Michael Ramirez cartoon for December 2, 2008 at Investor's Business Daily.

Barack Obama may have flip-flopped on Hillary’s foreign policy experience, but that’s small potatoes. Allahpundit, in a post at Hot Air, writes that lying is to be expected from the President-elect, but the more important issue is that he has made ambassador to the U.N. a Cabinet-level position, signaling to Hillary Clinton that she can be replaced, and that Obama means business when he says he wants soft diplomacy to play a bigger role in his administration.

Advice to Obama: don’t repeat the mistakes of Hoover and Roosevelt. Investor’s Business Daily points out this economic downturn is serious but by no means as severe as the Depression, but warns that we still ought to heed past lessons. In a nutshell: support free trade, cut taxes across the board, don’t rely on big government projects as economic stimuli, and support the Fed as it cuts rates.

Piracy is one of those unconventional threats Washington worries about: so get ‘em where it hurts. Seth Cropsey argues on The Weekly Standard’s blog and in an article that arming merchant vessels and increasing Navy patrols may help, but nothing will work quite so well as finding and attacking the pirates on shore (in Somalia), something the Russians have suggested.

Chambliss’ win in Georgia could spell a tough midterm election for Dems in 2010. When Saxby Chambliss beat Jim Martin by 16 points in what was expected to be a very close race, Democrats lost their chance at a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. Ed Morrissey at Hot Air argues that Democratic gains in 2008 don’t mark an endorsement of their policies and warns them against moving any farther to the left. The win also means Senate Dems will be unlikely to step in and decide the outcome in Minnesota, where Al Franken is caught up in a protracted recount effort—not without a chance for 60 in the Senate, argues Gary Gross at Let Freedom Ring.

Gay marriage won’t be all bad, but enough with the scorched-earth tactics, says Jonah Goldberg in an opinion piece for the L.A. Times. Goldberg cites vandalism against Mormon temples, mailing envelopes filled with white powder to Mormons, Mormon blacklists, and points out angrily that the Hollywood liberals who would decry McCarthyism are employing the same methods against proponents of Prop 8.

Don’t compare Bush to Nixon, says Fox News journalist Chris Wallace to film director Ron Howard. Wallace was at a film screening for Howard’s new movie, Frost/Nixon, about the former president who resigned after the Watergate scandal. Wallace argued that Nixon’s crimes were motivated purely by personal political gain, while President George W. Bush’s (referring to rendition and waterboarding) were motivated by a desire to protect his country. So there.

Unlike President Bush whose approval ratings are dismal, President-elect Barack Obama has received high approval ratings for his transition to the White House. A recent USA Today/Gallop poll shows that 78% approve of his transition work. And Obama is picking up favor among Democrats, Republicans and Independents for his Secretary of State choice, Hillary Clinton (69% approval rate) and his decision to keep Robert Gates as the Secretary of Defense (a whopping 80% approval rate). Let’s see if these approvals maintain when they get in office.

And can you believe that a small county in Alabama created a Barack Obama holiday? Yes, it’s true. Alabama’s Perry County will observe the second Monday in November as “The Barack Obama Day.” The county’s offices will close and its 40 employees will have a paid holiday. According the article: “The sponsoring commissioner, Albert Turner Jr., said the holiday is meant to highlight the Democratic president-elect’s victory as a way to give people faith that difficult goals can be achieved.”

And more bad news for automakers… According to the Associated Press, General Motors’ sales dropped 41 percent in November and Ford’s sales also fell 31 percent last month. It appears that the U.S. automakers may need that bailout, after all. GM, Ford and Chrysler pleaded for more than $38 billion dollars of government assistance including loans Tuesday. The companies are now asking for more than the $25 billion they requested two weeks ago and state they don’t have a Plan B. An intervention of some sort is predicted based on House Speaker Pelosi recent remarks.

American car companies are not alone in their financial worries. Toyota and Honda also saw their sales plunge in November, 34 and 32 percent, respectively. With the economy in a recession and consumer confidence in the tank, it’s no wonder people aren’t buying cars—even with crazy low gas prices which hit a three-year low Tuesday.  And Chrysler’s CEO is warning that an automaker industry failure could send the country into the dreaded D-word: a depression.

One Bush leaving Capitol Hill and another one coming in? Possibly. Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor and younger brother of Pres. Bush, is considering running for Republican Mel Martinez’ Senate Seat, according to an email exchange between Bush and Politico. Martinez said he will not seek reelection on Tuesday.

When President-Elect Barack Obama introduced his nomination for secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, at his press conference on Monday, he had plenty of kind words for his former Democratic primary rival.

