Nothing definitive, but I can report that former city councilor Gareth Saunders is considering entering this year's race for mayor of Boston.

Saunders, an African-American who represented Roxbury's District 7 from 1994 to 1999, attempted a mayoral run in 2005, but failed to get on the ballot.

If he runs this year, he would be considered a long-shot in a field that includes Michael Flaherty, Sam Yoon, and Kevin McCrea -- and, presumably, incumbent Tom Menino, who has not declared his intentions but is widely believed to be running.

So, state senator Marian Walsh's lifelong dream of having the number-two job at a state financing authority has been dashed, perhaps forever.

A few remaining questions for us to ponder:

--Will HEFA hire someone else for that long-vacant assistant executive director, to prove that it really is necessary? And if so, what will the salary be?

WaPo's Chris "The Fix" Cillizza is taking suggestions for a list of best state political blogs.

I'm not necessarily saying that you should go stampeding to nominate my very own Boston Phoenix Talking Politics blog. (Although I'm not discouraging you from doing so!)

It's just that last year, Cillizza's list included exactly zero from Massachusetts, and that just seems wrong.

I'm a big believer in protest. Large or small, from simple letter-writing to huge marches -- you disagree with something, you have an opinion to express, get out there with your compadres and tell the powers that be.

So I have not mocked or denigrated the "Tea Party" protests that have become all the rage on the right. I say go for it, rock on with your bad selves.

National Public Radio is doing a fun little online game, running a GOP 2012 Presidential nominating contest through NCAA Tournament-like brackets. They started with 32 candidates, and are now in the second round.

Mitt Romney, who was given a number one seed, is in big trouble -- he has come up against Ron Paul in this round, and those Ron Paul fans, they do love themselves some Internet.

It's amazing how often politicians get goaded into stupid behavior by simple baiting -- hire a guy to follow your opponent around in a chicken suit, and pretty soon he'll agree to participate in debates that he knows he should avoid.

To put it bluntly, a remarkable amount of political behavior is explainable only by large egos, thin skin, and small penises.

--John Tobin tells me that he will not run for the state senate seat being vacated by Marian Walsh. He also ruled out a stab at an at-large seat. "I am running for re-election in my district," he says emphatically. So far, it looks like rep. Michael Rush has the way cleared to graduate to the upper chamber, but there are still potential candidates in the suburban parts of the district making up their minds.

In the new issue of the Boston Phoenix -- in print tomorrow, online now -- I have an article about the recent, shall we say, missteps of Governor Deval Patrick. I don't know that there's been any long-term damage, but it's clearly more of a problem than the governor's people thought just last week, when I started reporting this story.

This coming Monday, city councilor John Connolly will hold a public hearing about his brain-child -- or Mayor Menino's brain-child, depending who you ask -- a bike-share program for Boston, which is getting a helping start-up grant from the state. Appropriately, this hearing will be at a bicycle shop: Landry's on Comm Ave.

Regular readers of this blog may know that one of my grand theories of the world is that political power in this country will be passed, over time, directly from the Baby Boomers to the Millennials -- totally skipping my loser generation, GenX.

One anomaly has been the Boston City Council, where GenX has held its own. Of the 13 members, 6 are pretty undeniably in that age range.

Typing while listening to Sen. John Kerry live, talking on the Senate floor about community service...

--A local accountant, Hiep Q. Nguyen, has opened a campaign committee and tells the Phoenix he is exploring a possible run for city council at-large. Nguyen is president of the board of directors for the Vietnamese American Civic Association.

Today begins the big arbitration showdown between the City of Boston and its firefighters of Local 718. The firefighters are the only city union that hasn't agreed to a contract from the last cycle -- they have been without a contract since 2006.

Each side gets to ask the arbitrator for four changes to the agreement. I have the city's proposal, but not the firefighters'.

Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele has reportedly hired Gentry Collins to be the party's new political director. Could be a sign of Romney making inroads with Steele. Collins has been a Romney guy for several years.

Back in 2005, when Romney became chairman of the Republican Governors Association, he made a strategically savvy move in hiring Collins as RGA political director.

I'm a couple of days late with this, but I think I'm still the first to report it: Egobudike "Ego" Ezedi, executive director of the Roxbury YMCA, sent an email letter out to his associates earlier this week, with this announcement:

I want to announce that I will be taking a nine-month leave of absence beginning Saturday, March 28, 2009 to begin campaigning full-time for one of four At-Large Boston City Council seats.

In this week's issue of the Boston Phoenix -- in print tomorrow, online now -- I take a look at the nation-wide explosion of "state sovereignty" initiatives, introduced in state legislatures to declare that the federal government has overstepped its constitutional bounds.

This exact same "Tenth Amendment Movement" reared its head roughly 16 years ago.