Plus, he's on the cover of Time this week with Arnold Schwarzenegger, celebrated as an independent-minded pol who's not bound by party orthodoxy and gets things done in a pragmatic way. The press loooves independents who aren't named Ross Perot, particularly those who are seen rising above the partisan Washington gridlock. And being mayor in the nation's media capital doesn't hurt.

But I think 2008 figured into the calculations of the Bloomberg News founder in this way: At the moment, he's a term-limited lame duck, with a Democrat in Albany closing off that option. He knows that as a prospective White House contender, he draws a lot more media interest and gets to play on the national stage, as he's increasingly been doing. The more he protests he's not running, the more the pundits speculate.

Now if Bloomberg, with his huge fortune, did jump into the race, he could clearly have an impact on both parties. So the political reporters will have a great time handicapping his prospects for a third-party run. And it's in his interest to do the exploratory thing.

(Can you imagine three New Yorkers in the race, Hillary vs. Rudy vs. Bloomy? It would be like a Yankees-Mets World Series and a Jets-Giants Super Bowl rolled into one. And by the way, it would be an act of ingratitude toward Giuliani, whose post-9/11 endorsement of Mike was arguably as important as his mega-spending in powering his come-from-behind win.)

Bloomberg has one heckuva record in the Apple, and he's done it without the polarization that surrounded Giuliani's mayoralty. Which is why Time gushes: Bloomberg is leading a national crackdown on illegal guns, along with America's biggest affordable-housing program. He also enacted America's most draconian smoking ban and the first big-city trans-fat ban. And he's so concerned about Washington's neglect of the working poor that he's raised $50 million in private money, including some of his own millions, to fund a pilot workfare program . . . there is an obvious appeal to a businessman who can work across party lines to get things done -- and could drop $500 million on a campaign without even noticing it was gone.

Time even says there's no bar to Arnold running as his veep.

But keep in mind that Bloomberg is a soporific speaker, which matters on the campaign trail. And he's the one who keeps saying that America probably isn't ready for a short, divorced, Jewish billionaire.

Let's go to the New York papers, starting with the Times:

"Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced Tuesday that he was dropping his Republican affiliation, a step that could clear the way for him to make an independent bid for the presidency . . .

"Even as Mr. Bloomberg continues to insist that he has no plans to run for president, his announcement has set off a storm of interest in political circles across the country, where it is being viewed as a signal of his serious contemplation of a campaign. His ability to self-finance a campaign presents him with obvious advantages, including the option of delaying even until next year a decision on whether to run.

"Despite Mr. Bloomberg's denials, his aides are working intensely behind the scenes promoting the idea of the mayor's candidacy and exploring the mechanics of starting an independent campaign."

The Daily News: "Despite his denials, he has spent months traveling the country, building his national profile while speaking out on hot-button issues, including illegal guns, immigration, health care and global warming.

Bloomberg, a life-long Democrat, became a Republican to run for mayor in 2001, but has always shown distaste for political parties."

The L.A. Times sounds a cautionary note:

"[H]is vast personal fortune -- more than enough to match spending by either major party's nominee -- has forced candidates already in the race to treat Bloomberg as a potentially serious threat.

"Still, Bloomberg could face enormous obstacles, including trouble getting his name on the ballot in some states. With sharply contested races under way for the Republican and Democratic nominations, it is anybody's guess how his candidacy could tilt the general election."

The Chicago Tribune has the local angle:

"Bloomberg's entry might actually hurt Sen. Barack Obama the most. Obama has positioned himself as the newcomer to Washington who's almost an outsider because he hasn't been in town long enough to be tainted.

"But Bloomberg could make the argument even more forcefully that he is even more the Washington outsider than Obama, that a vote for him would truly be a vote for change."

The Boston Globe has its own local angle:

"Were he to jump into the 2008 race, Bloomberg, a billionaire who was raised in Medford, would instantly shake up the field. His positions on social issues -- he supports abortion rights and gun control -- made him a Republican anomaly. But political analysts say he could appeal to a wide swath of the country as an independent, running as a centrist not beholden to either political party."

