This is partly a housekeeping note, and partly just a meta, rah rah kind of note.

First, the housekeeping: I'm probably going to have a relatively light day of posting today, because I'm working on this video-related project that I mentioned a week or so ago. (It should be done in December sometime.)

Second, I just felt like saying that President-elect Obama's video address today has got me all fired up all over again. In the days immediately following the election, there was a natural sort of waning of intensity as the afterglow of victory receded. And then the distraction of the HRC and Lieberman dramas was disconcerting.

All this was taking place in a leadership vacuum created by the combination of George W. Bush's unwillingness to do anything to help the economy, and by the fact that Barack Obama does not get sworn into office for two more months.

But today, President-elect Obama stepped up to the plate and started to define the work that we must do. He didn't tick off a technocratic list of bullet points aimed at achieving small goals. Instead, he set forth a bold vision of creating 2.5 million jobs by investing in our in nation's infrastracture and by starting the process of building a new energy economy.

These are things we've needed to do for years and years, and finally the moment is arriving where will we move from simply hoping that they get done, to actually getting them done. And that's inspiring.

In a sense, this is the beginning of his presidency. Sure, he won't put his hand on the Bible for several more weeks. But he's laying out what will happen as soon as he steps into the Oval Office. I can't wait.

In his weekly Saturday morning address, the President-elect discusses his plan to create 2.5 million jobs over the next two years through a stimulus plan to rebuild our infrastructure and energy economy:

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Keeping America ill-informed 24x7, they purport, and you decide:

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Minnesota Public Radio has posted a sampling of the ballots challenged by both sides in the senate recount.

Here's my favorite "close call":

The Coleman campaign challenged this ballot, arguing the voter didn't intend to vote for Franken, because of the small dot inside the bubble next to Dean Barkley's name.

Bloomberg:

Nov. 21 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks rallied and the Standard & Poor's 500 Index rebounded from an 11-year low after President-elect Barack Obama picked New York Federal Reserve Bank chief Timothy Geithner to head the Treasury.

"This news could really give the stock market a badly needed shot in the arm," Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York, wrote in an e-mail to clients. Geithner is a "fantastic choice to help lead the financial markets out of the wilderness."

Andrea Mitchell and Chuck Todd say that President-elect Obama will announce the team and answer questions on Monday:

Maddow goes off on the Senate for paying tribute to seven-time convicted felon Ted Stevens, and she couldn't be more right. I can't say I'm surprised when I say GOPers doing it, but seing Harry Reid and several other Democrats from the appropriations committee stand up and cheer Ted Stevens -- a criminal, for crying out loud -- made me sick to my stomach.

Throw the bums out.

Statement (via Ben Smith):

Washington, D.C. - U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) today commended the announcement of Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano as top contender for Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and made the following statement:

Today, Senator McCain called and congratulated Governor Janet Napolitano on her emergence as top contender for Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Senator McCain said "Governor Napolitano's experience as the former U.S. Attorney for Arizona, Arizona's Attorney General, and as Governor warrants her rapid confirmation by the Senate and I hope she is quickly confirmed." Senator McCain looks forward to working with her throughout the nomination process.

Turns out his scary collapse appears to have been a fainting spell, and nothing more serious. That's good to hear.

Mike Allen:

President-elect Barack Obama is "on track" to name Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) as his secretary of state shortly after Thanksgiving, two senior Obama aides said.

Nedra Pickler:

WASHINGTON - President-elect Barack Obama is on track to nominate Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state after Thanksgiving, an aide to his transition said Thursday.

Both of these leaks are coming from Obama-land, unlike most of the other leaking, so either someone is really way out of line, it's a done deal.

James Oakes:

By tradition, presidents-elect reserved a cabinet position, often secretary of state, for the leading rival in their party. John Quincy Adams inaugurated the practice by appointing one of his presidential rivals, Henry Clay, to that post. It was a controversial move in 1824; enemies of Adams denounced the appointment as a corrupt bargain.

By the 1850s, the practice had become a tradition. In that decade, Presidents Millard Fillmore, Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan installed in their cabinets men who had been major rivals for their party's nomination.

