So, how'd things turn out in the Ames Straw Poll? The final tally was delayed after a voting-machine error (insert sly joke here), but here are the results, by way of IowaPolitics.com:

1. Mitt Romney
2. Mike Huckabee
3. Sam Brownback
4. Tom Tancredo
5. Ron Paul
6. Tommy Thompson
7. Fred Thompson
8. Rudy Giuliani
9. Duncan Hunter
10. John McCain
11. John Cox

Marc Ambinder has more details on the final tallies.

Keep in mind, organizers hoped for 20,000 straw-poll participants today, and the total was just over 14,000. Eight years ago, nearly 24,000 Republicans took part in the event.

Some of this, it's fair to say, is the result of some top-tier candidates deciding not to participate in Ames, but it also speaks to the ongoing lack of enthusiasm for the GOP field of candidates. (When Obama polls better among Iowa Republicans than several Republican candidates, I think it's fair to say the field is struggling to inspire the GOP faithful.)

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) recently told Glenn Greenwald that the United States' legal system -- with its respect for the rule of law and citizens' civil liberties -- has been the envy of the world for years. But as we've departed from our principles, others are following suit.

"[T]here has been an erosion in the world with the rule of the law," Dodd said. "Having led the world in the rule of law in the post-World War II period, and having nations reluctantly moving in the direction we were moving in, and they now see the U.S. has retreated, and they are making a hasty retreat themselves."

Rick Perlstein pointed to Exhibit A.

Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe on Friday signed into law the controversial Interception of Communications Bill, which gives his government the authority to eavesdrop on phone and Internet communications and read physical mail. [...]

Secretary General Welshman Ncube of the MDC faction led by Arthur Mutambara called it a "final straw to the curtailment to the liberties of Zimbabweans.". [...]

But Communications Minister Christopher Mushowe said Zimbabwe is not unique in the world in passing such legislation, citing electronic eavesdropping programs in the United States.

Was Mugabe inspired by Bush? It's unlikely; Mugabe didn't need an extra motivation for a power-grab. But as Glenn noted today, "[T]he fact that such powers exist here does provide a potent refutation for those who want to suggest that Mugabe is doing anything extraordinarily tyrannical."

Given his track record, Alberto Gonzales probably isn't the best person to be giving anyone, better yet Iraqis, advice about the rule of law.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, under fire at home with calls for his resignation, is spending some time in Iraq.

The Justice Department said that Gonzales arrived in Baghdad on Saturday for his third trip to Iraq to meet with department officials who have been there to help fashion the country's legal system.

"I am pleased to see firsthand ... the progress that the men and women of the Justice Department have made to rebuild Iraq's legal system and law enforcement infrastructure," Gonzales said in a statement released by the department.

First, it's not at all clear why Gonzales is encouraged by the status of Iraq's legal system. Iraq is beset by what the AP charitably described as "sectarian lawlessness."

Second, I suppose there are less qualified officials in the Bush administration to oversee Iraq's drive to fashion a legal system, but no one comes to mind.

With McCain, Giuliani, and Fred Thompson sitting this one out, the results of Ames Straw Poll are fairly predictable -- Romney's going to come out on top. But there are still plenty of reasons to keep an eye on the results, and plenty of questions that will be answered once the votes are tallied.

* How much will Romney win by? -- Though Giuliani aides have been trying to raise expectations beyond reason (they've suggested Romney has to win by an 8 to 1 margin), Romney will realistically have to get more than 30% support to have a good day. (Bush won with 31% in 2000.) A big win will solidify Romney as the Iowa frontrunner. A narrow win will raise questions about his chances.

* Who'll come in second? -- With so many second- and third-tier candidates cluttering the Republican field, the race for second is fierce. Either Huckabee or Brownback will use a second-place finish to argue that they belong in the top tier (at least as much as McCain). Also keep an eye on Tancredo, this cycle's Alan Keyes.

* Is Brownback for real? -- The Kansas senator apparently has an impressive Iowa operation, including a fleet of buses to transport supporters. But as Chris Cillizza noted, "If he doesn't place second or -- maybe -- third, it's hard to see how Brownback justifies going on."

* Who'll drop out? -- "Those who fail miserably [in the Straw Poll] are out of the race," said Chuck Laudner, executive director of the Iowa Republican Party. "That's just the coldhearted truth of it all." Tommy Thompson has already suggested he'll likely withdraw unless he finishes in the top two, which is rather unlikely. Huckabee has also hinted he'll "reevaluate" if he fares poorly in Ames. Brownback, meanwhile, has said today is not a "make or break" event for him.

