For Eric Lichtblau, James Risen and the New York Times Washington bureau: There's bad news, and there's good news. The bad news is, Sen. Arlen Specter, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, would like to tie you all to an ant hill and smother you with Smucker's creamy fudge topping, for printing the Swift bank data surveillance story. At least, we can presume that's the case, based on the way Spector badgered Attorney General Alberto Gonzales during his testimony to the committee yesterday about prosecuting the authors (Lichtblau Risen) of the New York Times article.

The good news for Lichtblau and Risen is, Gonzales refused -- repeatedly -- to commit to any prosecution over the story. In Gonzales' words, "our longstanding practice, and it remains so today, is that we pursue the leaker." Gonzales indicated the administration would try to persuade reporters not to publish such articles in the future.

Pretty please?