Given what a lightning rod his predecessor was, it's pretty remarkable that Maryland U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein, a Bush appointee, is still in his job two months after a Democrat took office in Washington. But, as Tricia Bishop reports this morning, nobody seems to be in too much of a hurry to replace him. There are, to be sure, Democrats lining up as possible applicants for the post, but the powers that be in the state say they have higher priorities and, in the meantime, feel like Rosenstein is doing a fine job.

At first glance, you might think: Of course the Democrats think he's doing a fine job; he hasn't been spending all his time going after the "front-page" indictments in public corruption cases like former U.S. Atty. Tom DiBiagio did. With the notable exception of the investigation into Prince George's County state Sen. Ulysses Currie, most of the public corruption action in the last couple of years has come from the state prosecutor's office, not the feds.

On the other hand, a big, active corrpution investigation could be just the thing to secure your job; one of the few Republican U.S. Attys whose post is now totally secure is Patrick Fitzgerald in Chicago, who is in the process of prosecuting former Illinois Gov. (and Democrat) Rod Blagojevich. If Rosenstein were the one prosecuting Mayor Dixon, firing him would look like poor form, indeed. The president who has twice avoided being seen with Dixon probably would steer far clear of looking like he was meddling in her case.

What's really going on here is that Rosenstein has been working well with Baltimore and state officials on law enforcement priorities: Guns, drug trafficking and violent crime. All three levels of government appear to be on the same page in terms of how they're going after those criminals. Sen. Barbara Mikulski, whose say-so will have a huge impact on who is in this post, is more focused on filling a vacancy on the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, known as one of the most (if not the most) conservative appealate courts in the nation. As long as top Maryland officials are calling Rosenstein "wonderful" (Atty. Gen. Doug Gansler) and saying he's displaying "unprecedented cooperation" (Gov. O'Malley), she has no reason to move him up her to-do list.