So here's the news:

Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano (D), a border-state governor whose handling of immigration and homeland security issues brought her accolades from fellow governors, is President-elect Barack Obama's choice to serve as secretary of homeland security, Democratic sources said yesterday.

Now, here's the tea leaves:

1. Napolitano would beat McCain in 2010.
2. Obama met with McCain on Monday.
3. McCain indicated he plans to run for re-election yesteday.
4. And now Napolitano is apparently joining the cabinet -- taking her out of 2010 contention, making McCain's path easier.

And here's my speculation: on Monday, Obama and McCain may have struck some sort of a deal involving McCain offering his support on a key legislative initiative in exchange for Obama taking Napalitano out of the running for McCain's senate seat. The most likely policy area for such a deal would be energy. Despite his election year conversion to drill, drill, drill, McCain has been among the more progressive GOPers on energy policy, so it's possible that he actually would be in favor of geting something done.

If I'm right (and again, this is just total speculation), my only hope was that it was a damn good deal, because Obama had tremendous leverage in this situation, and if he can get McCain to assemble a between five and ten GOP colleagues to support progressive energy and global warming legislation, we may actually finally get something done. But it has to be something good -- it can't be a watered down half-measure. It nees to be the real thing.

In the end, Obama will be measured on what he gets accomplished, not whether he cut this deal or that deal. Hopefully, this was a step towards getting something done for America and the world.

All hands on deck:

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The Dow today: 7,552.29

The Dow on June 11, 1997: 7,575.83.

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Majority Leader Harry Reid leads the charge in paying tribute.

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She's at it again, denying that she said what she said:

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Felix Salmon:

The average GM assembly-line worker makes about $28 per hour in wages, and I can assure you that GM is not paying $42 an hour in health insurance and pension plan contributions. Rather, the $70 per hour figure (or $73 an hour, or whatever) is a ridiculous number obtained by adding up GM's total labor, health, and pension costs, and then dividing by the total number of hours worked. In other words, it includes all the healthcare and retirement costs of retired workers.

Via Daily Kos diarist Inky99.

Paul Phillips:

The Securities and Exchange Commission ("Commission") is adopting an interim final temporary rule...

Nothing restores confidence like the speedy adoption of a few new interim final temporary rules!

As of around midnight eastern, Barack Obama was leading by 5% and had 54.5 million votes:

Now he's over 67 million, with a 7% margin -- and John McCain has fallen under the 46% threshold.

GOP Congressman Zach Wamp (a likely candidate for governor in Tennessee) explains the Republican economic philosophy to Chris Matthews:

1. Low wages are a good thing
2. The less health care the better
3. It's time to let people learn their lessons the hard way

Wamp didn't mention one thing: even though he opposes bridge loans to the blue-collar auto industry, he supported the $700 billion bailout for the white-collar financial industry.

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Adam Serwer smacks down Zawhiri's identity politics gambit:

The best part about this is that a knee-jerk patriotic response implicitly rejects the notion of black American culture as oppositional by definition. And doing so is an act of solidarity with the future President of the United States!

There's been a lot of skepticism about an Obama victory shifting the Muslim world's view of the United States, but judging by this statement at the very least it's made Al Qaeda's efforts to develop a compelling rhetorical indictment of America visibly more difficult.

Well, my skepticism about HRC as SoS might be wrong after all. Mike Allen says both sides tell him it could be announced next week.

Good news for John Kerry (and probably also for either Richardson or HRC).

It's nice to see Kerry rewarded with an important chairmanship.

I noticed that in the hearings today, the auto executives were more disciplined about talking about the auto industry assistance plan as a "bridge financing" as opposed to a "bailout."

Now let's be clear -- this bridge financing would be offered at very low interest rates, and therefore would be a subsidy -- but certainly not the same as an outright grant of cash.

To me, it seems like a far more reasonable thing to do than I originally had thought the "bailout" was going to be.

Another day, another cabinet appointment. According to CNN's Ed Henry, Daschle will also be the administration's point person on the push for a universal health care plan. (A push that Rahm Emanuel apparently has gotten behind.)

