Bush’s former head of the Mine Safety and Health Administration, David Lauriski, resigned after “60 Minutes” revealed that “the agency had improperly awarded no-bid, single-source contracts. Two of those companies had ties to Lauriski and one of his assistants.” A permanent replacement has yet to be confirmed.

Tune into MSNBC’s Harball NOW (5PM). Topics: Abramoff and warrantless domestic spying.

While we all hope that the economy will strengthen, the White House’s all-out PR effort today on the economy fails to recognize how historically weak both wages and job growth have been. Most Americans have good reason to believe the economy is not working for them. We should not lower our standards to the point where our leaders can state that our economy is doing great when the typical worker has seen his or her wages drop in real terms over the last four years and when job growth is at historic lows for this stage of a recovery.

A more candid assessment of the December jobs and earnings report — and the full 2005 job record — would recognize the following 3 points.

1. The Unemployment Rate Would Be 6.6% if As Many People Were Looking for Work Today as Were When President Bush Took Office.

There are two reasons that unemployment rate can drop: one, because job growth is strong, or two, because fewer people are looking for work. Unfortunately, the entire story of the unemployment rate’s drop to 4.9% has been Americans falling out of the labor market.

In January 2001, 67.2% of Americans were working or looking for work. If that number had held, there would be an additional 2.7 million people looking for work and the unemployment rate would be 6.6%–1.7% above its official mark.

We saw this effect in December, where the unemployment rate dropped thanks largely to the labor force shrinking by 30,000 workers.

2. Both Average Real Weekly and Average Real Hourly Wages were Down in 2005 — and Indeed are Down for the 4 years Since the End of the Recession.

For the second year in a row, both real weekly and real hourly wages fell in 2005. As of December 2005, both were lower than they were when the recession ended in November 2001.

– For 2005, average real weekly wages fell 0.4% from $$552.75 in December 2004 to $550.60 in December 2005. Since the end of the recession, they are also down 0.4% from $552.58 in November 2001.

– For 2005, average real hourly wages fell 0.4% from $16.40 in December 2004 to $16.34 in December 2005. Since the end of the recession, they have been effectively stagnant, dropping one cent from $16.35 in November 2001.

3. The Rate of Job Growth for the Fourth Year of a Recovery is the Weakest it has Been Since the 1930s.

– The rate of job growth during 2005 — about the fourth year of the recovery — was the weakest of any comparable period since the 1930s. In 2005 (months 38-49 of the current recovery), total employment grew just 1.5%. In months 38 through 49 of recoveries this length since the 1930s, employment growth averaged more than twice that rate: 3.1%. While the economy added 2.0 million jobs — in some cases a sound year– it represented a weak rate, as mentioned above, for a fourth year of a recovery. Indeed, since the economy had net job loss for 2002 and 2003 combined, the labor market needed more robust job growth to make up for this unusual period of job loss. The job growth in 2005 is therefore, particularly unimpressive in the context of such a weak first two years of job performance in this recovery.

– The Job Growth Since the 2003 Tax Cut is Also the Weakest for this Stage of the Recovery Since the 1930s. The White House continues to boast about job growth since its last tax cuts. In a speech early last month, Bush argued that cutting taxes on dividends and capital gains encouraged “job creating investment” that helped the economy add “four and a half million new jobs.” This morning the White House used the same mark to herald the 4.6 million jobs created since May 2003. Yet, a real look beyond the talking points shows that this is really nothing to brag about. The 4.6 million jobs during this 31 month period represents only 150,000 jobs a month — or 3.6% rate. That is half the average rate of job growth for similar periods in recoveries since the 1930s — the worst ratefor such periods on record.

Just out from Time Magazine:

Washington’s power players have always bragged about being well-wired, but for disgraced former congressman Duke Cunningham, “wired” wasn’t just a figure of speech. In a week when legislators are focused on the question of who else might be brought down by ex-lobbyist Jack Abramoff’s cooperation with prosecutors as he seeks lenient sentencing over his two federal guilty pleas this week, sources tell TIME that ex-Rep. Cunningham wore a wire to help investigators gather evidence against others just before copping his own plea.

As we noted on ThinkProgress yesterday, before this story broke: “The Department of Justice made a plea deal with Jack Abramoff to get incriminating information on members of Congress. Why did they make a deal with a member of Congress, Duke Cunningham? It’s likely that there are bigger fish to fry.”

More on Cunningscam in this morning’s Progress Report.

Right-wing blogger Michelle Malkin, in a post titled “Jane Harman’s Bogus Attacks,” takes issue with Harman’s claim that briefings the Bush administration provided to Congress violated the law. Specifically, Harman argues that the administration briefings, which only included the leadership of the intelligence committees, failed to comply with the 1947 National Security Act, which requires the administration to keep the entire committee informed about intelligence activities.

Malkin cites an exception under the law [50 USC 413b(c)(2)]:

If the President determines that it is essential to limit access to the finding to meet extraordinary circumstances affecting vital interests of the United States, the finding may be reported to the chairmen and ranking minority members of the congressional intelligence committees, the Speaker and minority leader of the House of Representatives, the majority and minority leaders of the Senate, and such other member or members of the congressional leadership as may be included by the President.

It sounds impressive but it’s not true. That exception Malkin cites only applies to “covert action.” And, 50 USC 413b(e) — titled “‘covert action’ defined” – specifically says that “covert action” does not include “activities the primary purpose of which is to acquire intelligence” Alberto Gonzales has said repeatedly that the purpose of the program was to acquire “signals intelligence.”

Thus, the provision cited by Malkin is irrelevant. The applicable law is under section 413s, titled “Reporting of intelligence activities other than covert actions.” That provision requires the administration to:

[K]eep the congressional intelligence committees fully and currently informed of all intelligence activities, other than a covert action (as defined in section 413b (e) of this title), which are the responsibility of, are engaged in by, or are carried out for or on behalf of, any department, agency, or entity of the United States Government.

That’s the law the administration violated.

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin admits she was wrong: Read more

Appearing on MSNBC this morning, Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao tried to defend the administration’s record on mine safety enforcement, stating that federal inspectors had “increased their inspections [at the Sago mine] by about 84 percent.”

It is true that inspectors increased their inspections at Sago, but Chao neglected to mention what the inspections found. Federal investigators repeatedly documented the unsafe conditions at the mine:

Nearly half of the 208 safety citations levied in 2005 against the Sago coal mine where 12 men died this week were “serious and substantial.” Federal inspectors found 20 dangerous roof-falls, 14 power wire insulation problems, and three cases of inadequate ventilation plans, among the 96 major violations.

Amber Helms, whose father died in the mine, said: “If they had that many violations”¦, they shouldn’t have had the mines open in my opinion.” The problem wasn’t inspections; the problem was enforcement. Proper enforcement at Sago may have saved lives. As the New York Times editorializes this morning, the starting premise of the federal investigation “must be that the explosion that choked off 12 workers’ lives would never have happened if all the safety rules now on the books had been properly enforced.”

And each day, the evidence continues to mount that federal mine safety overseers, despite knowing about the problem, turned a blind eye to it:

Joe McGowan, a longtime Buckhannon, W.Va., resident who’s worked coal mines, oil and gas fields, and timber jobs in the past, says he spoke with his friend Junior Hamner, who died in the explosion, just two weeks ago about the dangers. “He said it’s nothing but a walking time bomb,” says Mr. McGowan, in a measured drawl. “He told me, ‘They’re going to kill us all.’”

Spinning statistics isn’t going to make mines any safer. Enforcing the laws will.

“The firm has links to no fewer than three of the scandals convulsing the U.S. capital. One partner, former DeLay aide Tony Rudy, is now a focus of a federal investigation of lobbyist Jack Abramoff. The group’s founder, former DeLay chief of staff Ed Buckham, set up a South Korea junket for his old boss that violated ethics rules. And the firm represents a company whose owner, prosecutors allege, bribed former Representative Randy Cunningham,” Bloomberg reports.

Job numbers in December didn’t meet expectations. But Scooter Libby, even as he faces a criminal indictment, is bucking the trend. “Libby is joining the Hudson Institute — a conservative think tank focusing on foreign policy and national security — as a senior fellow, focusing on issues related to terrorism and Asia.”

Amount of time Bush spent listening to the views of 13 former secretaries of state and defense about Iraq, according to the NYT.