Bribery. Conspiracy. Espionage. Extortion. Obstruction of Justice. Pick One or More.

This is all over the blogosphere, I've seen about six posts about it, all keying off a story on Congressional Quarterly's web site:

Allegedly, the NSA wiretapped Rep. Jane Harman (D, CA) promising a "suspected Israeli agent that she would lobby the Justice Department to reduce espionage-related charges against two officials of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington."

Then Attorney General Gonzales stepped in and allegedly used that information to "persuade" Harman to line up behind the Bush Administration's expansive wiretapping by using his muscle to kill an FBI investigation of Harman.

Not that it did anyone any good. The charges proceeded. Gonzales was fired. The wiretapping is under fire. And Harman, who wanted to become the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and who also apparently wanted an intel job with the Obama Administration, was not given those jobs.

An ethics investigation needs to be opened on her. If all of the above is proven, she needs to be sanctioned and, at the least, lose all intelligence and security committee assignments and have her security clearances reduced to those that would be given to the Russian ambassador.

UPDATE: Might not have been an Israeli agent, after all. If not, then this story means nothing, beyond the obvious point that the NSA was indeed wiretapping American citizens and that high officials in the Bush Administration used the information generated for political purposes. Which is not exactly surprising.