Notice how with Holder and Daschle, the stories have been that President-elect Obama offered the post, and that the post was then accepted. Contrast that with the handwringing surrounding the HRC scenario, which looks increasingly unlikely to me.

So after getting out of my morning shower, I turn on one of those fancy cable networks, and am greeted by a wonderful little discussion about how some crazy terrorist is insulting President-elect Obama in a new Al Quaeda recruiting tape, and all I think to myself is: less of this please. Do we really need to put these nutjobs on television everytime they issue a video press release?

...and John McCain under 46%. Here's where the numbers stand right now:

Obama: 67,065,042 (52.7%, 365 EVs)

McCain: 58,420,587 (45.9%, 162 EVs)

Those are numbers for everybody to be darn proud of (as if we weren't already!).

Al Giordano nailed it pretty good back in September, 2007:

If the third-quarter FEC reports, due on October 15, show that Obama's continued to raise money as he has thus far, his campaign's rhetoric about building precinct-level organization in the later primary states will likely become a reality. For the first time since the dawn of television, a maverick Democratic presidential challenger will be able to advertise in all the primary and caucus states between January and June. Plus, Obama will have converted significant swathes of his quarter-million donors into precinct-level organizers.

The AP totally botched its reporting on what Jeff Merkley did and didn't do today during the caucus. Bottom line: Merkley spoke up, and spoke out against Lieberman, and for that he deserves credit.

Bonnie Erbe of US News & World Report:

Today, that most liberal of hard-left blogs, the dailykos.com, started faulting Obama for sticking up for Democratic defector Joe Lieberman:

This is the post that Erbe referenced -- but she didn't link to it. Perhaps the reason why she didn't link to it is that nothing in the post faulted Obama.

Mark Begich wins (on Ted Stevens' birthday, no less).

We now have 56 Democrats, 40 Republicans, 2 independents, and 2 undecided.

Oh, and President-elect Obama is now less than 40K votes away from 67 million.

Here's Barack Obama, emphasizing his support for policies like cap-and-trade to combat global warming in a new video released by ChangeDotGov, the official YouTube channel of the transition. It was recorded for a climate summit led by Arnold Schwarzenegger -- the Republican governor of California.

For too long, bipartisanship has simply meant Democrats caving in to Republican demands. But that's not the the kind of bipartisanship we need. What we need is more examples like this: What we need is more examples like this: Democrats and Republicans who are willing to work with each other solve real problems.

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Notice the difference in the way Holder was announced versus HRC?

President-elect Obama has decided to tap Eric Holder as his attorney general, putting the veteran Washington lawyer in place to become the first African-American to head the Justice Department, according to two legal sources close to the presidential transition.

Holder, who served as deputy attorney general during the Clinton administration, still has to undergo a formal "vetting" review by the Obama transition team before the selection is final and is publicly announced, said one of the sources, who asked not to be identified talking about the transition process. But in the discussions over the past few days, Obama offered Holder the job and he accepted, the source said.

The announcement was definitive, straightforward, and without drama.

By contrast, the HRC saga is anything but. Also of interest was this line:

The announcement is not likely until after Obama announces his choices to lead the Treasury and State departments.

That's another way of saying he hasn't made the SoS announcement yet. Assuming Obama is going a different direction than HRC, rather than needlessly humiliate her, he's putting out a new story to calm the speculation on the SoS front.

I hope I'm not reading too much into this, but it's exactly what I love about Obama's decision-making process. He's in command, but he isn't throwing his weight around just for the sake of flexing his muscles.

Ben Smith:

Hillary, conflicted

Thrush reports that it's not a done deal on her side:

Hillary Rodham Clinton isn't certain she would accept the Secretary of State post even if Barack Obama offers it to her, several people close to the former first lady say.

My question is whether it was really ever a done deal on Obama's side. We'll see...but if it doesn't happen, I suspect the answer is no.

Whatever happens...all I can say is: too much drama.

As odd as this may sound, I totally support what Barack Obama said about Joe Lieberman. As President-elect, he had to make it clear that he was not out for revenge.

