Atrios checks in at our In China’s Shadow TPMCafe Bookclub.

It’s been a pretty interesting election cycle so far. So I figured it was about time we had a congressman/intern scandal. Here a kids’ advocate congressman gets caught emailing with 16 year old.

HUD Secretary Jackson reportedly too incompetent to be charged with corruption.

And they keep coming. There was a new witness against Sen. George Allen (R-VA) on Hardball today. See the video here.

BREAKING — White House ties to Jack Abramoff stronger than previously reported.

Update: Oh, and the favors they did for him.

Conrad Burns (R-MT) working to keep on schedule to insult every ethnic group in advance of November elections.

Did you know that House passed something called the Iran Freedom Support Act tonight on a voice vote with no debate?

You should. They’re going to try to ram it through the senate now too. Read the article and find out more.

TPM Reader BC …

I can’t stand it any longer: This evening all the network news programs air Bush’s slam, “The party of FDR and Truman is now the party of cut and run”. There’s no democrat presenting any equivalent slam against Bush or the “torture” republicans. The other day Rice gets extensive air time to say, “We received no strategy regarding Al Queda from the Clinton administration” and there are no democrats, no Richard Clarke, no Clinton to rebut the allegation. The republicans are making hay in Congress with all their “war on terror” provisions regarding Habeas Corpus, torture, and warantless wiretaps- the “tools the president needs to fight the war on terror” and you have to watch C-Span to hear any democrats presenting a sensible argument against Bush’s “tools”.

Every day I read countless liberal blogs offering compelling confrontation to the lies and smears the republicans let fly in their constant barrage, yet none of this corrective dialogue is observable in the MSM. I guess my point is, do we fault the MSM for this mostly one-sided debate the average news consumer is exposed to, or are the democrats no-shows when it comes to aggressively getting “our side” presented in the daily discourse of the media? The liberal blogs are great with exposing truth, but they’re preaching to the choir while the republicans never let up in their campaign to control the greater public dialogue. (An analogy- a dem takes a girl out on a date, and he spends the evening asking about her while telling her about himself- a pleasant evening enjoying one another’s company. A repub takes a girl out, and he relentlessly paws at her, he continuously tries to undress her, and single-mindedly devotes the entire evening pursuing his libido-driven agenda, much to her dismay. Worn down, she eventually succumbs to his aggressions.)

Thanks for letting me cry on your shoulder a bit.

TPM Reader RW …

I have to disagree with your earlier reader. Everyone’s waiting around for the Republicans to drop some sort of shoe. If it never comes, expect large Democratic gains. Right now I don’t think they have anything. Basically, their entire argument is that if we don’t stick with their failures, they will become bigger failures. And the only message they have is the same message they’ve had for years, fear and the flag. If there’s one thing about this country, it is that stuff gets old fast. And this stuff is real old.

Quick — who said this? “Please put Karl Rove in his usual table.” Any guesses?