MTV's Inaugural Ball for President Clinton in 1993 was as good as they get: Michael Stipe of REM, Natalie Merchant (then of 10,000 Maniacs) and Don Henley ("Democracy" here). Bill and Hillary and Al and Tipper made memorable appearances.

Fast-forward 16 years and it's definitely a change. The two biggest musical events will be the "We Are One" concert at the Lincoln Memorial on Sunday afternoon in D.C. and the Youth Inaugural Ball, from which MTV and Service Nation will host their own event, Be the Change, on Tuesday night.[More...]

The New York Times profiles Gregory Craig who will be Obama's White House counsel. In doing so, it provides this description of the types of power lawyers in Washington:

In a city consumed by power, power lawyers come in various stripes. The scandal lawyer extricates politicians from sticky situations. The celebrity lawyer represents big names. The talk-show lawyer sounds smooth on Sunday mornings. The lobbyist deal-maker lawyer uses political connections to open doors. The policy wonk lawyer advises behind the scenes.

Craig, the Times writes, is a "classic" of the protoype power lawyer. How so? [More...]

A NYTimes editorial says:

During the presidential campaign, President-elect Obama pledged numerous times to end DEA raids on individuals who use or provide medical cannabis in accordance with their state law. The U.S. Attorney General is the member of the cabinet who will implement Obama¹s criminal justice policies, including federal marijuana enforcement.

Confirmation hearings for Obama's nominee, Eric Holder, are scheduled to begin on January 15th before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, chaired by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT). Holder's past positions on drug law reform are outlined here.

Via NORML:

Please help NORML make sure the next Attorney General keeps the promises made by President-elect Obama! Call or write Senator Leahy's office at (202) 224-4242 and say:

Bumped - BTD

Update (TL) 8:47 am MT: Hillary just finished her statement. The Q and A is beginning.

The hearing on the confirmation of Sen. Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State is tomorrow before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. It's expected to be a one day hearing with a vote on Thursday.

By nearly all accounts, Hillary Clinton is on a fast track to confirmation for the premiere position in the cabinet of President-elect Barack Obama. Not only has committee chairman Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) scheduled a vote on her confirmation for Thursday, but its top Republican, Dick Lugar of Indiana, said he would vote for her before she was even officially nominated....After meeting with her last week, Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) called her nomination "a net plus for the administration and the country."

Go Hillary. This is a no-brainer. We're fortunate Obama chose her. Here's to a speedy confirmation.

President Elect Barack Obama will be on ABC's "This Week" with George Stephanopoulos this morning. What's hegoing to say?

[F]ixing our economy over the long term will require sacrifice from every American and scaling back some of his campaign promises.

Or in Obama's words:

"Everybody’s going to have to give. Everybody’s going to have to have some skin in the game," Obama said.

President-Elect Barack Obama gets his man:

Barack Obama has picked John O. Brennan as his top adviser on counterterrorism, a role that will give the CIA veteran a powerful voice on the government's use of security contractors and on other sensitive issues in which he recently has played a private-sector role.

.... The president-elect's decision comes only six weeks after Brennan was forced to pull out of contention for the directorship of the CIA because of fears that his statements supporting some controversial interrogation techniques would have complicated his confirmation.

This reminds me of Bush's tendency towards recess appointments to get around Senate confirmation. [More...]

Writing about Leon Panetta's selection as CIA Director, Ann Althouse quotes a misinformed (Brennan's statements in support of rendition and torture after leaving the CIA are what did him in, not his tenure at the CIA) NYTimes piece and draws and interesting conclusion - inside the CIA, they can not say no to torture:

[Quoting the NYTimes piece] "[Obama's] first choice for the job, John O. Brennan, had to withdraw his name amid criticism over his alleged role in the formation of the agency’s detention and interrogation program after the Sept. 11 attacks."

By contrast, Panetta wrote a piece in The Washington Monthly that said: "We cannot and we must not use torture under any circumstances. We are better than that." That's very nice, but . . . [i]f you aren't on the inside, dealing with the details and responsible for outcomes, it takes nothing to say that, and in fact, it's the most obvious opinion that anyone would take. . .

(Emphasis supplied.) Consider what Ms. Althouse is saying - that if you are "on the inside," saying no to torture is impossible. It seems to me that if that is true, then clearly the CIA could not have leadership come from inside its shop. More . . .

NYTimes:

President-elect Barack Obama has selected Leon E. Panetta, the former congressman and White House chief of staff, to take over the Central Intelligence Agency, an organization that Mr. Obama criticized during the campaign for using interrogation methods he decried as torture, Democratic officials said Monday.

. . . Aides have said Mr. Obama had originally hoped to select a C.I.A. head with extensive field experience, especially in combating terrorist networks. But his first choice for the job, John O. Brennan, had to withdraw his name amidst criticism over his role in the formation of the C.I.A’s detention and interrogation program after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Good for Obama for not letting the CIA's torture apologists pressure him into naming one of their own. The President-Elect makes it clear that torture will not be tolerated in his administration. As Panetta wrote in a March 2008 Washington Monthly article:

President-Elect Barack Obama today named four people to fill top spots in the Justice Department, which presumably will be headed by his nominee Eric Holder. They are:

• David Ogden for Deputy AG, the #2 spot. "Mr. Ogden, also a senior official in the Clinton Justice Department, has led the transition at the Justice Department since Mr. Obama’s election and has long been rumored as the front-runner for the #2 post."

• Dawn Johnsen to lead the Office of Legal Counsel..."A professor at Indiana University law school, she served on an acting basis as head of the office of legal counsel in 1997 and 1998 in the Clinton administration."

More...

Via Politico, Obama aides are now saying Richardson was pressed for information about the federal grand jury investigation into a possible "pay for play" situation and was not forthcoming. Others are putting the blame on Obama's transition team, saying the vetting of Richardson was inadequate.

There's also a second area of inquiry Republicans were likely to focus on during Richardson's confirmation hearings.

In addition, Senate Republicans told Politico ahead of Richardson's confirmation hearing that they were looking into questions about Richardson’s connection to a San Diego-based software company that came under investigation from the Securities and Exchange Commission.

More...

NYTimes:

Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico confirmed in a statement released Sunday afternoon that he has withdrawn his name as the commerce secretary nominee, citing a pending “investigation of a company that has done businesswith New Mexico state government.”

What's the investigation about? From a 12/19 NYTimes article: