.  It was only a few weeks ago that the Republicans were clawing their way back to contention for the November elections …

Can Democrats and Libertarians Find Common Ground?  —  I pretty much hate rules and restrictions on what I can do.  Because of that, there is no sense in which I would describe myself as someone who likes government intervention.  But unlike many libertarians, taxation and the size of government are not my main concern.

Investigation to Look at Facebook  —  University Says Social Networking Site 'Not Exempt'  —  Columbia will review information and images posted on students' Facebook profiles as part of its investigation into Wednesday night's Minutemen brawl, a University spokesman confirmed Thursday evening.

Oops, I Thought Matt Drudge Was the "Walter Cronkite of His Era"  —  Famous for doing the GOP's bidding by launching smear offensives against Democrats (see the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth), Matt Drudge this week became completely unglued over the widening Mark Foley scandal …

Job Growth Slows, Unemployment Rate Dips  —  Bush to Speak About Jobs and the Economy  —  The U.S. economy created far fewer jobs in September than anticipated, but revised job figures for previous months showed a surprisingly substantial uptick over what was previously reported.

Bush cites authority to bypass FEMA law  —  Signing statement is employed again  —  WASHINGTON — President Bush this week asserted that he has the executive authority to disobey a new law in which Congress has set minimum qualifications for future heads of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Conspiracy Theories Abound as Oil Prices Fluctuate  —  In mid-May with gasoline prices at $2.95 a gallon and rising, 15 percent of Americans listed high fuel prices as their top concern, outstripping terrorism.  And much of the public seemed ready to vent its wrath on President Bush and the Republican-led Congress.

RACE CLASHES HIT WINDSOR  —  Extra police are being drafted into the Windsor area today after three nights of violent clashes between white and Asian youths.  —  Gangs have fought battles in the streets using baseball bats and pitchforks.  A Muslim-run dairy which wants to build a mosque was petrol bombed.