I believe that there’s no more effective advocate than Hillary Clinton for that well-rounded view of how we advance American interests. She has served on the Armed Services Committee in the Senate. She knows world leaders around the world. I have had extensive discussions with her both pre-election and post-election about the strategic opportunities that exist out there to strengthen America’s posture in the world.

Various news outlets have documented this thawing of two icy competitors. Politico reported that Obama kept suggesting Clinton as a possible vice presidential pick, despite his staff’s objections.

The New York Times detailed how Obama wooed Clinton over the course of the presidential campaign.

• Their first conversation post-primaries wasn’t awkward!
• Obama called Clinton on her personal cell phone after some campaign stops she made for him!
• Michelle Obama talked to Clinton about what school Malia and Sasha should attend!
• Barack Obama told Clinton as secretary of state she could pick her own staff!

Apparently Obama didn’t want to send Hillary flowers for fear that he look desperate.

Now that he has formalized a pick that people have speculated about for weeks, and known to be true since before the Thanksgiving holiday, pundits can move on to wondering just how close Obama and Clinton’s relationship will be (or if that even matters in the first place). Will they be as tight as George and Condi? Is such closeness even a good thing?

We’ve looked into the future to see what notes Obama and Clinton passed each other at those dreadfully boring national security meetings. After all, they couldn’t send texts with Obama losing his BlackBerry privileges.

Jan. 22, 2009

Hey B- sorry about bothering you late last night. Yes, I remember what you said about boundaries. It’s just that I get bored when Bill is out of town. He’s in Dubai again. Anyway … coffee later to talk about Israel? -Hil

April 25, 2009

I know it’s not basketball, but want to join me while I catch up on my spring gardening? So I need more hobbies – sue me! (R U still licensed to practice?) -Hil

Aug. 4, 2009

Hillary! Ol’ Joe was only a few days off. Thanks for answering that phone call for me. I’m so groggy in the early morning. -Barack

Sept. 5, 2009

Will you listen to Gates and Jones go on? I said I didn’t want groupthink in my Cabinet, but this arguing is getting a little ridiculous. Time to take control of the meeting again. -B

Oct. 19, 2009

Hey Hil- Back from another peace conference? You get to do so much traveling! Don’t rub it in. And I don’t need any more presents … you remember the rules on gifts to the President. But thanks for getting that copy of Avatar when you were in Beijing—James Cameron is a genius!

Nov. 25, 2009

I know it’s last minute, but what are your plans tomorrow? Got another seat at the Obama table? I’ll make sweet potato pie.

Jan. 26, 2010

Are you hiding out at the undisclosed location tonight? If not, I’ll do my best to shake your hand at the State of the Union. But even if I don’t, remember we’re still best buds! You’re coming over for waffles on Sunday, right? The girls miss Aunt Hillary.

Jan. 26, 2010

P.S.—One down, seven to go! -B

Obama’s top picks for national security constitute a “Team of Rivals.” With Hillary Clinton as secretary of state, Robert Gates as defense secretary, and former NATO commander Gen. James Jones as national security adviser, the new team members have a more hawkish record on foreign policy than the president-elect. All, however, will be pushing for a more diplomatic approach than the previous administration.

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal may be the GOP’s own superstar. Though he denies he has any plans to run for president in 2012, some see a fight coming among Jindal and other prominent Republicans. Jindal spoke in Iowa last weekend, and former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee and Alaska Governor Sarah Palin are both expected to do the same as they compete for Iowans’ attention. The chief strategist from the McCain campaign said it’s not a question of if Jindal becomes president, but when.

High-paid anchors are getting the pink slip at TV news stations across the country. In a sagging economy, it’s apparently more practical to hire fresh faces (that you can pay less) than to keep the veterans.

Two more Senate races stand between Democrats and a filibuster-proof majority. Democrat Jim Martin came just close enough on Nov. 4 to Georgia Republican incumbent Saxby Chambliss to secure a runoff. Dems now hold 58 seats in the Senate; 60 would give them the power to bulldoze legislation past Republican opposition. The other contested seat is in Minnesota between Al Franken and Norm Coleman. The recount is still underway, with Coleman ahead by 270 votes, with each side contesting nearly 3,000 ballots to be reviewed by the board.

Some consensus is emerging on universal health care in America, according to the L.A. Times. Hospitals, doctors, labor unions, major businesses, insurance companies and lawmakers are beginning to agree on what such a system would look like. They wouldn’t drop employer-provided insurance; European-style single-payer systems are “off the table.” And change is needed, according to some leading institutions, including Kaiser-Permanente and Mayo Clinic, because Americans aren’t getting their money’s worth from the current system.

