As most of you know, the standard six degrees of separation mumbo-jumbo seldom applies to the political world, since you can usually connect up most things with two or perhaps three degrees tops.

Like Miguel Estrada -- would-be conservative ideologue in residence at the DC Circuit Court of Appeals and the still too-little-noted phone-jamming scandal in New Hampshire.

How do they connect up? Let's go to the tape ...

According to this press release, the Republican Leadership Council (RLC) is now running Spanish-language TV ads in California, Florida, Nevada and New Mexico attacking Democratic Senators who are part of the filibuster of Estrada's nomination.

Now, as you -- the loyal Talking Points reader -- will well remember, the Executive Director of the RLC, Allen Raymond, is also the president of GOP Marketplace, the Republican phone-bank chop-shop which sabotaged Democratic phone banks in New Hampshire last election day and is now being investigated by state and federal authorities.

Now, my mistake here was to imagine that the eight Republican Senators who are on the board of the RLC would have blanched a bit at the head of their organization getting caught hatching political dirty tricks which also seem to violate state and federal laws. But apparently it's not that big a deal. Last week I spoke Dave Lackey, a spokesman for Maine Senator Olympia Snowe (R). He told me they didn't have any comment. And if I had any questions I should take it up with the RLC, i.e., not their problem.

I'll call some of the other Senators' offices tomorrow and see what I come up with.