* Is Paul a player? -- Ron Paul has fared poorly in Iowa polls, but the Straw Poll is all about organization, and the Texas congressman has some loyal and active fans. If he manages a strong showing -- say, top three -- Paul will be hard to dismiss as a fringe candidate.

* What about the no-shows? -- As Eric Kleefeld and T. W. Farnam noted, if Giuliani, McCain, and/or Thompson actually generate some decent results without trying, there will be even more pressure on candidates who compete and come up short.

The voting is ongoing right now and will wrap up at 7 p.m. eastern. The results will be announced an hour later. Stay tuned.

Obama addresses question of whether he's "black enough" head on. That and other political news of the day in today's Election Central Saturday Roundup.

Wayne Barrett has done the political world a great service with a devastating piece in the Village Voice on Rudy Giuliani and the "five big lies" surrounding the former mayor's claim to fame: his performance on 9/11. The entire piece -- which, if read, should effectively end Giuliani's presidential ambitions -- is important, but there's one part of the story that's particularly worth highlighting.

It's Lie #3: Giuliani doesn't deserve the blame for putting the city's emergency-command center in the World Trade Center, an obvious, and once-attacked, terrorist target. The former mayor was warned, in writing, about the inherent flaws in the choosing the site, and was offered a better and more effective alternative, but Giuliani moved forward anyway. As Barrett explained, "The 1997 decision had dire consequences on 9/11, when the city had to mobilize a response without any operational center."

So, why is it, exactly, that Giuliani picked the WTC site? The mayor personally established a specific standard: he had to be able to walk to the command center from his office. ("I've never seen in my life 'walking distance' as some kind of a standard for crisis management," said Lou Anemone, the highest-ranking uniformed officer in the NYPD. "But you don't want to confuse Giuliani with the facts.")

There is, however, an explanation for the walking-distance standard.

The 7 WTC site was the brainchild of Bill Diamond, a prominent Manhattan Republican that Giuliani had installed at the city agency handling rentals. When Diamond held a similar post in the Reagan administration a few years earlier, his office had selected the same building to house nine federal agencies. Diamond's GOP-wired broker steered Hauer to the building, which was owned by a major Giuliani donor and fundraiser. When Hauer signed onto it, he was locked in by the limitations Giuliani had imposed on the search and the sites Diamond offered him. The mayor was so personally focused on the siting and construction of the bunker that the city administrator who oversaw it testified in a subsequent lawsuit that "very senior officials," specifically including Giuliani, "were involved," which he said was a major difference between this and other projects.

Giuliani's office had a humidor for cigars and mementos from City Hall, including a fire horn, police hats and fire hats, as well as monogrammed towels in his bathroom. His suite was bulletproofed and he visited it often, even on weekends, bringing his girlfriend Judi Nathan there long before the relationship surfaced. He had his own elevator.

For the city, this meant that on 9/11, the NYC make-shift command center didn't exist until seven hours after the attack. As for Giuliani's poor judgment, the most rational conclusion is that he put his center in the wrong place because he was creating a "convenient love nest."

Kevin Drum wonders how the GOP base is going to respond to news like this.

Right now, they're probably not aware of the whole story, and simply perceive Giuliani as someone who held some impressive press conferences on 9/11. But it's only a matter of time. Giuliani's decisions should be a national scandal that not only force him from the presidential race, but may even shame him permanently.

Inevitably, this is going to become a part of this campaign, and when it does, it's going to be ugly.

Last weekend, during a GOP debate in Iowa, George Stephanopoulos noted that Bush's alleged democracy-spreading foreign policy hasn't exactly worked out well: "There have been free elections in Gaza; they elected Hamas. There have been free elections in Lebanon; they empowered Hezbollah. There have been free elections in Iran; they elected President Ahmadinejad." Asked about the track record, former Gov. Mike Huckabee responded, "Sometimes when you get what you want, you don't want what you get."

With that background in mind, Hassan Fattah has a terrific report on how the U.S. government can promote elections, champion democracy, and stand behind like-minded international allies, but our support doesn't always translate well.

Lebanon's political spin masters have been trying in recent days to explain the results of last Sunday's pivotal by-election, which saw a relatively unknown candidate from the opposition narrowly beat a former president, Amin Gemayel.

There has been talk of the Christian vote and the Armenian vote, of history and betrayal, as each side sought to claim victory. There is one explanation, however, that has become common wisdom in the region: Mr. Gemayel's doom seems to have been sealed by his support from the Bush administration and the implied agendas behind its backing.

"It's the kiss of death," said Turki al-Rasheed, a Saudi reformer who watched last Sunday's elections closely. "The minute you are counted on or backed by the Americans, kiss it goodbye, you will never win."

