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This AP piece just points out what should be obvious to everyone by now -- that Barack "Change you can believe in" Obama has been filling the top ranks of his administration with Clinton era and/or beltway insiders.

What should, of course, be obvious is that such a move is probably necessary for a relative novice like President-elect Obama.  If he chose to surround himself with people who are as lacking in national experience as he is, the results would resemble . . . well, the Carter administration.

Obama is a true ideological believer when it comes to the ends he wants to pursue, but he's a hard core pragmatist about the means for achieving them.  If a certain frisson of excitement is lost among his liberal base when they learn that the West Wing will be filled with a bunch of retreads, no doubt he figures that's a trade-off everyone will be willing to make, so long as the results are worth it.  And make no mistake -- he's committed to making sure the results are worth it, at least for those on the left.

In trying to resurrect conservatism and the Republican party, I fear there’s a whole segment of our country we can never reach. These people, whether rich or poor, are not our natural constituents. These are the people to whom things are owed.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi say Detroit automakers should propose their own bailout package. Other senators would like to pass give the Big Three a $25 billion in assistance.

Democratic leadership refuses to consider bankruptcy as an option for the Big Three automakers and doesn't appear to have any solutions to save Detroit, either.

"We are kicking the can down the road because that gives us the chance to do something positive," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D.-Nev.) told reporters in a Capitol Hill press conference Thursday afternoon.

Democrats say bankruptcy has been ruled out although Washington could do little to rescue General Motors, Ford and Chrysler from that outcome if their companies ran out of money before federal funds could be allocated to them.

“We reject those who are advocating bankruptcy for the industry, we reject that,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said.

Aside from that, Democrats have made no other decisions. Instead, Democrats are putting pressure on auto executives to find their own solution.

“Until they show us a plan, we cannot show them the money,” Pelosi said.

A bipartisan group of senators would like to spend $25 billion on a federal "bridge loan" program for Detroit.

"The decision has been made by the leaders to bring us back on December 8th after there have been some hearings on the plan," said Michigan Sen. Carl Levin (D.-Mich.), one of the architects of the proposal.

The other senators pushing the $25 billion loan program are Sens. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.), Sen. George Voinovich (R.-Ohio) and Sen. Kit Bond (R.-Mo.).

COLMES: I wonder if conservatism killed talk radio; or, at least, talk radio as we’ve known it. We’ve already seen what conservatism has done to the country.  Surely talk radio doesn’t need to confine itself primarily to only those who agree with the right, especially at a time when even many Republicans are disgusted with what has become of their movement.  A new day for America politically may mean a new day for a medium that can be invigorated by a changing climate.

Congressman Wally Herger (R.-Calif.). He is seeking the position of Ranking Member on the House Ways & Means Committee

As a longtime member of the powerful Ways and Means committee Rep. Wally Herger (R.-Calif.) thinks it’s time to start speaking directly to the public what his committee does and how it will impact their day-to-day lives.

“We need to do a better job communicating with the grassroots,” Herger said. “The issues before Ways and Means are free trade agreements, taxes, entitlements and we have a chairman who promised to put across the mother of all tax hikes.”

The chairman Herger referred to is the ultra-liberal Rep. Charlie Rangel (D.-N.Y.) who currently leads the only committee designated with the authority to raise taxes. The Constitution dictates all revenue-raising bills must originate from the House and that duty is delegated to the Ways & Means Committee. Therefore, Rangel has a tremendous amount of control of tax policy.

Herger would like to be Rangel’s Republican counterpart as the new Ranking Member of the committee. And he’d like to rally support for conservative positions on Ways & Means issues through a new website created with the purpose of making complex legislation easier to understand.

“We can be friendly but we can very aggressively go out, and as Paul Harvey says, tell the rest of the story” through the website Herger said.

Herger lays out the reasons for he should be selected on his site which contains detailed position statements on taxes, entitlement reform, trade and health care and his conservative approaches of governance in each of those areas.

The California congressman is challenging Rep. Dave Camp (R.-Mich.) for the slot as Ranking Member of the committee. As a Way & Means member Herger has consistently voted for balanced budgets and lower taxes. He has a lifetime American Conservative Union rating of 96 percent to Camp’s 89 percent.

The Ranking Member will be selected by the Republican Steering Committee which is comprised sometime in early December.

Herger said will continue his online outreach on Ways & Means issues regardless of whether he becomes Ranking Member or not.

"We are ready to do whatever is demanded of us" in order to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, IAF commander Maj. -Gen. Ido Nehushtan told German magazine Der Spiegel in an interview published Tuesday.

Nehushtan told the magazine that whether a military strike is eventually decided upon is a political question and not an issue of Israel's military capabilities.

A strike against Iran's nuclear facilities "is a political decision," the IAF commander said, "but if I understand it correctly, all options are on the table… The Air Force is a very robust and flexible force. We are ready to do whatever is demanded of us."

Siegfried Hecker of Stanford University and a former director of the Los Alamos weapons laboratory said the growing size of the Iranian stockpile "underscored that they are marching down the path to developing the nuclear weapons option."

Congratulations to Hillary (and Bill) Clinton - who seem to have won the presidential election, despite the official results on Nov. 4.That's certainly a reasonable conclusion, anyway, based on the folks President-elect Obama is eyeing for his administration - folks such as former Clinton officials Eric Holder and Rahm Emanuel and Hillary Clinton herself.