President-elect Barack Obama may already be in the process of alienating the dovish elements of his coalition for change.  According to a story in Thursday's Los Angeles Times, some of the names being discussed as potential Cabinent members in the Obama administration -- current Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Sen. Hillary Clinton, for example -- have antiwar groups worried about the new president's foreign policy.

"There's so much Obama hero worship, we're having to walk this line where we can't directly criticize him," Kevin Martin, the executive director of Peace Action, told the Times. "But we are expressing concern."

Kelly Dougherty, of Iraq Veterans Against the War, agreed, saying, "Obama ran his campaign around the idea the war was not legitimate, but it sends a very different message when you bring in people who supported the war from the beginning."

It seems that the antiwar groups might have gotten ahead of themselves, and started expecting too much from Obama. During the campaign, he'd made it clear that his plan to withdraw from Iraq over the course of his first 16 months in office would be subject to change if the situation on the ground changed. "I've always said that the pace of withdrawal would be dictated by the safety and security of our troops and the need to maintain stability. That assessment has not changed," he said in July. And a former Obama foreign policy advisor told the BBC in March that her boss' plan is a "best-case scenario." 

Besides, while Cabinet appointments clearly affect policy, there's not necessarily a perfect correlation between the two. In some ways, Obama's decisions on these appointments could help him successfully implement a more liberal foreign policy. Writing for CNN.com on Wednesday, Steve Clemons argued this point, saying:

If Obama wants to change the strategic game on Iran, Israel-Palestine, Syria, Cuba, Russia and other challenges, he will need partners who are perceived as tough, smart, shrewd and even skeptical of the deals he wants to do. Clinton is all of these.

Clinton may be the bad cop to Obama's good cop. Because she is trusted by Pentagon-hugging national security conservatives, she may legitimize his desire to respond to this pivot point in American history with bold strokes rather than incremental ones.

Bill O'Reilly has competition for his reputation as the most dedicated soldier fighting against the "War on Christmas." In a column in Thursday's Wall Street Journal, Daniel Henninger, the deputy editor of the paper's editorial page, put himself on the front lines. Henniger argues that our inability to say "Merry Christmas" was a main factor leading to our current economic crisis. Henniger writes (h/t ThinkProgress):

This year we celebrate the desacralized "holidays" amid what is for many unprecedented economic ruin -- fortunes halved, jobs lost, homes foreclosed. People wonder, What happened? One man's theory: A nation whose people can't say "Merry Christmas" is a nation capable of ruining its own economy...

Responsibility and restraint are moral sentiments. Remorse is a product of conscience. None of these grow on trees. Each must be learned, taught, passed down. And so we come back to the disappearance of "Merry Christmas."

It has been my view that the steady secularizing and insistent effort at dereligioning America has been dangerous. That danger flashed red in the fall into subprime personal behavior by borrowers and bankers, who after all are just people. Northerners and atheists who vilify Southern evangelicals are throwing out nurturers of useful virtue with the bathwater of obnoxious political opinions.

The point for a healthy society of commerce and politics is not that religion saves, but that it keeps most of the players inside the chalk lines. We are erasing the chalk lines.

If you thought the threat of subversive, depraved hedonism was contained to San Francisco, the American Family Association wants you to think again.

“They’re Coming to Your Town” is the title of a DVD the AFA is selling for suggested donations of $14.95 a pop. “They’re Coming” sounds the usual alarms, warning: “The Eureka Springs they knew is gone. It is now a national hub for homosexuals. Eureka Springs is becoming the San Francisco of Arkansas.”

The apparent cause for concern is the city council’s unanimous passage of a domestic partnership registry for gay couples. “They’ve come out of the closet,” shudders one fellow in the DVD trailer.

AFA calls the city council “homosexual controlled,” and claims that “a handful of homosexual activists infiltrated the Eureka Springs, Arkansas government,” as if gay residents of the town were an espionage cell. And the group doesn't exactly add to its credibility with the desperate-sounding sales pitch at the end of the trailer: "Learn the strategies used by gay activists, and don't let this happen to your city. This DVD is a must teaching tool. Watch, and learn, how to fight a well-organized gay agenda to take over the cities of America, one city at a time. 'If it's not happening in your town, get ready, because it is going to happen.' Show it at home, in Sunday schools, bible studies, or community groups. Purchase your copy, or a five-pack to share with others today! And spread the news -- they're coming to your town."

