An immensely depressing article in the Times about how the Gaza war has marginalized and enfeebled the Palestinian Authority (essentially Fatah), even where it runs things in the West Bank.
--Josh Marshall
Worth taking a moment to see this slide show of photographs of the key members of Obama's team, photographed by Nadav Kander for the New York Times.
--Josh Marshall
I guess it made for 36 hours of good headlines. But as was pretty obvious when this story broke, Geithner's going to sail right through. If even Grassley's saying nice things, it's just hard to get up much drama on this one.
--Josh Marshall
I noticed that today's Gallup numbers had President Bush inching a speck up to a 34% approval, the highest he's had in about a year. But what really strikes me is the internals. Democrats and Independents still live in one country while Republicans live in another one entirely. Approval among Dems is at 6%; among Independents 28%; among Republicans, 75%.
Different worlds. And even without Bush it's where the country is, what Obama faces.
--Josh Marshall
Feds promise billions more to Bank of America to help close their purchase of Merrill Lynch.
--Josh Marshall
Coming out tonight ...
In an exit interview with PBS's Jim Lehrer on the NewsHour airing tonight, Vice President Cheney repeats claims that Saddam Hussein worked with al-Qaeda. Asked if he made any mistakes in his eight years as V.P., Cheney only mentions underestimating the psychological harm Saddam had done to his own people. He said his administration bore no blame for the economic problem and the terror threat was inherited because of the poor handling by previous presidents.And he shrugged off a statement today by a key figure, who used to work under him, calling the handling of one terror suspect out-and-out "torture."
--Josh Marshall
Gannett is going to put most of its U.S. employees on a one-week unpaid furlough during the first quarter to cut costs.
--David Kurtz
A TPMCafe Reader/Blogger brought this up. And I've been wondering about it too. In The Politico yesterday Roger Simon asked whether the differing fates (in terms of senate aspirations) of Roland Burris and Caroline Kennedy proves that "the race card trumps the gender card in U.S. politics."
But doesn't it actually prove that you're in a much stronger position to get seated in the senate if the governor of your state appoints you to the senate (like Burris) than if he or she doesn't (like Kennedy)?
What am I missing? The Senate Dems caved because they ended up having no legal argument. I'm not sure how Caroline Kennedy is in any worse position than I am since we're both New York state residents who've yet to be appointed to the senate by Gov. Paterson.
--Josh Marshall
A recent Justice Department report found that John Tanner, the former head of DOJ's voting-rights section, told a colleague he liked his coffee "Mary Frances Berry style -- black and bitter." Berry, an African-American, was at the time the chair of the US Commission on Civil Rights, which works to protect voting rights.
This is hardly the only piece of evidence that Tanner -- who it it appears is still on the DOJ payroll, and still working on voting issues -- might not be the best person to be safeguarding Americans' right to vote.
See Tanner's record in all its glory:
Full-size video at TPMtv.com.
Late Update: We refer in the video to Tanner's support for a Georgia voter ID law that an appeals court later likened to a Jim Crow era poll tax. But we should have mentioned that the US Supreme Court ultimately upheld the law.
Late Late Update: In fact, the US Supreme Court has not ruled on the Georgia law. A district court at first rejected it, then upheld it after it had been modified so that voters could obtain an ID for free. That decision is currently being appealed.
--Zachary Roth
Republicans make Sen. Vitter (R-Bordello) point man on opposing TARP 2.0 bailout funds.
--Josh Marshall
bin Laden no longer for negotiations over Gaza. Calls for outright jihad.
--Josh Marshall
The Geithner nomination seems to be basically still on track -- housekeeper and tax issues notwithstanding. That and the day's other political news in the TPM Election Central Morning Roundup.
--David Kurtz
Real change almost always comes in the face of crisis. So if you believe that Global Warming is real and that sometime soon will have to be confronted in a big way ... and if you believe that our reliance on oil is not only an environmental threat but a threat to our economic security and national security as well ... and if you believe that we need to start manufacturing 
things that people in other countries want to buy, when else do you expect real change to come on these issues -- a real start on the big changes -- if not now?
