- The "Trouble with Vito" series in the Daily News continues! Now it's a suspect photo of Congressman Vito Fossella with Sesame Street's Elmo and Rosito that has appeared in both re-election media and a "taxpayer-financed constituent mailing." Fossella's people say that muppet picture and other were "indvertently" used on a reelection website. Inadvertently or advertently so the Daily News could plaster it on the front page?

- And Ben Smith at the Daily News reports that our inscrutable billionaire Mayor may truly consider to run for president. A few weeks ago, the Mayor, uh, joked about considering higher office that would require an office the West Wing and even said he could "easily put up" $500 million for a campaign. But now his political adviser Kevin Sheekey told Ben Smith, "If John McCain gets beaten to the right - which is possible in a conservative Republican primary - and if Democrats elect someone through a primary who Democrats generally view as unelectable, there's a large segment of the American electorate that is looking for something different... [That disaffected segment could translate into] 36% of the vote in enough states to give you an electoral win." It sounds like there's some whiteboarding and political modeling going on!

- Senate hopeful Kathleen T. McFarland is out of campaign money and facing accusations she never received a degree at MIT. We expect she'll leave the race by the end of summer.

- Perennial candidate Mark Green is still under fire for a comic's remark about Italians during a fundraiser. (Italian American comic Paul Mercurio said an audience member looked like he was in "Cuomo's posse ... [but] your neck isn't thick enough," and a national Italian-American organizations wants an apology, according to the Post.) Though Green's spokesman essentially apologized, we doubt that's good enough - people like candidates apologizing because it makes good TV.

- And earlier this week, Attorney General and Democratic gubernatorial candidate Eliot Spitzer endorced State Senator Carl Andrews for Major Owens' Congressional seat in Brooklyn. This race has been under the microscope because the only white candidate in the Democratic primary is City Councilman David Yassky (there are two other black candidates besides Owens). A few months ago, the Politicker found one of Yassky's mailings that had a huge matzoh on it, but was sent to a "building in the western half of Crown Heights, which is full of African-American and Caribbean-American churchgoers."