South Knox Bubba examines Knoxville Convention Center bookings and finds less than 40 days for 2005.
Please tell me that the powers behind that mammoth were not this far off in their projections/economic assumptions. This ranks up there with the Titantic‘s design engineers with respect to margin of error.

http://jeffgannon.com/:

Jeff Gannon
A Voice of the New Media
The voice goes silent.
Because of the attention being paid to me I find it is no longer possible to effectively be a reporter for Talon News. In consideration of the welfare of me and my family I have decided to return to private life.
Thank you to all those who supported me.

No! Not the voice of the new media! What does it take to be an effective “reporter” for Talon News, anyway?
This is a weird story. I suspect we’ll be hearing more about “Jeff Gannon” and how he got a White House media credential.
UPDATE: Imagine if it was 1998?

Literally:

The Virginia House of Delegates has tentatively approved a bill to crack down on people who wear low-riding pants.
Freshman Norfolk Delegate Algie Howell Jr. introduced the bill at the urging of constituents who are offended by the exposed underwear.
. . .
Delegates approved a measure that would allow police to assess a $50 fine on anyone who exposes their below-waist underpants in a “lewd or indecent manner.”

What if I’m offended by lawmakers who waste legislative time and government resources passing silly bills? Can we ban them from entering the state capitol?

The White House streamlines:

President Bush’s senior adviser, Karl Rove, will take on a wider role in developing and coordinating policy in the president’s second term, the White House announced on Tuesday.
Rove, who was Bush’s top political strategist during his 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns, will become a deputy White House chief of staff in charge of coordinating policy between the White House Domestic Policy Council, National Economic Council, National Security Council and Homeland Security Council.

We have a political consultant shaping national security policy. Probably makes sense, since homeland security has largely been a political operation for the past three years anyway.

An Ohio State Supreme Court justice gets stopped after having too much to drink:

In a video shot by a dashboard camera in the patrol car, Resnick told Patrol Sgt. W. H. Stidham that her husband was on dialysis and that her 97-year-old mother-in-law was in the hospital.
Resnick also admitted to Stidham that she “did have something to drink.”
But she insisted she could drive safely and repeatedly asked Stidham to let her go.
“My God, you know I decide all these cases in your favor,” she said. “And my golly, look what you’re doing to me.”

You gotta love it when a “very important” person tries to use this excuse to get out of trouble. No, you can’t do this to me–these DUI laws are for the common masses.