Now that the official White House line is that George W. Bush doesn’t know anyone named Jack Abramoff, nor “recalls ever meeting him,” there’s just one step the administration must complete: getting back any pictures that actually show the President in the company of the thieving little lobbyist.

High-ranking spinners have been working with the Secret Service to put together a full list of White House events that Abramoff might have attended. Then they hope to figure out why he was there, concluding that it’s possible Abramoff may have, at some point, been in the same room as the President. With Bush already floundering in the polls, the last thing the White House wants is for a photograph to surface of Bush with a man whose crimes are rocking political foundations and continue to be exposed.

Despite the fact the Bush administration was contacted by Abramoff and his stooges 200 times in the first 10 months of Bush’s presidency alone, personal contact with Dubya remains unproven.

» Scott Saxon