Good morning, Washington. The D.C. Council is set to vote today on whether to confirm sometimes controversial Acting Attorney General Peter Nickles. Yesterday the committee on public safety and the judiciary actually voted against Nickles by a 3-2 margin, though that was partly due to a procedural fiat manufactured by At-large member Phil Mendelson, who changed the resolution language to make it so that in order to disapprove the nomination, you had to vote for it.

As D.C. Wire points out, the main Council complaint about Nickles is that he’s too close to Mayor Fenty, leading him to effectively be serving as both general counsel to the mayor and as Attorney General. City Desk has a rundown on the unusually high number of undecided members going into today’s vote, and Marc Fisher licks his lips over the possibility that it may all come down to Ward 8 Council member and former mayor Marion Barry. Stay tuned!

Metro Mechanic Fired for Telling Dirty Joke: The Examiner reports that a veteran Metro mechanic has been fired, and three top executives suspended, after the mechanic told a dirty joke while serving as emcee at a departmental awards ceremony. Only problem? The story doesn’t include the dirty joke, or jokes, in question. How are we supposed to decide whether the firing was justified if we don’t even know what the joke was about? Give us the dirt, Examiner!

Briefly Noted: Senators pressuring Maryland State Police over ‘terrorist’ database … New round of ‘Street Smart’ pedestrian safety ads hit the airwaves … Jacqueline Cecilia Wright, former D.C. tax office employee, gets 15 months in fraud scheme … Teenage girl shot at Illinois and Decatur NW … Woman’s body found in stairwell in Silver Spring.

Photo by the pezident