CHANGE: Obama Hits New Low in McClatchy Poll.

IOWAHAWK: OBAMA NAMES BILL CLINTON TO PRESIDENTIAL POST.

Ending weeks of speculation and rumors, President-Elect Barack Obama today named Bill Clinton to join his incoming administration as President of the United States, where he will head the federal government’s executive branch.

“I am pleased that Bill Clinton has agreed to come out of retirement to head up this crucial post in my administration,” said Obama. “He brings a lifetime of previous executive experience as Governor of Arkansas and President of the United States, and has worked closely with most of the members of my Cabinet.”

Clinton said he was “excited and honored” by the appointment, and would work “day and night” to defeat all the key policy objectives proposed by Mr. Obama during the campaign.

Heh. Read the whole thing.

Related: ‘Something Very, Very Weird is Going on in Washington.’

AT AMAZON, it’s the holiday toy list. I ordered my six-year-old nephew the Snap Circuits SC-750 electronic project kit. I’ve ordered him the junior versions in the past, but he seems to be such a prodigy that this year I’m taking him up to the big version.

UPDATE: Science fiction writer Sarah Hoyt (author of Darkship Thieves) emails:

On the snap-circuits toy — not only did my younger son love it, but shortly after we moved to this house (when he was eight) we had a power outage and couldn’t find our battery radio to figure out what was going on and if there was any real danger/need to evacuate. The kid assembled us a “radio” in minutes. Okay, you had to put your finger on it and serve as a living antenna to hear it, but it served its purpose. So, it’s a toy AND disaster preparedness equipment. :)

Great story, and I’ll bet he’ll remember that he did that for the rest of his life.

HEH: Great news: Bill Clinton apparently now president again. “I can’t do justice to what you’re about to see. The spectacle of the president bugging out of his own press conference to go to a Christmas party is weird enough, but having Clinton back at the White House podium fielding questions on the hottest domestic issue of the day shoots past deja vu and lands firmly in ‘am I hallucinating?’ territory.”

WAR AGAINST PHOTOGRAPHY UPDATE: Black teen who filmed an LAUSD campus cop hitting a student faces bizarre charges and years in prison.

On Dec. 2, Jeremy Marks, a Verdugo Hills High School special education student, was offered a new plea offer by the L.A. County District Attorney: If he pled guilty to charges of obstructing an officer, resisting arrest, criminal threats and “attempted lynching,” he’d serve only 32 months in prison.

That actually was an improvement from the previous offer made to the young, black high schooler — seven years in prison.

The D.A. then handed Angela Berry-Jacoby, Mark’s lawyer, a stack of 130 documents, and the message within those thick files was clear: She says District Attorney Steve Cooley’s prosecution team plans to try to discredit Marks, and several other Verdugo Hills High School students on the witness stand, by dragging out misbehavior incidents from their school records over the years.

Marks, 18, has been sitting in Peter Pitchess Detention Center, a tough adult jail, since May 10. Bail was set at $155,000, which his working-class parents can’t pay to free their son for Christmas. His mother is a part-time clerk at a city swimming pool, his father is a lab tech.

The first thing to understand is that Jeremy Marks touched no one during his “attempted lynching” of LAUSD campus police officer Erin Robles.

The second is that Marks’ weapon was the camera in his cell phone.

There’s an “attempted lynching,” all right, but . . . .

More here: The Curious Case of Jeremy Marks: Student Accused of Trying to Lynch a Campus Cop.

UPDATE: Reader C.J. Burch emails: “Campus cops, like teachers, only have the nerve to make trouble for the kids they think won’t give them a bad time back.”

JIM TREACHER: Did Obama Just Quit? “Say what you want about Sarah Palin quitting her job, but at least she finished her own press conference.”

GOOGLE’S CRUSADE AGAINST CAPSLOCK.

THE BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST at Columbia University.

UPDATE: Piling on: Palin-hating Columbia Professor, Huffington Post Blogger Busted for Incest.

Plus, from the comments: “Us folks down here in Arkansas want signed apologies from the Ivy League for all the nasty jokes. As do the people in the Appalachians, probably.”

A NEW, IMPROVED VW Microbus? The neo-retro approach somehow makes me think of a Ford Flex. Which is a compliment.

UPDATE: Reader Erik Fortune writes: “Speaking as a Flex owner, thanks for saying thatJ. We absolutely love ours!”

They seem like good vehicles. I’ve never driven one, but I like their looks and everyone I’ve spoken to who owns one likes it. When I was toying with the idea of replacing my Toyota Highlander Hybrid the Flex was on the shortlist, but I decided to hang on to it a while longer.

IS SPENDING THE G.O.P.’S GLOBAL WARMING?

See, no one believes the Democrats on Global Warming. Why? Because they live in big houses, fly on their private jets, and consume more than the average aggregate of a third world country.

Liberals aren’t using outhouses. They drive Hummers. They have fleets of submarines. They cool their homes. They are, in short, unserious about the Cataclysm That Is Upon Us.

So, we don’t take them seriously and go about living our lives.

