I love those 'sign our petitions' sections of the dccc web page. They might as well say just give us your email so we can put you on our lists. As if anyone could possibly believe that a petition to oust Gonzales would be anything but laughed at by this Administration.
Taking it upon myself to speak for the moderate American, the partisan rhetoric has been ratcheted up to such a point, that ads like the dccc anti-Wilson ads and the ads from New Mexican Car Dealers for Politicizing Federal Prosecutors (or whatever their name is) attacking Iglesias, can't possibly contribute anything towards dialog or governance or middle ground or any semblance of progress for our Country. They can, and, I'm sure, do resonate with those that are energized by extremist rants, and inspire the fringe to cough up contributions. One need only see how Wilson's war chest has been helped by the current controversy to see that.
My question is this - what about what is best for Americans? What about the future of our Country? If we've gotten to the point when the partisan ends justify some extremely questionable means from both extents of the political spectrum, where does this leave the moderates who just want to have a government that cares more about the American Citizen then about partisan cat fights?

So Republicans love crooks and the ethically-challenged. What sales pitch do conservatives like Heather use, Give me money, I have yet to be indicted?

Raise all the money you can, Heather, you're still going to get your keister handed to you in November 2008.

Raise all the money you can, Heather dear, you*ll need it to pay for your lawyers* fees...

Heather Wilson will not be reelected and will need to raise as much as she can to pay for legal fees . She deserves to be defeated and disgraced.

What in the world is the DCCC trying to do?
Wilson hasn't been taken out yet, and it's probably not likely she'll get taken out now. The only way that seat opens up is if Wilson resigns, steps down to run for Domineci's seat, or gets indicted.

In response to E:
I think what the dccc is trying to do is to take a 'hot button' issue, in this case Heather Wilson, and use it to raise money and membership. These type of news stories evoke the type of deep-seated passions that tend to convert easily into contributions. "Don't just sit and stew," the generic plea for money might say, "send us your money, and we'll fight this grave injustice on your behalf." I think this article does a good job of showing how both sides benefit financially through these kinds of directed requests for money. One could also argue that the contributor benefits by the elimination of the sense of being powerless to fight against something that they feel this sort of deep-seated passion towards.
Unfortunately, I fear, this practice is going to become more and more prevalent, as its ability to rake in a lot of smaller contributions is now considered to be the future of campaign finance. Where the parties used to concentrate on kissing up to the wealthy individuals, special interests and other deep pocket entities that contribute huge amounts but are high maintenance. Now, the parties have learned the formula for raising loads of cash with relatively little effort. Today, they need only have a contentious issue, a webpage, and maybe a letter or two, and they can rake in the cash. No future political appointments to worry about, no changes in pending legislation... generally none of the back room wheeling and dealing that would result from being beholden to the deep-pocket entities, but with as much cash. Of course the parties will always court the deep pockets, but now they have an additional revenue stream with almost no increase in overhead. Its hard to imagine them giving that up for any reason.

How is it that politicians can pay non-campaign-related legal bills with campaign cash? I've never understood that.
And why would anyone be dumb enough to contribute to a campaign knowing their contribution could be used to keep the crooked candidate out of jail, not to win an election?

to John:
I'm not an expert, and I'm not even sure that this answer is correct, but I think that the FEC considers legal fees to be campaign related if a campaign is paying them.
Since any campaign will most likely incur legal fees - they need lawyers for many different, legitimate reasons, ie. to verify compliance with campaign finance laws, etc - legal fees paid to lawyers employed by the candidate are considered permissible expenditures, and do not count against spending limits and are not even required to be reported. An exception to this is when the fees are paid by the national committee, in which case the expenditure is still permissible, but counts against the spending limits and must be reported.
My sense is that the FEC is reluctant to regulate this because it could interfere with campaigns filing legal challenges against opponents for such things a filing improprieties, failure to meet requirements for office, challenges to ballot petitions, or many other possible conflicts requiring court intervention.