Of course, this is the organization that's selling this as a Christmas decoration. Hey, I guess it only looks like a burning cross.

(Hat tip to Andrew Sullivan.)

Shortly after Democrats retook Congress in 2006, conservatives began sounding the warning bell -- the left was salivating over the prospect of bringing back the Fairness Doctrine, and its restoration was surely imminent. And if the democrats had their way, conservative talk radio as we know it would soon be a thing of the past.

But, as I wrote in an article way back in April of 2007, there's a distinct lack of evidence to support the right's concerns. At the time, when I contacted spokesmen for two Democratic members of Congress who'd have to play a key role in any restoration of the Fairness Doctrine, weren't even really sure what I was talking about. "I'm not aware that there's any kind of debate about the Fairness Doctrine," Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, said. "To be honest, I barely even know what it is ... [Sen. Reid] is not contemplating anything like that. It truly is not on his radar screen." (For the record, the Fairness Doctrine is an old FCC rule that said broadcasters had to provide balance in any opinion broadcasting; it was scrapped during the Reagan administration.)

With the election of Barack Obama to the presidency, the chorus of fear has only grown louder. But The New Republic's Marin Cogan showed, in an article published Wednesday, that there's still no reason to believe Democrats are really planning to "Hush Rush."

Cogan writes:

I looked at Obama's position--and it turns out that he doesn't want the policy reinstated. Then I called the array of Democratic congressmen who had been tagged by conservatives as doctrine proponents. But they all denied any intention to push for its reinstatement... Responses from the offices of most of the Democrats who have been pegged as fairness-doctrine proponents--[Chuck] Schumer, Dick Durbin, Dianne Feinstein, and others--have ranged from a firm denial that the issue is a priority at all to disbelief at finding themselves at the center of a manufactured controversy.

Thursday morning, House Democrats voted 137-122 to make California Rep. Henry Waxman chair of the House Energy and Commerce committee, replacing longtime Chairman John Dingell of Michigan.

The vote wasn't just mundane political infighting -- it could have major implications on energy and environmental policies. Dingell represents a state that depends on the auto industry; if he were chair of the committee, he likely would have posed a major obstacle to the Obama administration's goals on both fronts.

As Salon's Andrew Leonard wrote in a post over at How the World Works on Wednesday, "Many activists consider Dingell to have been a steadfast opponent of tougher fuel economy standards. His 2007 proposal to tax carbon emissions was widely viewed as a sneaky political maneuver aimed at equating climate change action with big new taxes. Waxman, on the other hand, favors an aggressive approach to tackling climate change and other environmental issues."

Opponents of Proposition 8 may not have won at the ballot box, but they will get their day in court.

The proposition, which California voters approved on Election Day, overturned an earlier state supreme court decision and banned same-sex marriage. Now, the court will consider lawsuits brought by proponents of same-sex marriage who are asking that the initiative be invalidated. According to the Los Angeles Times, California's governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, has said he thinks the court will rule for the plaintiffs, and he supports that result.

The court's seven justices voted against a stay of the initiative, meaning that same-sex marriages can not continue while the case is considered. A hearing may be held as soon as March.

The recount in the race for one of Minnesota's Senate seats began Wednesday morning. By the end of the day, it was already about 18 percent complete, and challenger Al Franken had gained on incumbent Republican Sen. Norm Coleman.

Before the recount, Franken trailed Coleman by 215 votes. Now, according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, that gap is down to 174 votes.

CNN is reporting late Wednesday night that President-elect Barack Obama wants Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano to head the Department of Homeland Security.

In Arizona political circles, talk has been building since before the election about what Napolitano might do in an Obama administration -- she endorsed Obama early, though she wasn't able to deliver Arizona in the state's Feb. 5 primary. Some people in Phoenix had speculated that Napolitano might be up for consideration as attorney general, but now that seems to be going to Eric Holder.

