With all the speculation and contention about the three indictments Travis County Prosecutor Ronnie Earle has secured against Tom DeLay, it's easy to forget one point: the Earle investigation was supposed to be the one DeLay squeaked by on, the lesser of the two ethical-legal sandtraps on his politico-personal horizon.

Whatever the disposition of the Texas indictments, most Republicans will now tell you, privately, that they don't expect DeLay ever to recover the Majority Leader's office. But even if he manages that highly improbable early knock-out blow in Texas, he's still got the Abramoff case waiting.

The news out of the UK this week -- that DOJ officials asked their counterparts in England and Scotland to do follow up interviews about DeLay's activities on his Abramoff trips -- is another sign that he's at the center of the Abramoff investigation. That's where his real problems have always been.