Obama Signs Manufacturers Act Video

Transcript

New White House Fun Maker Smoot An Anti Diva

Healthcare passed, but all we've heard about today is repeal and how bad healthcare legislation is and how it will raise premiums and how Armageddon is near. I've struggled to find anything positive, so it looks like, once again, the media is falling down on the job, and the republicans continue to be high achievers in fear mongering. Or maybe I'm on healthcare overload! So here's a neat profile on Julianna Smoot, who replaced Desiree Rogers. Smoot, they say, is the anti-diva, in contrast to Rogers. Smoot gets to plan all the fun stuff at the White House:

Smoot, 42, spent the past year working as chief of staff to U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk. He says that when the presidential transition team learned Smoot was interested in working at the trade office, he was told: "If you don't take her, you're a fool."
Smoot already had an eye-popping achievement by then. As finance director for the Obama campaign — her first presidential race — she brought in nearly $750 million, a record amount that surpassed the combined total for both major party candidates four years earlier. Early on, the impressive cash haul marked Obama, a first-term senator, as a serious contender and in later stages it provided the cash to let him do pretty much whatever he wanted.
Plenty of other Democrats, too, owe their campaign millions to Smoot's abilities. She steered fundraising for Democratic Senate candidates in 2006, raising a record sum.
Smoot is taking over the Social Office from Desiree Rogers, a fashion-forward Chicago confidante of the Obamas who resigned after little more than a year in the job. Rogers' service was marked by a series of successful high-wattage social events and lots of new and creative twists, among them an East Room poetry jam and trick-or-treating by thousands of D.C. kids on the White House lawn.
Her tenure was marred, though, by the big blowup over the party-crashers at the Obamas' first state dinner and a general sense that she acted too much like a celebrity and not enough like a staff member.
Smoot comes across as the anti-diva. Fashion doesn't consume her. No one expects her to turn up in Vogue magazine, as Rogers did early on. Or to pull up a seat at a state dinner, as did Rogers. Or to have a front-row seat during New York fashion week, as did Rogers. Think J. Crew, not Comme des Garcons. Read more at MSNBC.

Trade Rep Kirk on U.S. Export Goal and Brazil Dispute

Update March 11: Obama announces National Export Initiatives. Watch

U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk talks about the U.S. goal of doubling exports in five years, and a dispute with Brazil over cotton subsidies.

Obama Speaks on Relations With China

Obama speaks on U.S. China relations at a time when China is concerned about its U.S. investments. Don't they own us now? The U.S. wants China's help with North Korea. This event, held in Washington, is a twice a year event started by the Bush administration, according to Bloomberg.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of the Treasury Geithner co-chair the dialogue. Clinton and Geither's op-ed on China:

When the United States and China established diplomatic relations 30 years ago, it was far from clear what the future would hold. In 1979, China was still emerging from the ruins of the Cultural Revolution and its gross domestic product stood at a mere $176 billion, a fraction of the U.S. total of $2.5 trillion. Even travel and communication between our two great nations presented a challenge: a few unreliable telephone lines and no direct flights connected us. Today China’s GDP tops four trillion dollars, thousands of emails and cellphone calls cross the Pacific Ocean daily, and by next year there will be 249 direct flights per week between the U.S. and China.

To keep up with these changes that affect our citizens and our planet, we need to update our official ties with Beijing. During their first meeting in April, President Barack Obama and President Hu Jintao announced a new dialogue as part of the administration’s efforts to build a positive, cooperative and comprehensive relationship with Beijing. So this week we will meet together in Washington with two of the highest-ranking officials in the Chinese government, Vice Premier Wang Qishan and State Councilor Dai Bingguo, to develop a new framework for U.S.-China relations. Many of our cabinet colleagues will join us in this “Strategic and Economic Dialogue,” along with an equally large number of the most senior leaders of the Chinese government. Why are we doing this with China, and what does it mean for Americans?

Simply put, few global problems can be solved by the U.S. or China alone. And few can be solved without the U.S. and China together. The strength of the global economy, the health of the global environment, the stability of fragile states and the solution to nonproliferation challenges turn in large measure on cooperation between the U.S. and China. While our two-day dialogue will break new ground in combining discussions of both economic and foreign policies, we will be building on the efforts of the past seven U.S. administrations and on the existing tapestry of government-to-government exchanges and cooperation in several dozen different areas. Read more at the WSJ

Transcript of Hillary's remarks here.
Read more on this here.
U.S. Trade rep Ron Kirk talks about trade with China:

Obama Gets in Some Golf With Commerce and Trade

The motorcade pulled up to the golf courses at 9:28. The president, in tan shirt and tan shorts and golf saddle shoes walked a short distance from his cart and greeted a group on a practice putting green that had been shooting him with their camera phones. Among the president's golfing guests were Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, trade representative Ron Kirk and White House staffer Marvin Nicholson. An entourage of 14 golf carts entered the South Course at about 9:45. The president's cart was driven by the general manager of the course, Mike Thomas, a civilian. Read the rest at Lynn Sweet's blog

Trade Nominee Has Tax Issue But Might Catch a Break

Three's a trend. Five means that the tax system needs overhauled. Jon Kyl calls Ron Kirk's tax underpayment inadvertent.