Kos has issued one of his periodic updates on the Democratic race, and he's still down on HRC:

" Hillary Clinton. She's done a great job bamboozling people into thinking she's anti-war, even though she's a proponent of the 'residual force' strategy of leaving 50,000 or whatever troops in Iraq holed up in remote bases to -- what? -- hunker down as massacres happen around them and mortar shells land on their compound? As Atrios has been saying all day today, that's the 'serious' position right now, even though it makes little strategic sense.

"Meanwhile, she refuses to see anything wrong with her war authorization vote. Of course, that's a sign of poor [judgment], but it's compounded by George Bush-like refusal to acknowledge mistakes. We've had plenty of that with Bush. I'm not eager for more of the same.

"She's surrounded by people like union-buster Mark Penn, who have clear influence on her positions. I'm amazed at how 'tough' macho-man union bosses are giving Hillary a pass even though her closest advisor runs a company dedicated to helping corporations crush unions.

"And finally, while Hillary should have as good a chance as any Democrat to win the White House, she'll kill us downticket in House and Senate races in the South, some parts of the Midwest, and the Mountain West. None of the other guys would necessarily help us in those races, but they wouldn't hurt either the way Hillary would. We're talking negative coattails here . . .

" John Edwards. Some of you will shoot me for this, but the more time passes, the more his 'haircut' deal [ticks] me off. Why? I see it as a strategic, tactical, and personal failure, and one that was so easy to avoid that it makes me question his judgment in a long, tough, presidential battle . . .

" Barack Obama. Ahh, Barack. The candidate least tainted by DC baggage, most able to run an innovative and transformative campaign. Yet he's got his stable of traditional consultants, like David Axelrod, stocking up on cash so Axelrod's media firm can then run tens of millions of dollars of ads. All the while, the campaign is being built not to win, but to not lose. Where are the innovations? Where are the risks? Why the stultifying caution?"

Other than that, they're great candidates.

National Review's Jim Geraghty is also distinctly unexcited by Obama:

"When a somewhat racy music video of a woman with the hots for a presidential candidate causes the biggest stir in about two months, as in the case of Barack Obama recently, it's a sign that a campaign has hit a plateau . . .

"The Washington Post conducted a usefully detailed poll on how Democratic-primary voters feel about their three leading candidates, Clinton, Obama, and John Edwards. They found voters felt that Hillary was the strongest leader, the most experienced, the most trusted to handle a crisis, and the one with the best chance of winning. So what's left? Well, Obama ranked just behind Hillary on 'understands the problems of people like you,' was ranked the 'most inspiring,' and led solidly on 'most honest and trustworthy.' Those areas represent Hillary Clinton's soft underbelly, and that is where Obama is going to have to heighten the contrast. Obama has to do this while not appearing to go negative.

"And it's not clear that he can count on any other Democratic candidate to do any real damage to the frontrunner. Edwards has hit Clinton pretty consistently since he entered the race, with limited results. Some of the other candidates, like Bill Richardson, actually defend Hillary (aka auditioning for veep). The ones who truly go after her, like Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel, are too far out on the fringe to make an effective attack . . .

"Obama has ridden his antiwar stance from 2002 about as far as it can take him. Now he needs to take Hillary's refusal to apologize -- interpreted by the base as obstinacy and intractability, and compare her traits to what they hate about Bush."

Do big budget wars lie ahead? Fred Barnes says the White House is spoiling for a fight:

"What looms now is a budget war much like the one in 1995 between House Republicans led by Speaker Newt Gingrich and President Clinton. Only this time it's between a Democratic Congress and a Republican president.

"Bush is prepared to veto at least 11 of the 12 appropriations bills that are expected to reach the White House by late summer. House Democrats have allocated $23 billion more for these bills than the president requested, thus providing a justification for the vetoes. The twelfth is the defense appropriation, which Democrats have set at slightly less than Bush asked for. But he may veto it, too."

Somehow I doubt he'll veto 11 of the 12 bills.