The paradox of American policy in the Middle East -- promoting democracy on the assumption it will bring countries closer to the West -- is that almost everywhere there are free elections, the American-backed side tends to lose.

Throughout the post-WWII era, foreign leaders used to promote their bonds with the United States as a sign of strength and credibility. We were a beacon of hope that countries were anxious to be associated with. Not anymore.

In reality, Bush's democracy talk has always been more about rhetorical games than actual policy anyway, but so long as the administration continues to call for more elections, it can continue to expect discouraging results.

Digby added a compelling approach to what has to happen moving forward, starting in 2009.

Last week, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) may have inadvertently leaked classified information during a Fox News interview, disclosing an aspect of a FISA court's decision regarding warrantless wiretapping. On Thursday, Rep. Peter Hoekstra, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, may have unintentionally done the same thing.

ABC News' (and TPM alum) Justin Rood explains.

For the second time in as many weeks, a senior House Republican may have divulged classified information in the media.

In an opinion article published in the New York Post Thursday, Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., reported the top-secret budget for human spying had decreased -- the type of detail normally kept under wraps for national security reasons.

"The 2008 Intelligence Authorization bill cut human-intelligence programs," Hoekstra wrote in the piece, in which he also criticized "leaks to the news media."

Formerly the chairman of the intelligence committee, Hoekstra is now its highest ranking Republican. In its recent budget authorizations, that committee kept from public view all figures and most discussion of spending on such classified items as human spying. Hoekstra's apparent slip was first noted on the liberal Web site, Raw Story.

"If Mr. Hoekstra wants to break ranks and disclose that information, that's fine with me," said Steven Aftergood, a government secrecy expert who has long pushed to declassify overall spending on intelligence. "But it is the sort of thing he has harshly criticized in the past."

Given Hoekstra's hackish history, this week's alleged disclosure is par for the course. After all, Hoekstra has had a series of recent intelligence-related embarrassments.

* In November 2006, Hoekstra pushed the administration to publish online a vast archive of Iraqi documents captured during the war. The idea was to let far-right bloggers "prove" that Saddam had WMD, but Hoekstra's plan led to the accidental release of secret nuclear research, including a basic guide to building an atom bomb.

* In October 2006, Hoestra "stripped the credentials of a Democratic committee aide he believed may have leaked a then-classified document to The New York Times. A month later, he quietly reinstated the aide's access."

* In July 2006, Hoekstra called a humiliating press conference to announce, "We have found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq" -- despite failing to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

* In June 2006, Hoekstra and Rick Santorum wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed, alleging that some officials in the intelligence community are attempting to destroy the Bush administration -- and America itself.

Maybe House Republicans can find someone a little less reckless to serve as the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee?

The Philadelphia Daily News' Stu Bykofsky, one of the city's most widely-read columnists, caused a bit of a stir with his latest column, which posited a provocative idea: another 9/11-style attack to "help" America. As Bykofsky sees it, "we have forgotten who the enemy is," and the murder of thousands of Americans would help us get back on track.

America's fabric is pulling apart like a cheap sweater. What would sew us back together? Another 9/11 attack.

The Golden Gate Bridge. Mount Rushmore. Chicago's Wrigley Field. The Philadelphia subway system. The U.S. is a target-rich environment for al Qaeda. [...]

Is there any doubt they are planning to hit us again? If it is to be, then let it be. It will take another attack on the homeland to quell the chattering of chipmunks and to restore America's righteous rage and singular purpose to prevail.

Everything about this column seems misguided -- the diagnosis of what ails America, the description of the symptoms, the proposed cure. The surprising part of this, however, is that a variety of far-right media outlets seemed to embrace Bykofsky's message. ThinkProgress noted that Drudge seemed to think highly of the piece, conservative radio host Mike Gallagher invited Bykofsky on to his show, and Fox News' John Gibson went so far as to endorse Bykofsky's thesis on the air: "I think it's going to take a lot of dead people to wake America up."

For a column that pines for mass murder, this isn't the reaction I expected.

Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, confirmed by the Senate in June to serve as the president's war advisor (aka, the "war czar"), has kept a remarkably low profile. NSA Stephen Hadley told reporters a while back that Lute would be "up close to the president" to work "full time, 24/7" on implementing Bush's war policy, but that apparently includes practically disappearing from public view.

In fact, Lute has not been mentioned by Bush, Cheney, or any White House spokesperson, in any context, since he was confirmed. I was beginning to think we may want to put his face on milk-cartons.

Yesterday, Lute finally emerged -- and immediately sparked a controversy.

Frequent tours for U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan have stressed the all-volunteer force and made it worth considering a return to a military draft, President Bush's new war adviser said Friday.