And he was right. This was not an issue of revenge. But he didn't say that Lieberman should keep his chairmanship either. He simply said that it was up to the Senate to decide, and that is the correct thing to say.

Obama resigned from the Senate on Sunday, no doubt in part to avoid taking part in today's meeting. I think that was the right decision.  The President is not dictator, and the Senate -- and the Senate alone -- is responsible for what it did.

Update (1:23PM): Initially, I had posted the wrong video. Now corrected.

This is weak:

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Wowsers.

District and federal officials are preparing for as many as 4 million people for the inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama, a crowd that would be three or four times larger than previous big events on the Mall.

Only a fraction of those people will be close enough to get a good look at the action. But officials are planning extra JumboTrons at the Mall and along the inaugural parade route so that spectators can feel a part of the historic day.

Let me put this number a different way: if 4 million people show up, that will be equivalent to something like 1 in 17 Obama voters across the country.

Oh, goody.

Update: Here's Harry Reid bragging about the decision:

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The vile McCain aide Michael Goldfarb hearts Hillary (via Ben Smith).

On the issues, Clinton's a hawk. Not only did she vote to authorize the war in Iraq, she delivered her vote in style -- her floor speech on October 10, 2002, went so far as to connect Saddam to al Qaeda:

Ben Smith weighs in with a look at how the possibility of HRC as SOS is causing some (totally understandable) strife within Obama-land, and Al Giordano continues his push to thwart her nomination.

I'm still totally confused. I don't know why Obama would want her as Secretary of State as opposed to, say, Secretary of Defense. For a Democrat, she's a hawk -- think about her support for Kyl-Lieberman, her vote for the Iraq war resolution, and her threat to "totally obliterate" Iran -- but she's still to the left of any Republican Obama might appoint.

SecDef also has as much stature as SecState, the vetting issues with Bill would not be nearly as thorny, and for those who care about such things, her appointment would shatter a glass ceiling at DOD.

The NYT outlines the two options that seem to be on the table:

Mr. Reid proposed a $100 billion economic stimulus plan that would include $25 billion in loans for the auto industry as well as $13.5 billion for roads, mass transit and other public infrastructure; money for financially ailing state governments; more jobless benefits; and added food stamp assistance.

If that plan stalls, as seems virtually certain since the White House and Congressional Republicans have resisted it in the past, Democrats say they will propose a separate program that would divert to the auto industry $25 billion of the $700 billion approved earlier for the financial industry. Companies would have to meet a set of conditions like limits on executive compensation and a ban on dividend payments. Under the Democratic legislation released Monday evening, the loans would be for 10 years at 5 percent interest the first five years and 9 percent the second five.

It seems that advocates of the bailout have not focused enough on the fact that the  bailout consists of cheap loans rather than outright grants.

This is just crazy: pirates have seized a supertanker the size of the USS Nimitz carrying $100 million worth of oil. $100 million!

It was sailing with an unarmed crew of 25.

Marc Ambinder has had some fairly interesting stuff today.

First, on Clinton as Secretary of State:

According to Democratic sources, Clinton disclosed the information to only three people and swore them to secrecy.

If true, then Obama-land has been the source of the leaks. But that doesn't seem to be the case:

Initial confirmation seemed to come from an unnamed Clinton spokesperson who allegedly told NBC's Andrea Mitchell that Clinton was in Chicago for "private business."  Mitchell later clarified that she heard the words from a Clinton "adviser," not from Clinton's Senate office.

Now that Obama-land sources are speaking up, it's clear the Secretary of State was just one of the possible roles discussed:

Sources close to the process have said that Obama and Clinton discussed a variety of possible roles she could play in a new administration, including Secretary of State.

If Clinton is offered a cabinet spot and decides to accept it, it's not unreasonable to expect her to want to think about her options and spend time discussing the offer with her close friends and advisers.

So I guess the real story is basically "who knows."

And second, on the State of the Union:

But given that President-elect Obama's inauguration takes place a week or so before the SOTU is traditionally given, the plan, as of right now, is to push the formal State of the Union into early February.  Note: the speech might not be labeled as a "State of the Union" -- it might be labeled an "economic address."

