Man, this is a story I wish I’d been paying attention to from the get go. So apparently the White House wants a “war czar” to be in charge of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and they’re having difficulty finding anyone to take the position.

The highest-ranking White House official responsible exclusively for the wars is deputy national security adviser Meghan O’Sullivan, who reports to national security adviser Stephen J. Hadley and does not have power to issue orders to agencies. O’Sullivan plans to step down soon, giving the White House the opportunity to rethink how it organizes the war effort.

Unlike O’Sullivan, the new czar would report directly to Bush and to Hadley and would have the title of assistant to the president, just as Hadley and the other highest-ranking White House officials have, the sources said. The new czar would also have “tasking authority,” or the power to issue directions, over other agencies, they said.

Is it just me, or does the White House seem to not have a damn clue what the Constitution says? I’m going to be cribbing a bit from Colbert, who quipped so perfectly, “Yes, it’s be nice if the White House had a chief who could command the military… some kind of commanding chief, who could chiefly make commands to the military…”

Seems like every news item that comes out relating to Obama makes me proud to be a registered Democrat. While there has been a lot of rhetoric on the Hill concerning cleaning up Washington, it seems like not too much has happened. Well Senator Obama has taken a fantastic step in returning all of the campaign donations he received from lobbyists.

Democratic Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign has returned more than $50,000 in political contributions after discovering the donors were lobbyists.

Obama, who has pledged to change the ways of Washington, has repeatedly said he will not accept money from lobbyists or from special interest political action committees.

But as the campaign prepared to file its first quarter finance report to the Federal Election Commission, it also noted that it has given back $50,566 from 49 donors whom the campaign identified as lobbyists.

Overall, Obama raised $23.5 million for the primary and $25 million overall in the first three months of the year.

The Democratic party is showing a lot of promise for 2008. Between Barack Obama, John Edwards, Bill Richardson, and the potential of Al Gore running, I’d have a hard time choosing who to throw my support behind.

It makes me feel sorry for the redcoats. The flipfloppy devoid-of-integrity McCain? The 9/11 whore Giuliani? The also rather flipfloppy Mitt Romney? Who are they going to put on the ticket that won’t be an unmitigated disaster for their presidential chances? Doesn’t seem to be much in the field.