Rep Scott Matheson was in the news yesterday after it was revealed that his brother Scott had been offered a federal judgeship.

Lots of people, conversant with the facts of the now infamous Lousiana Purchase, or the Cornhusker kickback, or Chris Dodd's 100 million dollar earmark for an 'unnamed' healthcare facility in Connecticut, or the union exemption from the Cadillac heath plan tax, etc..., etc...

...were understandable suspicious that Jim Matheson (D-UT) was getting bought off after two 'no' votes on the health-care bill.

The Left and is media lapdogs pooh-poohed it as if such a thing could never happen. Matheson himself called it absurd. Such denials are as ritualistic as saying you're resigning to spend more time with the family. Yet its clear to everyone that Matheson is under enormous pressure to vote with the Party and against the expressed wishes of his constituents.

As proof of the absurdity of such a egregious behavior by the Obama administration, the lamentable Orin Hatch offered this exculpatory evidence.

Hatch said he knew Scott Matheson was going to be the nominee more than a month ago and disputes any idea that Obama was trying to get a vote for the nomination.

Well I thought that was interesting because something else happened a month ago as well.

According to internal Department of Interior documents leaked to a Utah congressman and obtained exclusively by Fox News, the mostly public lands include Arizona deserts, California mountains, Montana prairies, New Mexico forests, Washington islands and the Great Basins of Nevada and Colorado -- totaling more than 13 million acres.

Sources say President Obama is likely to choose two or three sites from the list, depending on their size, conservation value and the development threat to each one's environment.

High on the list were two Utah sites, and one in particular stood out and alarmed Utahns--the San Rafael Swell near Moab, Utah.

Why is this important?

Well, you'd have to know some Utah political history--which Jim Matheson undoubtedly does.

Jim Matheson is a popular five term Democrat Congressman from arguably the most red state in the country. He votes against his party more often than he votes for it, which has made him a political fixture in Utah with a possible future as one if its Senators or as governor (he's only 50...). He's a virtual clone of another Utah Democrat--the late Bill Orton, who was a three term Congressman from Utah's 3rd district. He also voted against his party more often than he voted for it, and won landslide reelection victories for his trouble. The in 1996, he lost his seat, defeated by the unremarkable Chris Cannon. What was Bill Orton's unpardonable sin?

Bill Clinton made a national monument out of the Grand Staircase-Escalante with only 24 hours notice to Utah's governor and congressional delegation. Worried that he'd be skinned alive, Clinton held the dedication ceremony at the Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona.

Orton never had a chance.

So there you have it--the Chicago way--silver or lead? Judgeship (and who knows what else...), or the end of your political career?