CQP: The Senate Finance Committee reported Monday that President Obama’s nominee for U.S. Trade Representative — former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk — underpaid his taxes by a total of $9,975 for 2005, 2006 and 2007, making Kirk the fifth Obama nominee to face tax-related problems during the confirmation process.

It was not immediately clear whether the development would threaten Kirk’s nomination, with one top Senate Republicans saying the tax oversights appeared “inadvertent.”

“Mayor Kirk has agreed to promptly file amended returns reflecting the adjustments discussed in this memo,” the Finance Committee said in its report. Kirk has agreed to file his amended return this week.

Obama announced that Kirk would be his choice as chief trade negotiator in December, but the committee has not yet acted on his nomination. Chairman Max Baucus , D-Mont., said last week that he was unaware of any problems with Kirk’s nomination.

The committee announced Monday that it would postpone Kirk’s confirmation hearing from March 5 to March 9, but a committee aide said the reason for the delay is a scheduling conflict with a planned White House health care summit.

“Mayor Kirk is the right person for this job and I will work to move his nomination quickly,” Baucus said Monday. “I am confident he can successfully restore the confidence of Congress and the American people in a balanced international trade agenda. I look forward to his testimony before the Finance Committee next week.”

Minority Whip Jon Kyl , R-Ariz., said it was too early for him to judge any peril to the nomination or gauge how his colleagues would react.

“In his case, it looked like it was inadvertent,” Kyl said.

What happened?

According to a committee report, in 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007, Kirk asked that honoraria received for speeches he gave be assigned to his alma mater, Austin College. As a result, he and his paid tax preparer did not think that the money, which totaled $37,750, counted as taxable income. In 2005, however, Kirk deducted four honoraria totaling $7,500, as charitable donations.

Obama, Bush, Blago, Warren and Levi

An action packed day and I've been away so let's get caught up.
Obama announces Ron Kirk for Federal Trade Representative and venture capitalist Karen Mills, administrator of the Small Business Administration. Obama announces his picks for labor, Hilda Solis, and transportation, Ron LaHood:

CNN: At a news conference in Chicago, Illinois, Obama nominated Rep. Hilda Solis for secretary of labor. She is a four-term Democratic congresswoman from Los Angeles, California.

He also nominated Republican Rep. Ray LaHood of Illinois as transportation secretary, venture capitalist Karen Mills to head the Small Business Administration and former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk to serve as U.S. trade representative.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Will Bush pardon the shoe thrower? The shoe thrower, who has been beaten hopes so.
Blagojevich won't back down and his attorney is thuggish. I caught a few minutes of his press conference.
George Bush taps into the bank bailout money to rescue the automakers:

Politico: President Bush steps into the Roosevelt Room at 9:01 a.m. and announces a $17.4 billion bailout for GM and Chrysler, with the loans conditioned on the automakers showing a plan for 'viability' by March 31. A senior administration official told reporters during a telephone background briefing just before the president spoke that the firms need to show they can be 'profitable soon.' Ford got new financing before credit froze, and has said it does not need immediate government assistance to stay alive.

I kind of feel sorry for Bush because he seems to be a guy of limited talents forced into big shoes. He did the best he could, which wasn't good enough.

WSJ: The administrations of George W. Bush have virtually assured such a displacement by catastrophically throwing the country off balance, both politically and financially, while breaking the nation's sword in an inconclusive seven-year struggle against a ragtag enemy in two small bankrupt states. Their one great accomplishment -- no subsequent attacks on American soil thus far -- has been offset by the stunningly incompetent prosecution of the war. It could be no other way, with war aims that inexplicably danced up and down the scale, from "ending tyranny in the world," to reforging in a matter of months (with 130,000 troops) the political culture of the Arabs, to establishing a democracy in Iraq, to only reducing violence, to merely holding on in our cantonments until we withdraw.

Also, from Politico:

'Obama has yet to name his picks for senior intelligence positions; those announcements aren't expected until Obama returns from his holiday break. Several Democratic officials with knowledge of the deliberations said Friday that Dennis Blair, a retired admiral and the former head of U.S. Pacific Command, is likely - if not certain - to become director of national intelligence.'

Obama team is seriously scouring NASA's budget:

LA Times: Reporting from Washington -- Most nights it's possible to look skyward with a pair of cheap binoculars and see a $100,000 mistake circling the Earth. The glowing object -- an orbiting NASA tool bag -- was lost last month by an astronaut during a routine spacewalk.

The canvas-and-acrylic caddy contained two grease guns, a scraper, a trash bag and some wipes, hardly cutting-edge technology. So why did it cost $100,000?

