From CNN:

Former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby has been found guilty on four of five counts in his perjury and obstruction of justice trial.

Libby was convicted of:

1. obstruction of justice when he intentionally deceived a grand jury investigating the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame;

2. making a false statement by intentionally lying to FBI agents about a conversation with NBC newsman Tim Russert;

3. perjury when he lied in court about his conversation with Russert;

4. a second count of perjury when he lied in court about conversations with other reporters.

5. Jurors cleared him of a second count of making a false statement relating to a conversation he had with Matt Cooper of Time magazine.

You can check out complete coverage of the trial and the verdict at Firedoglake. In case you haven’t been following their coverage – FireDogLake has been doing extensive live blogging from inside the courtroom. They were actually given press credentials and have done some groundbreaking work both during the lead-up to the trial and during the actual criminal trial proceedings. They have taken blogging to the next level! Nice work!

From The Courier-Journal in good ol’ Kentucky:

Cash Over Conscience

In bringing George W. Bush to Kentucky for a fund-raiser, Sen. Mitch McConnell sets the terms for his own re-election campaign in 2008.

He says to Kentucky voters, “I am who I am, whether you like it or not.”

And who is that? Not just a Republican leader dutifully standing with his party’s president, but an embracing partisan ally of Mr. Bush, willing to accept, excuse or deny all of this administration’s substantial failings in order to trade on its fealty to the moneyed interests and swell his own re-election campaign stash.

Since Mr. McConnell’s political career has been based on the primacy of money, and the desires of those who give it, this makes a certain kind of sense.

He long ago became one of the legendary money grubbers in modern American politics, in order to buy TV time for commercials that demean, disgrace and ultimately defeat his opponents.

So raising campaign cash this year, arm-in-arm with a discredited president who has, in Sen. John McCain’s words, wasted American lives in a bungled Iraq war, is no problem for our senior senator. He spells it P-O-L-I-T-I-C-$.

Read the rest here.

“I think that Donald Rumsfeld will go down in history as one of the worst secretaries of defense in history.”

– Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), quoted by the Associated Press.

Goodbye for now, sweet prince.

Jack Abramoff corrupted our political system. He owes every single American an apology. Now, he’ll have plenty of time to think about his actions when he’s sitting in a jail cell for the next six years. He deserved more, but we’ll take what we can get.

Abramoff reports to prison today.

Jack Abramoff, the lobbyist known for lavishing politicians with football tickets or whisking them away on exotic golf junkets, will start life Wednesday with a new identity: federal inmate No. 27593-112.

Abramoff is to report to federal prison to begin serving a nearly six-year prison sentence for a fraudulent deal to buy a fleet of casino ships in Florida. He also is awaiting sentencing for corrupting government officials and their staff members.

If it were up to the Justice Department, Abramoff wouldn’t be heading to prison — at least not yet. He could hold the key to a sweeping corruption case involving Congress, members of the Bush administration and their aides — and prosecutors said putting their star witness behind bars would impede the investigation.

But a Miami federal judge refused to delay the sentence, meaning Abramoff’s cooperation will have to continue from prison. Abramoff’s lawyers had no comment.

Abramoff was originally assigned to a federal prison in Pennsylvania about four hours away from Washington. Prosecutors wanted him assigned to a prison in Cumberland, Maryland, about two hours away.

The Justice Department said the issue has been resolved and, though the Bureau of Prisons will not comment on where Abramoff will report, prison officials began making preparations for a crush of reporters outside the Cumberland prison.

Abramoff enjoyed access and influence across Capitol Hill, from his close ties to congressmen, to his hundreds of contacts with White House officials. He kept his powerful friends flush with campaign cash, gifts and trips such as a $92,000 chartered jet to Scotland for a golf outing with Rep. Bob Ney, Bush administration official David Safavian and congressional aides.

At the RNC.

The Washington Post is reporting that Melhman is stepping aside and that this move was planned regardless of how things went in the mid-term elections. In case you haven’t been following, the Republicans were thumped.

From the WaPo:

Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman, who guided President Bush’s reelection campaign to victory in 2004 and saw his party suffer the loss of the House and Senate on Tuesday, will not seek a second term as party leader, informed sources said last night.

Mehlman is leaving his position voluntarily and has not come under any pressure from the White House or state party leaders to vacate his position as a result of Tuesday’s elections. According to a Republican strategist familiar with developments at the RNC, Mehlman told the White House in August that he would leave after the elections.

Mehlman met with reporters yesterday to review the midterm elections at a lunch sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor and was asked whether he planned to stay on as party chairman. He declined to answer directly but said, “I will announce soon what my plan is in the future.”

It is being reported by the Washington Times that Lt. Governor of Maryland, Michael Steele, has been offered the job. Steele was recently thumped by Senator-elect Ben Cardin (D-MD) and to the best of my knowledge, Steele has yet to officially concede that race.

This has nothing to do with Bill Maher officially “outting” Mr. Melhman on CNN, right?

There they go again- Republicans overtly manipulating international events to impact their chances in the mid-term elections.

We need to call them on their crap and make sure that Americans know that no verdict can change the fact that George W. Bush and this Republican Congress have failed to lead and therefore need to go.

All Americans must work to make Bush and his political operatives know that we’re calling them on this and we are watching.

From the WaPo:

A court trying Saddam Hussein for killing Shi’ites in the 1980s could deliver its verdict on November 5, officials said.

The U.S.-backed court was due to announce on Monday a final date for verdicts on the ousted Iraqi leader and seven of his former top lieutenants for crimes against humanity, a charge which carries a maximum penalty of death by hanging.

However, the court said it needed more time to review testimony. Court spokesman Raed Juhi said the Iraqi High Tribunal would reconvene on November 5 although it was not clear if a verdict would be announced then.

Let’s see how this plays out…

Great ad from the DSCC. I’m not certain where it’s running- if anyone has seen it, drop me a line.

From AmericaBLOG:

Note to the Hastert advance team: Maybe the graveyard background wasn’t the best idea… I’m just sayin’…

From AmericaBLOG:

AP: Former chief of staff to Tom Reynolds and Mark Foley says he warned Hastert’s office two years ago about Foley…

A senior congressional aide said Wednesday that he alerted House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s office two years ago about worrisome conduct by former Rep. Mark Foley with teenage pages.

Kirk Fordham told The Associated Press that when he was told about Foley’s inappropriate behavior toward pages, he had “more than one conversation with senior staff at the highest level of the House of Representatives asking them to intervene.”

The conversations took place long before the e-mail scandal broke, Fordham said, and at least a year earlier than members of the House GOP leadership have acknowledged.

Leave your predictions in the comment box. I say Hastert has 24 hours left.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) is in big trouble. He’s desperately back pedaling, trying to find excuses, but at the end of the day, Hastert cares more about politics than he does this great nation.

Hastert is part of a major Congressional cover up – an organized campaign to protect a known pedophile in the GOP ranks.

A message to Dennis Hastert: resign your post, Mr. Speaker. You are the leader of a party that has lost touch with American values and you must go.

Even the uber-conservative Washington Times agrees.

Time to go, Denny. Sorry, but you brought it on yourself.