The Republican version of The World Is Going To End, has been spending. And, for once, it’s not hyperbole. The United States is in a very precarious financial position. . . . The Republicans risk undermining their credibility. The bill before Congress RAISES taxes on estates by 35%–so those farms that change hands? Yeah, the taxes will put many of them out of business.

There will be pork and spending and as soon as January rolls around, we’ll hear about all these cutting ideas that the Democrats will hate.

So, while I see the reasons for passing the bill right now, I worry about the Republicans undermining themselves long term.

GOP leaders should be worrying about that. But they may just be thinking, hey, Al Gore made a lot of money before his credibility was lost. . . .

CALIFORNIA’S HIGH-SPEED RAIL OFF TO AWFUL START: “There are a lot of critics when it comes to high-speed rail. So what does California do? They approve the first section of HSR rail to be built without trains or electricity. This has bad idea written all over it. . . . No trains, no maintenance facilities, just empty tracks and stations. Que?”

HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE? Utah Regents adopt plan to push most adults through college by 2020.

On Thursday, the Regents approved the 100-page Higher Ed Utah 2020 Plan, crafted at the request of Gov. Gary Herbert, after months of meetings and consultations. The plan seeks to get more students into college and earning degrees — currently less than 50 percent graduate — while promoting the role of higher education in economic innovation and workforce development.

How? By expanding need-based aid, embracing instructional technology and conducting classes online, shoring up the community college mission at the state’s regional universities, and subsidizing associate degree-seeking students, among dozens of other recommendations.

Then there is the unaddressed question of how to pay for it.

Hmm. Maybe they should read this, first.

UPDATE: Utah Tea Party organizer David Kirkham emails:

When I first went to Poland I could not believe how many people had advanced degrees. Phd’s abounded everywhere I went. But stop and think. Why was I there in Poland in the first place? I was there to make cars in a once mighty MiG fighter factory that was desperate for work. PZL-Mielec was a company that was “too big to fail.” I was there the day it crashed. Our arrival offered hope in a factory that was long forsaken by its government.

How did I get there? I convinced a wealthy friend of my father’s to loan me the money to start our company. If all his money had been taxed away, I could have never started our company and hired all the people we now employ today. Even in this economy we are still hiring.

All those degrees didn’t make Poland, or any other country in the Soviet Bloc, prosper. Only freedom will lift a nation–and its people–from poverty.

You wrote, “Hmmm, maybe they should read this first…”

How about, “Maybe they should remember what the Utah Tea Party thought about Senator Bennett.” We won’t stand for overspending in Utah any more than we will in the US Senate.”

Indeed.

AT AMAZON, it’s the Friday Sale.

HELP ME BUBBA-WAN, YOU’RE MY ONLY HOPE! “This afternoon, President Barack Obama held a White House meeting with the last Democrat to hold that office, and the only Democrat to win re-election to that office since LBJ, Bill Clinton. After the meeting, the two held a brief press conference in which Obama offered a quick introduction before turning the Q&A over to Clinton. . . . And then, an extraordinary thing happened. Obama said he had kept the First Lady waiting for half an hour, and told the press they were in ‘good hands.’ And he left the briefing. Clinton did not. The former President continued the press conference, the logo of the White House behind him in what looked like a flashback to his pre-Monica days.”

Those rumors that White House insiders are worried by Obama’s disengagement just got a lot more credible . . . .

UPDATE: Reader Bill Gasper (along with several other readers) takes issue with the quoted passage:

“The only Democrat to win re-election to that office since LBJ”, I don’t think so, he was only elected once, don’t recall a 1963 election. Truman wasn’t reelected either, no 1945 election, FDR would be the last one before Mr Clinton.

Well, LBJ, like Truman, was an incumbent whom the voters returned to office. That’s not quite re-elected, but it’s awfully close.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Matt Miller emails:

Maybe they need to create another phony seal to put on the podium, something like “The Office of the Stand-in for the President of the United States”.

Let’s face it this guy has never held a real job for any length of time before moving on to something else. Accountability is tough.

Indeed. And unfamiliar.

CHANGE: Why I’d rather my daughter marry a rich man than have a brilliant career.

IS BATMAN A State Actor? This and other superhero related issues are explored at the Law And The Multiverse blog.

CHICAGO’S GUN CATCH-22: You Must Get Gun Range Training. But You Can’t Get Gun Range Training.

JOEL ROSENBERG: The Empire Strikes Back.

AN INFRARED ADD-ON could let standard digital cameras diagnose cancer.

OBAMACARE UPDATE: White House Concedes Individual Mandate Is Not Severable.

SOME BACKGROUND on WikiLeaks.

LIFEHACKER’S guide to weblog comments.

JONAH GOLDBERG: “If Obama had pushed a one-year suspension of the payroll tax instead of the first stimulus, wouldn’t the country — and Obama – be much better off right now?” That approach was always a non-starter. Insufficient opportunities for graft.

BECAUSE THE LAST THING THEY NEED IS NEW ENTRY-LEVEL JOBS: New Fast Food Restaurants Banned in South L.A.

LOOKING FOR A YEAR-END CHARITABLE DONATION? Consider donating money to The Foresight Institute, which does useful work on nanotechnology and related technologies.