As we’ve asked a number of times, what about the U.S. attorneys who weren’t fired?

Well, here’s one whose job seems secure.

Here’s a press release just out from 60 Minutes on the McCain Baghdad ‘stroll’ …

Presidential candidate Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) says he misspoke in comments he made about security in Baghdad and acknowledged that heavily armed troops and helicopter gunships accompanied him when he visited a market there. McCain tells this to Scott Pelley in his first interview since the visit for a 60 MINUTES report that will include the only video camera footage of McCain’s market visit, to be broadcast Sunday, April 8 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT).

In two interviews before the Army took McCain and 60 MINUTES on the heavily guarded visit to the al-Shorja market last Sunday, the senator said security had improved in Iraq. Upon his return, he also told a news conference he had just come back from a neighborhood one could walk around in freely. The remarks made headlines and he now regrets saying them. “Of course I am going to misspeak and I’ve done it on numerous occasions and I probably will do it in the future,” says McCain. “I regret that when I divert attention to something I said from my message, but you know, that’s just life,” he tells Pelley, adding, “I’m happy, frankly, with the way I operate, otherwise it would be a lot less fun.”

He continues to maintain that the president’s surge policy has improved safety in Baghdad. “I can understand why [the Army] would provide me with that security, but I can tell you that if it had been two months ago and I’d asked to do it, they would have said, ‘Under no circumstances whatsoever.’ I view that as a sign of progress,” says McCain.

Continuing America’s military presence in Iraq has been a key position in McCain’s presidential bid. He says he knows he is out of step with the rest of the country. “I believe we can succeed and I believe that the consequences of failure are catastrophic,” he tells Pelley. “I disagree with what the majority of the American people want. Failure [in Iraq] will lead to chaos, withdrawal will lead to chaos,” McCain says.

McCain has been critical of the way the war has been executed and has severely criticized former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld. In the interview Sunday, he lays some of the blame on the president, as well. “I say that [Bush] is responsible and I’ll continue to say he is responsible. Should I look back in anger or should I look forward and say, ‘Lets support this new strategy, let’s support this new general and let’s give it everything we can to have it succeed,” McCain tells Pelley.

Now, I’m still curious about this Times of London report that said 21 workers from that market were abducted and executed the next day. As I noted later the same day, it’s hard to know precisely what happened here or what it means without a lot more local knowledge. But on its face it seems at least worth seeing if these two events weren’t connected. I haven’t seen any follow-up on this. Is the original Times piece accurate? If not, I’d like to know. And if it is, as I assume, I’d like to hear about just what happened and whether it was tied in any way — as retaliation, a statement, etc. — to McCain’s visit.

The Washington Post editorial page takes a beating from one of WaPo‘s own columnists over its bogus attacks on Pelosi’s Syria trip.

BREAKING: John Edwards pulls out of Fox/Congressional Black Caucus debate.

BREAKING: If it’s Friday, it must be more Attorney Purge news. Goodling resigning from DOJ.

Update: More here.

If I want to understand what’s happening with Iran, I go to Bernie Kerik.

There was a lot of buzz today about a corruption case in Wisconsin from last year. A Bush-appointed US Attorney indicted a government bureaucrat in a case that implicated the state’s Democratic governor. But yesterday a circuit court threw out the conviction saying the evidence against the convicted official was “beyond thin.”

Indeed, the circuit court judges thought the case was so bogus that it’s hard not to ask whether the US Attorney in this case, Steven Biskupic, might not be one of those “loyal Bushies” who kept his job because he knew that one of his jobs was getting Republicans elected. It prompts the question; but it’s certainly too soon to say that’s the case. And yet look at how Biskupic’s number two and spokesperson responded when asked if the prosecution was politically motivated.

In an interview, Michelle Jacobs of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Milwaukee denied that the prosecution was politically motivated.

“I can tell you that from our perspective it was not, but that is as far as I’m going to go,” said Jacobs, a first assistant U.S. attorney.

Is that a strong denial?

Was Monica Goodling another GOPer ‘making the bullets’ in the war against the Democrats?

We put this together before the news this afternoon that Goodling had resigned from the Justice Department. But look what one of our readers saw in the Tim Griffin video we brought you last week.

(ed.note: This won’t make much sense until you see the video. But once you do, you’ll notice that we re-view two scenes right at the end of our segment. In one Griffin calls out “Hey Monica, how we doin'”. Then we show another scene in which the woman who appears to be Goodling walks past Griffin. However, it is important to say that in the scene where Griffin says “Hey Monica” you don’t see the person he’s talking to. Both clips were shot within about a half hour of each other in the same office — the RNC oppo research war room on debate night in 2000. And we think both clips point to the conclusion that Goodling is the one shown in the video. But these are two clips which appear about a minute apart in the documentary.)

DOJ throws a life raft to Paulose. Main Justice is sending John Kelly, Deputy Director of the US Attorney’s executive office in DC, to help run the office in Minneapolis. Also, it appears Paulose was an aide to McNulty rather than Gonzales.

Will these guys never learn?

The U.S. Attorney purge scandal exploded after Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty went to Capitol Hill in February and smeared the professional reputations of the eight fired USAs, who, having gone off quietly into that good night, suddenly reversed course and started defending themselves, which ignited a firestorm that continues to this day.

Which brings us to this morning’s New York Times piece on the mass resignation of the administrators in U.S. Attorney Rachel Paulose’s office in Minnesota:

Ms. Paulose’s defenders at Justice Department headquarters said the criticism of her was unwarranted. They said older lawyers had difficultly dealing with a young, aggressive woman who had tried to put into place policies important to Mr. Gonzales like programs to combat child exploitation.

Got it? The administrators who resigned are a bunch of sexist old men (never mind that one of the four who resigned was a woman) who are soft on child exploitation. We’re not told the identities of Paulose’s defenders at Main Justice, but it’s worth noting that she was briefly an aide to the aforesaid McNulty before her appointment as U.S. Attorney.

Those who fail to learn the lessons of history . . .