"I think it makes sense to certainly consider it," Army Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute said in an interview with National Public Radio's "All Things Considered."

"And I can tell you, this has always been an option on the table. But ultimately, this is a policy matter between meeting the demands for the nation's security by one means or another," said Lute, who is sometimes referred to as the "Iraq war czar." It was his first interview since he was confirmed by the Senate in June.

And with that, we may not be hearing from Lute again anytime soon.

Mitt Romney is expected to win tomorrow's Ames straw poll, but he really has to win big. That and other straw poll and political news in today's Election Central Happy Hour Roundup.

Fibbing goof Bill O'Reilly can't understand why John Edwards won't give any love to Fox News after they've given him such fair coverage on Fox. Take a look. It'll start your weekend on a good note ...

Also nice to see the Foxies crying a river about the hard shake they're getting from the Democrats.

If you've been following the Scott Thomas Beauchamp Affair, I strongly recommend reading the latest update from The New Republic. The short version is that the Army's investigation of the case appears to be confined to a) releasing no information about their investigation or details of its findings, b) leaking alleged details to the Weekly Standard, which no one will confirm on the record and c) keeping Beauchamp himself in communications lockdown where no one but family members in monitored conversations can communicate with him.

Perhaps Beauchamp made this stuff up. And that's not a throwaway line; I freely concede it may turn out to be the case. There's no getting around the fact that the legacy of the Glass Affair puts an extra hurdle of credibility in TNR's way.

But the behavior of the Army Public Affairs Office suggests that what they are pushing is not an investigation that would pass any muster in the light of day but a war against a particular article and publication.

And not to put too fine a point on it, but going back over recent years -- the WMD stories, al Qaeda link, the Iraq War and more -- when you've got the goods, you take it to a real press outlet. When you're blowing smoke, you take it to the Standard.

I think it's a measure of how brain dead the Republicans have become on the "war on terror" that their big puffing or policy statements on the issue now most often amount to bizarre and sometimes incomprehensible grammatical reformulations or, failing that, reorderings of sentence structure.

So for example, now you have Mitt Romney saying, "There's not a global war on terror. There's a global war being waged by the terrorists and if I am president, there will be a global war waged on the terrorists and we will win."

This comes after Rudy's insistence on rebranding the War on Terror as the "Terrorists' War on Us." (see the video)

Their perplexity and paralysis in the face of reality is making them look like one of those alien computers or robots at the end of one of the old Star Trek episodes where Capt. Kirk hits them with too much kick-ass logic and smoke starts to come out of their ears and then they explode.

Late Update: Alternative Headline: Emerging GOP consensus that War on Terror is being waged in the passive voice!

Turns out fear isn’t just an RNC campaign strategy. It’s also useful, apparently, to spook up contributions.

The political parties use a variety of tactics in fundraising pitches to try and grab attention. But here’s a letter from the RNC that seems particularly beyond the pale. It styles as a “Voter Registration Verification and Audit Form” and warns the voter about “irregularities” in his/her party affiliation.

Check it out. And thanks to TPM Reader Dennis Sidwell for sending it in after it succeeded in spooking his 83 year-old father.

Dick Cheney makes the case for strikes against Iranian forces.

In Ohio yesterday Rudy said, inter alia ... "I was at ground zero as often, if not more, than most of the workers. ... I was there working with them. I was exposed to exactly the same things they were exposed to. So in that sense, I'm one of them."

I think this is going to be a real problem for His Rudiness. And unlike many gaffes, which are just offhanded statements that tell us little about the person in question, I think this one points to an underlying contempt for the folks who ended up sacrificing their health or even their lives during the clean-up process.

Obama and Clinton explain "old school" opposition to gay marriage; Edwards says he isn't "uncomfortable" around gays; and Richardson stumbles over whether being gay is a "choice." That and other items in today's Election Central gay issues debate roundup.

Conservative economist and AndrewSullivan.com guest blogger Bruce Bartlett giving thanks for the new Michael Gerson take-down piece in The Atlantic ...

Judging by Scully's account, no bigger phony than Gerson ever walked the corridors of the White House--and that's saying a lot. Apparently, Gerson spent just about every waking hour trying to figure out how to take credit for anything good that came out of the West Wing and had any number of gullible accomplices in the press corps that were happy to oblige him in his effort ... Another reason I'm grateful to Scully is that I could never understand why the Washington Post gave Gerson a column when he clearly has nothing interesting to say about anything. Apparently, it is payback for all the leaks Gerson was spilling to the Post all these years. Unfortunately, the Post erred by not also hiring the speechwriters who did all the work Gerson took credit for as well.