James Hibberd (via Ben Smith):

Barack Obama's first televised post-election interview gave Sunday night's "60 Minutes" its biggest audience in at least nine years.

The CBS News program was seen by 24.5 million viewers and earned a 6.4 preliminary adults 18-49 rating. That marks the show's largest viewership since 1999.

So Dems are trying to spin their decision to reward Joe Lieberman with the Homeland Security Chairmanship as a 'stinging rebuke' because he's been booted from an EPW subcommittee.

As if that wasn't hilarious enough, somebody is now trying to push the idea that Lieberman is unhappy with the way things worked out:

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Ambinder argues that Obama indicated during his 60 Minutes interview that energy would be his first policy initiative. I think he's correct, but it's not entirely news: just before the election, Obama told Wolf Blitzer that other than ensuring the stability of our financial system, energy policy was his top priority. And he's consistently listed energy policy as among his top three agenda items -- along with getting out of Iraq and health care reform -- since the earliest days of his campaign.

Personally, nothing excites me more than the possibility that we will finally make progress on energy, not just for environmental reasons but also because nothing is more central to America's and the world's long-term economic growth than achieving a reliable, affordable, clean source of energy.

The DNC internet team has gone rogue and posted a diary at Daily Kos for those who would like to leave Gov./Dr./Chairman Dean their best wishes for his 60th b-day.

The NYT says HRC as SOS is looking like an increasingly serious possibility:

WASHINGTON -- President-elect Barack Obama's advisers have begun reviewing former President Bill Clinton's finances and activities to see whether they would preclude the appointment of his wife, Hillary Rodham Clinton, as secretary of state, Democrats close to the situation said Sunday.

The examination of the former president suggests how seriously Mr. Obama is considering bringing his onetime rival for the Democratic presidential nomination into his cabinet.

The two most bizarre sentences in the article have nothing to do with Bill, however. First, we have:

He met with Mrs. Clinton in Chicago on Thursday to talk about the prospect and word quickly filtered out.

And then second:

Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton have kept their conversations tightly held, but that silence has only convinced some associates that the prospect is serious.

Hmmm. Obama met with Clinton and word quickly filtered out, but they have both kept their conversations tightly held? Something doesn't compute.

CBS has posted the full video online, though it does not yet appear to be embeddable.

Update (9:21PM): I just finished the first part of the interview. What a joy it is to listen to a President (or President-elect) who comfortably and knowledgeably talks about history and what books he's reading.

On a more wonkish level, President-elect Obama emphasized his pragmatic approach to the presidency, focusing on the need to do things that will actually work. To that end, he reaffirmed his conviction that we need a major stimulus plan to get the economy going again and underscored his desire to see an assistance plan for the auto industry.

He also said that at least one Republican would serve in his cabinet. Other than saying that he expects to make them soon, he didn't reveal anything more about his planned appointments, including on the speculation about HRC as secretary of state.

He also said that he would follow-through on his promise to close Guantanamo and end the policy permitting torturing enemy combatants. He said that he would meet with the Joint Chiefs of Staff as soon as he takes office to begin the process of pulling out of Iraq, and he again pointed out the importance of winning in Afghanistan and of capturing or killing Osama bin Laden.

I've been heads-down most of the day working on a video-related project that is still a few weeks away, but that I think you'll enjoy when it's finally ready.

As you probably know, President-elect Obama and Michelle Obama gave their first post-election interviews to 60 Minutes. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem as if 60 Minutes has posted the video yet, but I'm sure it will be coming soon, and I'll put it up when I see it online.

I had a random thought about the auto industry bailout being discussed. What if instead of bailing out the industry, the U.S. government decided to replace not only its entire fleet of roughly 400,000 cars, but also fund the replacement of most state and local government cars -- and gave the contract to U.S. automakers?

Of course, the replacement cars would have meet strict efficiency standards. That would probably require some R&D work, so perhaps the government would both pre-pay, and offer up a premium, but the idea would be that automakers would be forced to deliver something tangible for the economic assistance, and it would be something that would keep people working.

It also would encourage the auto industry to build better cars without creating a huge new fight about regulation.

