Thursday Links

• File under: Bush and the GOP using every lever of government to maintain power - White House officials conducted 20 private briefings on Republican electoral prospects in the last midterm election for senior officials in at least 15 government agencies covered by federal restrictions on partisan political activity. The previously undisclosed briefings were part of what now appears to be a regular effort in which the White House sent senior political officials to brief top appointees in government agencies on which seats Republican candidates might win or lose, and how the election outcomes could affect the success of administration policies. By the way, this is illegal.

• Blacks already feeling the pinch from a housing shortage in the New Orleans area after Hurricane Katrina are facing racial discrimination in their search for rental property.

• When New Hampshire's Democratic Governor John Lynch signs the civil union bill granting gay and lesbian couples virtually all the same legal rights as married heterosexuals next week, it will make New England the first region to have every state granting a measure of legal rights to same-sex couples. Even as the bulk of the country has passed constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage and civil unions, New England has stubbornly gone its own way.