Was Rudy, who as president would inherit the Iraq mess, too busy to be a member of the Baker-Hamilton committee? TPM's Greg Sargent isn't buying the Official Explanation:

"The Giuliani campaign is pushing back on the big story today reporting that he was kicked off the Iraq Study Group because he blew off ISG meetings. The Rudy camp's claim is that he was seen as a 'potential presidential candidate' and didn't want this fact to turn his work for the ISG into a 'political football.'

"But a quick and dirty bit of research shows that the Rudy campaign's pushback here is entirely bogus.

"As you know, Newsday reported that Giuliani was bumped from the ISG after blowing off its meetings. The paper further suggested that a key reason for missing them was that he was busy making money giving high-priced speeches.

"The Rudy camp is disputing the story . . . The argument here is that Rudy backed out of his commitment to the ISG because he knew people were thinking of him as a potential Presidential candidate, something that (he allegedly thought) could potentially politicize his role on the panel. How selfless!

But even a cursory bit of research completely debunks the Rudy camp's pushback here.

Rudy's role with the ISG was announced in March of 2006. This was presumably done with Rudy's consent. That means that Rudy was willing to serve on the ISG in March of 2006, right? Right.

"As it turns out, Rudy himself was openly telling reporters that he was a potential candidate for President many months earlier than this. From the Associated Press in October of 2005:

" COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) -- Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani said Sunday he will contemplate next year whether to run for president in 2008. 'I will be considering it next year,' Giuliani said during a visit to Denmark.

"So very clearly, Rudy himself was saying that he was a 'potential presidential candidate' five months before agreeing to join the ISG. He even openly stated that he'd be actively considering a run during the same year -- 2006 -- that the ISG would be doing its work. So why did Rudy join it in the first place? . . . This is just total bull, pure and simple. No polite way to describe it."

Picking up on a Politico story that Republican candidates are starting to distance themselves from the president, Right Wing Nut House's Rick Moran says: nice try.

"All of this slipping and sliding away from Bush by the GOP field will probably go for naught anyway. That's because whoever emerges to claim the nomination will have to face the fact that just about every time a Democratic campaign commercial comes on TV next year, it will show the GOP nominee on one side of the screen and some unflattering picture of the President on the other. The Democrats are going to connect the Republican Presidential hopeful to Bush like superglue. And by the time they're done, voters will think that Bush [is] running for a third term.

"So what's the point of breaking with the President if the other party isn't going to let voters forget George Bush? If the other candidate's name is Clinton, the Democrats are going to have their own problems in breaking with the past. Looked upon with great affection by Democrats and left leaning independents, Bill Clinton is a lot less beloved in many parts of the electorate vital to the Democrat's prospects for success. The idea of 'The Bill and Hill Show' coming back to the White House does not sit well with about half of all independents. And Hillary's negative rating -- an astronomical 49% in the last Rassmussen poll -- would seem to indicate that a GOP counter strategy of tying Hillary to her husband's scandal plagued administration could end up making the entire issue of running away from Bush a wash."

From the other end of the spectrum, Americablog's Joe Sudbay also scoffs at the supposed Republican trend:

"Obviously, part of the 2008 GOP election strategy for presidential and congressional candidates alike is to pretend they don't own George Bush. They'll need the distance to have any chance of success. Our job is to make sure that George Bush is draped around all of their necks. They created the monster. They own him. There will be no distance."

I'm on the scent of a big story. Or rather, Jason Zengerle is in the New Republic:

"Chris Matthews caused some eyes to roll (and some predictable heads to explode) last week when, musing on the 'sex appeal' of Fred Thompson, he asked:

Can you smell the English leather on this guy, the Aqua Velva, the sort of mature man's shaving cream, or whatever, you know, after he shaved? Do you smell that sort of -- a little bit of cigar smoke?

"And now, courtesy of 'Hotline,' comes this comment by CNN anchor Alina Cho after the network aired an interview with Mitt Romney this morning:

He looks great, sounds great, smells great.

"It's almost as if Mike Gravel is just one spritz of Old Spice away from being taken seriously by the political press."