Meanwhile

I'm as guilty as anyone of election obsession getting in the way of everything else going on. And there's actually a touch of good news, if it holds -- Democrats in Congress showing some cajones.

The Cheney Administration pushed through a bill last summer they so wryly called the "Protect America Act". It was his way of keeping his FISA crimes from being recognized as such, with an expiration date he surely expected to be re-upped. After all, every single time the Dems have tried to stand up to him, he's stamped his foot and they've turned tail, giving him everything he wants.

Not this time:

What happened? The administration did everything right. The invocation of "countless American lives" hanging in the balance, the specter of terrorists delightedly chatting away undetected, the urgency emphasized by a threat to delay a long-scheduled presidential trip to Africa in order to secure the nation against attack.

That's right, the Protect America Act, the surveillance bill the administration pushed through Congress last August in a brilliantly executed squeeze play, will expire at midnight. The House should have already folded by now and simply passed the Senate's surveillance bill, complete with retroactive immunity for the telecoms. But the Dems haven't; they're sticking to the bill they passed months ago. What gives?

Nice way to end the week, after the Senate folded earlier on telecom immunity. (Although Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) made a credible defense for not punishing the telecoms, as long as you punish the government figures who strongarmed them.) Cry-baby Republicans walked out of the chamber...only there was no ball they could take home with them.

But there's even more fun in the new world. Bush tool Harriet Miers and Cheney tool John Bolton have been cited by the House of Representatives for Contempt of Congress. They earned it for their refusal to appear and spill the beans on the Cheney-Bush mob:

...recommending that the House of Representatives find Harriet Miers, former White House Counsel, and Joshua Bolten, the White House Chief of Staff, in contempt of Congress for refusal to comply with subpoenas issued by the Judiciary Committee. These subpoenas were issued as part of the Committee’s investigation into the firings of a number of United States Attorneys and matters concerning the politicization of the Justice Department. This resolution also provides for...authorizing the Committee on the Judiciary to initiate or intervene in judicial proceedings to enforce certain subpoenas.

Don't ask me what happens next, but it's about time. In fact, it looks like Colbert legend Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL) is aiming for bigger game: