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Word late Friday is that Paul McNulty, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, is going to be President Bush's new nominee for Deputy Attorney General.

This isn't necessarily bad news for conservatives...but it isn't good news, either. The White House apparently passed up a good opportunity to place a solid, professional woman in the slot, Karen Tandy, who heads the DEA and is considered a capable and reliable prosecutor and administrator. Instead, they went with someone cut from the same political cloth as former DAG James Comey.

McNulty is believed to be political, but in a bad way, looking for the spotlight, but with little interest in taking one for the team, whether it is conservatives or Republicans. He has been a tough prosecutor, but also a huge self-promoter, and DOJ insiders predict this will be trouble for the current Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales.

There are rumblings that McNulty is similar to fellow White House nominee Harriet Miers in at least one way: he left the Catholic Church some time ago for an Evangelical Church, and was known during his time in DOJ headquarters back in the late 1980s to enjoy spreading the Gospel, as it were.