Today's Michael Ramirez cartoon from Investor's Business Daily.

The current financial crisis has already cost more than World War II, writes financial blogger Barry Ritholtz, and that’s after adjusting for inflation. It’s hard to conceptualize $4.6165 trillion (Bloomberg reports it as $7.76 trillion), so try this: government bailouts, including the recent addition of Citigroup, amount to more than the cost of the Marshall Plan, the Louisiana Purchase, the race to the moon, the savings and loan crisis, the Korean War, the New Deal, the invasion of Iraq, the Vietnam War, and NASA combined.

But CEO’s with fat salaries are just a distraction. If every oil company executive worked for free, writes Thomas Sowell at National Review, it wouldn’t lower the price of a gallon of gas by a dime or the cost of a car by even one percent. It’s an age-old story in which politicians give us someone to hate and blame in order to grab more power for themselves. Example: pols pressure banks into lending to people that normally wouldn’t qualify and when the economy turns sour, they blame deregulation and call for greater government control. He’s not having it.

A Secretary of State Hillary Clinton should worry conservatives, argues Paul Mirengoff at Power Line. Many conservatives espouse America’s rights to resist international pressures and to protect its own self-government, and they are willing to project American power to do so. While Obama’s picks for national security so far have shown no great desire to shake things up, he still inclines toward moving America into the international mainstream, Mirengoff writes, and Clinton has shown no indication she’ll act as a counterweight to that.

The Holy Land Foundation is going down, and CAIR should go with it, argues Scott Johnson. HLF, a Muslim charity, was found to have given financial support to Hamas, which the U.S. lists as a terrorist organization. In two separate posts, one at Power Line and one at National Review, Johnson lays out why it is one of the government’s most significant cases against terrorist conspirators in the U.S. since 9/11, and applauds the government’s outing of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) as an un-indicted co-conspirator in the case.

At this rate, the Minnesota recount could drag on for months. Power Line blogger Scott Johnson has been following the recount, including state Senate hopeful Al Franken’s efforts to get some previously rejected absentee ballots back in the count. And he seems to be calling former Washington Democratic Party Chair Paul Berendt’s involvement in the process a “nightmare scenario.”

No need to discuss Barack Obama’s citizenship any more. Right Wing News blogger John Hawkins writes that he still receives e-mails asking why he has decided to stop writing about Obama’s legitimacy. Pointing to his post of a month earlier, he reminds those clinging to the belief that Obama is not really a citizen that the state of Hawaii has acknowledged they have a copy of his live birth certificate and that a newspaper clipping from 1961 proves he’s American. Discussion over.

Barack Obama won through media spinning and voter ignorance, or so seems to be the lesson of a popular video circulating on Youtube.

Hillary Rodham Clinton may be the next secretary of state. Obama’s team has begun to scour former president Bill Clinton’s financial ties for signs of conflict of interest, signaling to some Democratic insiders that the new administration is considering his wife for the cabinet post.

President-elect Barack Obama appeared on 60 Minutes yesterday to discuss the transition to the White House from both political and personal standpoints. He stressed the need to quickly assemble a national security team to prevent vulnerabilities to terrorist attacks during the transition, and he said it would be his job to restore confidence in the financial and consumer markets. Of course, he also had to address the issue of picking the presidential pooch. Also yesterday, Obama officially resigned from the U.S. Senate.

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Democratic National Convention protesters are being vindicated. Seven of the first nine defendants to face trial for participating in “anarchic demonstrations” have been cleared. One was convicted, and the other faces a retrial after the jury deadlocked. In all, 106 people were arrested in Denver on the opening night of the convention, and 50 of those eventually pleaded guilty. Defendants and their attorneys are calling the acquittals an embarrassment to Denver and are calling for the remaining cases to be dropped.

Dan Rather’s quest to clear himself may be paying off. The former CBS Evening News anchor had been pushed out after it came out that an investigation on 60 Minutes relied on false documents to show that President George W. Bush was given special treatment by theTexas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War. Rather has invested $2 million of his own money into a lawsuit against his former employer, and he has uncovered some documents that suggest CBS actively sought G.O.P.-approved panelists to investigate how it handled the Bush segment, apparently so the network could stop Republican criticism.

MTV’s Total Request Live had its final show on Sunday, but not without a three-hour star-jammed celebration featuring live performances by Beyoncé, Ludacris, Nelly, Snoop Dogg, Backstreet Boys and 50 Cent. Many other stars attended. Eminem and Christina Aguilera called in their congratulations. The show spanned a decade and 2,500 episodes.