NASA officials said they had no answer to that question -- beyond the fact that, as spokesman Allard Beutel put it, "space flight is expensive." That expense is drawing serious scrutiny from the incoming administration of President-elect Barack Obama.

Of 74 questions submitted to the agency by Obama's NASA transition team, more than half asked about basic spending issues, including cost overruns.

Two Obama administrations for the price of one?

WSJ: The Obama transition is putting a new twist on that idea. The president-elect is giving the country two administrations for the price of one.

The first, composed of Mr. Obama's initial wave of high-profile appointees, is full of familiar Washington veterans. This is the team that pleased moderates and even some Republicans, reassured financial markets -- and made the party's liberals complain about "retreads" and wonder what all that change rhetoric was about.

The second wave of appointments, most coming in the past week or so, is composed of lesser-known names, new faces and, all told, the kind of folks who look like the fabled "agents of change" promised in the campaign.

Obama's team lacks the ideological fervor:

But the most striking characteristic of the emerging cast of characters is this mix of old and new faces. What the two camps have in common is a general lack of obvious ideological fervor.

The gay community is really upset about Rick Warren giving his inaugural blessings. I think this guy is being elevated to more than his worth. I understand the outrage, though. An Obama advisor assures Marc Ambinder at the Atlantic that he's with gay people:

The deeper dynamic, though, is this: liberal groups are used to being treated like stepchildren in Washington. They are used to being under seige at all times, and it's going to take some adjustment to realize that gay rights are probably not in danger because of things like the Warren pick. (An Obama adviser, discussing this matter with me, urged patience, saying that Obama is committed to the substance of his campaign promises to expand gay rights.)
A little private reassurance would go a long way, and it seems that the Obama team ihas not accounted for the fact that everyone, on all sides, is going through a period of psychological adjustment from the Bush years.
This includes liberal interest groups accustomed to being slapped around by Bush and taken for granted by Bill Clinton.

Rick Warren praises Obama's "courage." Seems to me Warren could've offered a bit more humility to the gay community. Warren will be on Dateline tonight declaring that he's not homophobic. I think Warren is too big for his britches. That's the one of the problems with the choice of Warren. It validates his views. But he's not worth the fuss.

I commend President-elect Obama for his courage to willingly take enormous heat from his base by inviting someone like me, with whom he doesn't agree on every issue, to offer the Invocation at his historic Inaugural ceremony.

Hopefully individuals passionately expressing opinions from the left and the right will recognize that both of us have shown a commitment to model civility in America.

The Bible admonishes us to pray for our leaders. I am honored by this opportunity to pray God's blessing on the office of the President and its current and future inhabitant, asking the Lord to provide wisdom to America's leaders during this critical time in our nation's history.

Mike Madden of Salon asks: How the hell did Warren get inauguration tickets?
All the people at Salon are angry about Warren:

Even on vacation, I can't quite get over the choice of pastor Rick Warren to give Barack Obama's inaugural invocation. I'm all for Obama (and Republicans, for that matter) reaching out to the other side. I am not theoretically opposed to Obama choosing an antiabortion gay-rights critic; I'm opposed to Warren himself. He's a poster boy for kinder, gentler 21st century bigotry, and Obama shouldn't validate him with this lofty symbolic role.

Sarah Palin's daughter's Bristol's soon to be mother-in-law (Levi Johnston's mom) is busted on drug charges. The Palin clan never stops making news. 

Obama Picks Ron Kirk For Trade Rep

Attorney Ron Kirk was the first black mayor of Dallas. His favorite quote: “If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.” He likes the color blue.

USA Today: A Democratic official says President-elect Barack Obama intends to name Ron Kirk as the United States' trade representative.
Kirk is a former mayor of Dallas, and was the first black to hold that post.

The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because Obama has not made the selection public. He's expected to make the announcement in coming days.

Kirk's challenges:

Reuters: Obama is expected to make the announcement on Friday in Chicago, the source said.

Kirk, a partner at the Houston-based law firm of Vinson and Elkins, has acknowledged having talks with Obama's transition team about a job in the new administration.

Obama turned to Kirk, who is little known in Washington trade circles, after his first choice Rep. Xavier Becerra, a California Democrat and member of the House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee, turned down the job.

"My concern is how much weight this position would have had, and I reached the conclusion that it would not be a top priority or even a second or third priority," Becerra told La Opinion, a Los Angeles Spanish-language newspaper, in an interview earlier this week.

Becerra's comment increased already strong U.S. business concerns that long-time trade priorities like finishing the Doha round of world trade talks would be put on the back burner while Obama and Congress focus on restoring U.S. economic health and other domestic concerns.

Obama has already indicated that winning approval of two pending free trade agreements with Colombia and South Korea will not be top agenda items.

Instead, one of Kirk's first challenges, if approved by the Senate, would be to make good on Obama's promise to add stronger labor and environmental provisions to the North American Free Trade Agreement, a pact often blamed by labor groups for moving U.S. jobs to Mexico.