A big part of the DHS job would be dealing with illegal immigration; the department includes all the federal border security and immigration agencies. Napolitano has already made that a major focus back home. More undocumented immigrants cross the border in Arizona than in any other state, thanks to years of federal policy that has funneled migrants into the state's harsh desert (where they're more easily tracked by Border Patrol agents before they reach urban areas, though the crossing is far more dangerous). Napolitano surprised some immigration advocates when she endorsed a state law last year that calls for Arizona to strip business licenses from companies that knowingly employ undocumented workers, and she was calling for the federal government to send National Guard troops to the border well before President Bush finally did so in 2006.

Obama transition sources didn't answer e-mailed questions about Napolitano late Tuesday night, but Arizona political observers believe it's all but a done deal. Napolitano, apparently, is not talking about an appointment back home -- which, given the secrecy the transition team has said it's aiming for, could mean she is up for a job. If she leaves the statehouse in Phoenix, Republican Secretary of State Jan Brewer would replace her.

What this rumor does to the other big rumor in Arizona politics -- that Napolitano wants to run for John McCain's Senate seat in 2010, whether McCain retires or not -- is a little uncertain for now.

With Mark Begich winning in Alaska, Jeff Merkley victorious in Oregon and Al Franken hot on Norm Coleman’s heels, it looks like the Democrats' quest for 60 Senate seats is headin’ on down to Georgia, where early voting has begun in a run-off between Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss and Democratic challenger Jim Martin. 

Democrats are fighting an uphill battle in the red state: A Rasmussen poll shows Martin 4 points back and Georgia’s secretary of state reports a decrease in African-American turnout. But the party is doing its best to take the seat, and hoping that some of the residual enthusiasm from Barack Obama's win will help Martin.

Meanwhile, Republicans are doing their best to make sure this ends up as more than a war of Democratic aggression. Both parties have begun diverting significant resources, including some big names, to the peach state. John McCain and Mike Huckabee have already stumped for Chambliss. Bill Clinton is putting his weight behind Martin. And Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani and Al Gore are on their way, as are a host of Obama campaign operatives. The Republican National Committee has committed 2 million dollars to helping the Chambliss campaign, and the National Republican Senatorial Committee has begun airing ads that claim Martin helped create the biggest tax hike in Georgia history.

The run-off was mandated by Georgia election rules, which say that a candidate needs to receive a majority of the vote in order to be elected. On Nov. 4th, Libertarian candidate Allen Buckley kept both Chambliss and Martin from hitting the 50 percent plus one mark. Buckley -- who will not be on the ballot this time around -- is embracing his spoiler status and showing, as they say in Georgia, a bit of chutzpah. He's has now said that in order to receive his endorsement Chambliss and Martin would have to sign on to a lengthy statement of principles. Neither is likely to do so.

Update: Due to an editing error, the original version of this post mistakenly identified Senator-elect Jeff Merkley as Gordon Merkley. Our apologies, and thanks, to the readers who pointed out the mistake.

With Jan. 20th approaching fast, the Bush administration is racing to weaken air-quality standards in and around parks and wilderness areas.

The move could pave the way for two dozen new coal-fired power plants to be built near national parks. And of all the Bush administration's attacks on clear-air regulations, this one is so egregious that half of the regional managers within the Environmental Protection Agency have formally dissented from it, according to documents obtained by the Washington Post. Senior agency officials in the Southeast, West and Great Lakes areas have voiced fierce resistance to the proposal, which would have the effect of legalizing temporary spikes in pollution from coal-fired power plants, oil refineries and other big polluters.

While air quality in national parks isn't as important to public health as more general soot and airborne lead pollution regulations, it's of huge symbolic and ecological value. Many parks, such as the Shenandoah National Park, struggle with poor air quality, shrouding stunning vistas from view. At that park, visitors in the 1930s reported seeing the Washington Monument more than 70 miles away. These days visibility is often barely a mile.

The ugly news: the EPA could issue a final rule as soon as this week, over the objections of many of its managers. But if the rule is enacted, the National Parks Conservation Association plans to petition the agency for reconsideration. That would provide a window for the Obama administration to throw the sooty policy out.