Today was Karl Rove's last day at the White House. He got all choked up.

With Larry Craig going tomorrow, I suspect this song will be in my head all weekend -- Patty Smythe and Scandal, "Goodbye to You."

Via atrios, Think Progress has the video of Iraq war "critic" and proven liar Michael O'Hanlon criticizing the GAO's Iraq report because it does not jibe with General Petraeus' conclusions:

“I have to be quite critical of the GAO. . . . Gen. Petraeus just gave an interview, I think yesterday, to an Australian paper, in which he said that there could be a 75 percent reduction in sectarian killing since the winter time. Now let’s allow for the possibility that Petraeus’ data isn’t quite right. . . . I hope it’s a flaw in the draft that will be improved in the final result.

Michael O'Hanlon is a dishonest person.

He says he supports Hillary Clinton. She needs to immediately disavow any connection with Mr. O'Hanlon.

We have three new diaries today, two written by AndGarden and one by Denver journalist Dave Cullen, all well worth reading.

• Still Blackmailing Homos
• The House, Not the Senate Will Win the War
• Matt Bai, Michiko Kakutani, and the Netroots

Please read them, and if you like them, hit the "recommend button."

TalkLeft is seeking new diarists this week. Details here.

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White House spokesman Tony Snow will leave September 14. Dana Perino will replace him.

CNN reports Sen. Larry Craig may resign today.

Fox News reports:

The Republican National Committee has warned Sen. Larry Craig privately that if he does not resign, the party will not provide him financial support in the upcoming election and it will recruit a Republican opponent to run against him.

I have been extremely careful in not labelling General David Petraeus as essentially becoming a political hack for the Bush Administration's Iraq policy. I have argued that he will deliver a soldier's report, one intent on shoring up support for a mission he believes in and feels he can accomplish. I have always argued he can not be, by definition, an honest evaluator of his own strategy and performance. That just seems common sense to me. But it is becoming increasingly clear, for even someone like me that really does not want to believe it, that General Petraeus and his operation have chosen to become political hacks doing the bidding of the Bush Administration and Republicans. This story in the Washington Post provides damning proof of what Petraeus has become:

The sheets of paper seemed to be everywhere the lawmakers went in the Green Zone, distributed to Iraqi officials, U.S. officials and uniformed military of no particular rank. So when Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.) asked a soldier last weekend just what he was holding, the congressman was taken aback to find out.

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Woe is me, cries the Justice Department, according to the Wall St. Journal.

In the past few years, U.S. attorneys' offices around the country have been unable to fill vacancies. Lawyers sometimes can't travel to interview witnesses. Even funds for basic office needs such as photocopying documents and obtaining deposition transcripts have been cut, according to current and former officials.

Apparently,

Department of Justice data show the impact. Prosecutions are down overall, with large drops in categories such as drugs, violent crime and white-collar offenses.

Could have fooled me. But assuming that's true, what's the reason? How about the war in Iraq?

After the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, federal priorities shifted to terrorism from routine crime fighting. The cost of the Iraq war also prompted Congress and the White House to slow the growth of many types of domestic spending.

....[M]ore than 100 lawyers and administrative personnel from U.S. attorneys' offices have gone to Iraq to help the fledgling government there. The offices generally pay the salaries of the seconded attorneys, which would typically be about $120,000 a year plus an additional 25% in combat pay.

Easy answer: Shift the priorities back to crime-fighting, bring the prosecutors home from Iraq.

There is one group of prosecutions that have increased: Immigration cases.

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Inspector General Glenn Fine has responded by letter to Sen. Patrick Leahy and informed him that his office is investigating whether Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was truthful during his Senate testimony about the firing of U.S. Attorneys, the warrantless surveillance program and other issues.

Senator Leahy has issued this response:

"I am pleased that Department of Justice Inspector General Glenn Fine will look into my concerns about potentially false, misleading or inappropriate testimony by the Attorney General. I look forward to the Inspector General's findings on the unprecedented firings of nine United States Attorneys, the improper political hiring of career officials within the Justice Department, the misuse of National Security Letters, and the efforts to bypass the Department's finding that a warrantless surveillance program was without legal basis.

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In 2004, Bush proclaimed himself to be a "compassionate conservative." Where's the compassion here?

Jacqueline Coats' husband drowned after he dove into a fierce Pacific Ocean riptide to rescue two boys. Now the immigrant from Kenya might be forced to leave the United States because he died before filing her residency application.

She is among more than 80 foreign-born widows across the nation who face possible deportation because their husbands died before immigration paperwork was approved.

A class-action suit for the women was filed yesterday. I hope they prevail. Also check out the website, Suriving Spouses Against Deportation.

The Chicago Tribune has an interview with Illinois Senator Dick Durbin. It sounds like he's supporting Barack Obama:

If it's a national poll, Hillary Clinton will always run ahead of Barack Obama. Even though we [Illinoisans] know Barack personally, and his kids' names and everything, only 60 percent of Americans do. Now go to the states where they're working and you'll find that the polling is much closer between the two of them and Barack at this point is either tied or ahead in most of these states.

So I feel good about it. I would say at this point that he still has that magic. He is bringing the fortysomethings in as John Kennedy did in '60. It's not just the volunteers and the voters, but it's a lot of business people and community leaders who are in that age range [and] who think it's their turn. And that's good for us.

I got to meet Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo tonight. We had our makeup done together. He was on CNN and I was on after him on MSNBC.

We chatted very amiably for over a half hour. I told him I thought he looked very good (posture and clothes) in the Republican debates, and although I've never agreed with anything he's ever said, I think it's pretty cool he's taken his quest for the Republican nomination as far as he has.

I did try to ask him some serious questions. Does he read blogs? Never. His campaign had a blogger who was terrific but he went back to college. He gets news clips with articles about himself every day. He knows bloggers write negative things about him and he has no interest in reading them.

Does he have a favorite for the Republican nomination if he's not the candidate? No.

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Say hello to Texas Prison Bid'ness... a blog about the private prison industry in Texas.

Their post today:

Willacy County Commissioners approved an additional $50.1 million in revenue bonds to expand the notorious MTC Tent City detention center. According to the Valley Morning News, the detention center, a series of tent-like structures made of windowless Kevlar pods that already has capacity to hold 2,000 ICE detainees, will expand by 1,000 beds.

What's it mean? The county will troll for inmates.

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