"Greed is one thing."

"But this guy took it to a different level."

I know, I know ... you're thinking I'm talking about Bob Menendez. Or maybe Jack Murtha.

Not this time. The title above and the lead sentence are actually quotes from this morning's New York Times expose of just how $90,000 in cash bricks ended up in the freezer of Louisiana's Democratic Congressman, William Jefferson.

You can read it here.

Another Torricelli? Two Days and Counting. Or ... 14?

Two days from today, we will be 51 days away from the November election.

On Monday, September 18, under New Jersey statute, the deadline will arrive -- and pass -- for Democrats to replace Senator Bob Menendez on the ballot with a new candidate.

Of course, given our experience in 2002, and the precedent set in the case of Torricelli v. Everyone, no one I know of expects that if New Jersey Democrats let that deadline slip and then decide, oh, say, ten days from today to replace Menendez, that the New Jersey Supreme Court will NOT allow the switch; having sanctioned the law-breaking once before, it's hard to come back and say, "Oh, silly us! We were wrong four years ago, but we'll get it right this time!"

The way I see it, New Jersey's Democrats have until at least September 30 (12 days beyond the deadline) to announce a decision to replace Menendez.

September 30, after all, was the day Bob Torricelli made his withdrawal announcement four years ago.

"Does His Wife Know?"

Read this first.

Yes, I actually got the credit for the line. But, as often happens in a good campaign staffed by high-quality professionals, it wasn't mine originally.

Just in case this one turns out not so well, though, I'm going to allow him to keep his anonymity, and I'll take the heat if it gets turned up.

Not that anyone who knows the folks in my office would have much trouble figuring it out, now that I've acknowledged I wasn't the original author of the line. But he can pretend to be anonmyous anyway.

Click here. Please.

Seriously. I mean it. Pay attention, and do what the nice lady says.

The New Jersey Switcheroo, or How To Pull a Torricelli

It just might be happening again in New Jersey.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water ... New Jersey's Democrats may be up to it again.

At least no one can blame me this time.

(You know what I like best about the Wall Street Journal editorial linked above? The pixilated image of Bob Menendez. It makes him look fat. Bwahahahahahahaha.)

My Killer App

There's a blog that's running a contest right now to find the next Killer App for Macs: My Dream App.

Here's my entry:

I am an iPod/iTunes fanatic: How Steven Jobs Got Me. Sorry, Marty.

I have roughly 2,000 CDs loaded onto my latest iPod.

In MAC OS X Panther, iTunes allowed me to look at my CD album art in both iTunes and on my iPod. It was a nice feature, but nothing too splashy.

And now, with MAC OS X Tiger, I get an added bonus: iTunes album art can be displayed on my computer as a screen saver. Yep, I can now see all the CDs I've got in my iTunes library, displayed as album covers. Five rows from top to bottom, seven columns from left to right, I get a lovely mosaic of squares on my computer screen when it goes to sleep. And every few seconds, one of the squares swivels (like the computer has its own little invisible Vanna White inside) to change and display a new album cover.

Nothing more than a momentary diversion, granted, but one that grabs me every time -- because, with more than 2000 "albums" to look at, I get to see a lot of CDs that I haven't played in quite a while. With 15,000 songs on my iPod, there's a LOT of music that I haven't played recently.

So here’s the Killer App:

Create an option on the “Album Art” screensaver function so that when I come back from lunch and I see all those album covers on my screen, and I see a CD I haven’t played in quite some time, I can move my mouse to point the cursor at a particular CD, click on it, and have iTunes open and begin playing that CD.

How cool would THAT be?

All it would take is a software fix that would start a three- or five-second delay from the moment I moved the mouse, and another one that would recognize the particular file folder associated with the album art I choose to point the cursor to before clicking.

The result? I’d get to listen to a much wider variety of music, on a far more regular basis, without having to deliberately take the time to search through my iTunes library. And isn’t making our lives easier what Apple and Macs and iTunes are all about?

Here's the rotten part:

The contest's submissions window was over long before I wrote this post. That's the price I pay for doing what I do for a living -- as much as I really would have liked to submit this idea, I just haven't had time to sit and do anything that wasn't job-related for way too long. As it was, I wrote this little post at about 3 AM this morning. And I haven't even had time today to actually publish it.

C'est la vie.

William Jefferson, Back in the Spotlight

Hmm. The businessman accused of bribing Democratic Congressman William Jefferson of Louisiana was just convicted ... of bribing Congressman William Jefferson.

Which makes it kind of hard for Jefferson to argue that he was not bribed -- if there's a briber, there must be a bribee, after all.

Businessman Gets 7 Years for Bribing Legislator.

Dean Broder speaks: The Media Owes Karl Rove an Apology.

Otherwise entitled, "Ray Donovan Said It Best: 'Where do I go to get my reputation back?'"

Read on: One Leak and a Flood of Silliness.

At Long Last, the CIA Leak Investigation Plames Out

It's not often that the Washington Post eats its words. But this morning, in a rather remarkable document, the editorial board of my hometown newspaper does just that, with respect to the nearly three-year-old investigation of who broke Valerie Plame's cover.

Click here to read "End of an Affair."