One important caveat would be that the existing government fleet would have to be recycled somehow, which would be a major undertaking.

If you combined such an approach with merging health care reform and the stimulus plan, you might be able to save the auto companies without just giving money away, and more importantly, you'd be keeping people working, and making sure they get health care.

As I've said before, I'm no expert on this stuff, so please, feel free to tell me if my idea is total bunk.

The NYT says President-elect Obama may have to give up his BlackBerry, thanks to a combination of disclosure laws and security concerns.

"How about that?" Mr. Obama replied to a friend's congratulatory e-mail message on the night of his victory.

But before he arrives at the White House, he will probably be forced to sign off. In addition to concerns about e-mail security, he faces the Presidential Records Act, which puts his correspondence in the official record and ultimately up for public review, and the threat of subpoenas. A decision has not been made on whether he could become the first e-mailing president, but aides said that seemed doubtful.

...

Mr. Obama used e-mail to stay in constant touch with friends from the lonely confines of the road, often sending messages like "Sox!" when the Chicago White Sox won a game. He also relied on e-mail to keep abreast of the rapid whirl of events on a given campaign day.

Mr. Obama's memorandums and briefing books were seldom printed out and delivered to his house or hotel room, aides said. They were simply sent to his BlackBerry for his review. If a document was too long, he would read and respond from his laptop computer, often putting his editing changes in red type.

His messages to advisers and friends, they say, are generally crisp, properly spelled and free of symbols or emoticons. The time stamps provided a window into how much he was sleeping on a given night, with messages often being sent to staff members at 1 a.m. or as late as 3 a.m. if he was working on an important speech.

He received a scaled-down list of news clippings, with his advisers wanting to keep him from reading blogs and news updates all day long, yet aides said he still seemed to hear about nearly everything in real time. A network of friends -- some from college, others from Chicago and various chapters in his life -- promised to keep him plugged in.

Not having such a ready line to that network, staff members who spent countless hours with him say, is likely to be a challenge.

This may sound trivial, but there's gotta' be a way for him to be able to use a BlackBerry or some other sort of communications device as President. It's one of the best ways -- perhaps only -- that for a President to avoid the getting caught in the bubble.

Ah, don't you love Republican infighting? Not only was Sarah Palin's press conference an awesome display of her (frightfully deficient) intellect, but GOP governors were ticked off that she stole the limelight.

Frank Rich takes a closer look at the back biters in Sunday's NYT:

On FOX News Sunday, Byron Dorgan affirmed that senate Democrats would decide Tuesday whether Joe Lieberman should be rewarded with the homeland security committee chairmanship after his support for Republicans during the 2008 campaign.

As a chairman of one of our significant committees in the Senate, not just going off and supporting a presidential candidate of the other side but also criticizing the candidate on our side, and also involving himself in a couple of senate races on the other side. The question is, is that acceptable? The answer is no.

...

I was concerned and was upset about what happened earlier this year, but you know what, we turn the page, we'll make a decision about that on Tuesday.

Dorgan added that kicking Lieberman out of the caucus was not on the table. Here's video:

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Three basically unrelated stories about my hometown:

1. For the first time since the 1920s, there's been a population drop in Las Vegas. Clark County's official estimate shows a drop of 10,000 (0.5%), but another measure suggests an even steeper decline: housing vacancies have risen from 4.5% to 7%.
2. MGM Mirage CEO Terri Lannie abruptly announced his retirement this week, possibly precipitated by a story suggesting that he had falsely claimed an MBA from USC. On the other hand, the reason might be more fundamental: MGM Mirage stock is down 87% this year.
3. Peter Eastgate won the World Series of Poker earlier this week. At 22 years old, Eastgate is the youngest WSOP Main Event winner ever, pushing aside Phil Hellmuth who had formerly held that title. Also, this year the WSOP experimented with a terrible new format idea: delaying the final table for months after the initial stages of the tournament. There's a number of reasons why this is bad for poker (imagine playing the Super Bowl three months after the conference championship games), but it seems to have contributed to a boost to the TV ratings, which were up 50% over last year, and 18% over 2003.