Susan Ralston, who provides a nexus between disgraced Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff and Karl Rove, resigned from her job as Rove’s assistant on Friday:

Hours before the beginning of a three-day holiday weekend, the White House announced the resignation of Susan Ralston, a top aide to presidential adviser Karl Rove.

Just a week before, Ralston’s name was mentioned 162 times in a 93-page congressional report on the influence wielded in the Bush White House by uber-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a convicted felon.

The bipartisan House Government Reform Committee studied documents from Greenberg Traurig LLP, Abramoff’s former lobbying firm — billing records and other documents — indicating that Abramoff and his team had made 485 lobbying contacts with White House officials over three years, 69 of which were with Ralston, who seemed to serve as a messenger between the Abramoff and White House camps.

Before coming to the White House, Ralston served as executive assistant to Abramoff. In her letter, dated Thursday but released to the media toward the end of the day today, Ralston wrote that “the time has come for me to pursue other opportunities.”

If the Dems take the House, my congressman, Rep. Henry Waxman, would become the chair of the Committee on Government Reform, which oversees and investigates the administration. (You may remember that Rep. Dan Burton used his chairmanship of this committee to conduct endless, proctological exams of the Clinton Admininistration.) The possibility that Waxman might be investigated Ralston’s activities makes his take on Ralston’s resignation particularly interesting:

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the ranking Democrat on the House Government Reform Committee, said in a statement that “It looks like the White House is trying to make Susan Ralston the scapegoat.”

Waxman said the committee has unanswered questions “about the assistance that Ms. Ralston provided Mr. Abramoff from inside the White House.”

“There are also many unanswered questions about the assistance that higher-ranking White House officials appeared to provide Mr. Abramoff,” including former White House political director Ken Mehlman, who is now chairman of the Republican National Committee, Waxman added.