It's a lot to expect early in an administration. But look through a couple centuries of our history and you'll see that there are just no examples of administrations that started small and did big things in year 2 or 4 or 6. That doesn't happen. Look at Roosevelt, Johnson, Reagan, presidents pack their biggest punch on day one. And even though many big things can happen in subsequent years, the presidencies are almost always defined at the beginning. Later triumphs and reforms grow from the changed political terrain created at the outset.
A lot I've written over the last few weeks that's been critical of what seems to me like a too little ambitious approach from Obama. But I base that on a belief that the current economic crisis is just the immediate hole we find ourselves in, perhaps the immediate manifestation of these other deep and critical challenges I noted above -- all tied to unsustainable reliance on fossil fuels, financialization of the US economy and decline of US manufacturing. I don't think we have much time to spare.
--Josh Marshall
You've likely heard some brief mention of Marcus Schrenker, a penny-ante Bernie Madoff, who tried for the spectacular getaway as his life of scheming and defrauding began to crumble around him. 
With defrauded investors coming from one side and state investigators closing in on the other, Schrenker hatched the idea of faking his own death in a plane crash.
Flying from Indiana to Florida, he radioed in a distress call from his single engine plane, telling air traffic controllers a cockpit window had imploded leaving him bleeding profusely. He then donned his parachuted and jumped out of the plane at roughly 2500 ft. (Just jumping out of ten story building and being done with it is so passe.) Waiting for him not far from his landing zone was a motorcycle he'd prepositioned in the Alabama pine barrens.
The plan hit a fatal flaw when the military jets scrambled to intercept Schrenker's plane noticed that there was no one flying it and that the door to the cockpit was open.
After a few days on the run, officers from the Gadsden County Sheriff's office caught Schrenker tonight.
--Josh Marshall
Republicans roll out new plan to revive the economy by destroying Social Security ...
Mr. Obama has told Republicans he is open to suggestions, and Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, said his conference would urge Mr. Obama to consider a two-year suspension of payroll taxes to benefit individuals and corporations.Mr. McConnell said Senate Republicans were intensely interested in the idea, which was presented at their own weekly lunch by Lawrence B. Lindsey, who was President Bush's top economic adviser from 2001 to 2002, and John H. Makin, an economist at the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research.
--Josh Marshall
From a pool report ...
The PEOTUS departed Hay-Adams at 6:17 p.m. and at arrived at 6:34 p.m. at No. 9 Grafton St., Chevy Chase (right off the circle). Thanks to the good work of Hans Nichols (of Bloomberg and "Daily Show" fame), Montgomery County property tax records showed this is the home of conservative columnist George Will (valued at $1.9 million, according to the 2008 levy).We're still awaiting confirmation that this is indeed Will's house from the transition, but your pool is satisfied with the documentation.
Your pool has been told it's a dinner party.
And, thanks to an enterprising photographer, a shot through a window showed op-ed stalwarts William Kristol and David Brooks are also part of this unlikely gathering of tight, right suits.
Transition mouthpiece Tommy Vietor was also spied inside the manse.
--Josh Marshall
From TPM Reader D(K) ...
Doesn't it seem a little odd that when you have a ball player (Roger Clemens) who lies to Congress about steroid use in baseball, the U.S. Attorney for DC convenes a grand jury to consider a perjury indictment, but when an official of the Justice Department (Bradley Schlozman) lies to Congress about trying to politicize the civil service within DOJ, the U.S. Attorney fo DC passes on further investigation or prosecution? Which really seems like the more significant problem for the country?
--Josh Marshall
Cheney's Regrets: Why Didn't The Iraqis 'Bounce Back' More Quickly?
Asking during a wide-ranging exit interview with Jim Lehrer about mistakes he has made, Dick Cheney cited his underestimating "the extent of which the Iraqi population had been beaten down by Saddam Hussein" and their failure "to bounce back fairly quickly" after the U.S. invaded the country.
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