The plot thickens:

Bolstered by a newly expanded majority, Harry Reid met with Joe Lieberman on Thursday to sketch out the conditions by which the Connecticut independent could continue to caucus with Senate Democrats. But Lieberman did not accept Reid's initial offers, leaving his future in the caucus uncertain, and potentially setting off a campaign to pressure the Democratic steering committee to decide Lieberman's fate.

(Emhais supplied.) Apparently Reid asked him to relinquish his committee chairmanship:

Reid offered Lieberman a deal to step down as chairman of the homeland security committee but take over the reins of another subcommittee, likely overseeing economic or small business issues officials said.

What next? Lieberman begging and pleading I suspect:

I like the way Matt Yglesias describes what bipartisanship should mean:

[T]he trick with these bipartisan concepts is to make sure that the credibility is flowing in the right direction. . . . The new administration needs to . . . build support for progressive policies by showing that it can be supported by a politically diverse group of people.

This is sharp thinking.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

The freakout begins:

Right now, the rumors are that Larry Summers is the choice for the Treasury Secretary post. As Dean Baker suggests, this would not be a good thing.

It would be a really bad start to his administration if President Obama picked a Treasury Secretary who shares a substantial part of the blame for the bubble economy and the financial crisis. It will not be easy to pick up the pieces and get the economy back on its feet, but we would be going in the wrong direction to put one of the people responsible for getting us in this mess in the top economic position in the Obama administration.

It would be interesting to hear Dean Baker's theory of how Larry Summers "shares a substantial part of the blame for getting us in this mess." His post does not say. And it goes without saying that Stoller does not explain it. I hope Krugman weighs in on this.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

It turns out that arresting half the workforce at Iowa's Agriprocessors, Inc. for crimes related to their status as undocumented aliens wasn't good for Agriprocessors or, more importantly, for the town of Postville in which the kosher meatpacking plant is located. Agriprocessors has filed for bankruptcy.

The workforce arrests weren't Agriprocessors' only problem. Serious labor law violations, including the employment of underage workers, resulted in thousands of misdemeanor charges against the company, its owner and its top manager. The company's former CEO was arrested last week on federal charges of conspiring to harbor illegal immigrants. Consumers (Jeralyn among them) stopped buying Agriprocessors' products after the plant's working conditions and child labor violations were publicized.

Still, it's difficult for a company to stay in business when half its workforce is suddenly hauled off to jail (not to mention the devastating consequences to the workers and their families). [more ...]

We're not going to have Gov. Sarah Palin to kick around any more much longer, which is fine by me, since all I ever wanted was for her not to become Vice President and for people to recognize John McCain's astoundingly reckless judgment in choosing her for the ticket, but I do find this amusing and can't resist writing about it.

The New York Times recaps her final moments at the Arizona Biltmore Wednesday and last trip aboard her McCain-Palin campaign plane:

As Ms. Palin’s entourage of two dozen family members and friends boarded the plane, and aides scurried around loading diapers, bottled water and a Louis Vuitton duffel onto it, Ms. Palin darted over to the reporters, whom she regularly derided as “Barack Obama’s friends in the media” in her stump speech, to shake hands and say goodbye.

[More...]

Barack Obama ran a masterful campaign and is clearly one of the finest politicians we will ever see. That said, Obama's win is also a function of the emerged Democratic majority. to wit, demography is political destiny. Matt Yglesias consistently made an important point - a vote is a vote - whether it is from a white man or an African American woman or a Latino. After 2004, the DLC types harped on the need to do better among white voters, particularly "values voters." This election really shattered the myth that Democrats needed Bubbas to win. The Media of course still does not fully get it:

Obama won men, which no Democrat had managed since Bill Clinton. . . . He won 54% of Catholics, 66% of Latinos, 68% of new voters — a multicultural, multigenerational movement that shatters the old political ice pack. . . . The Republican caucus is smaller, more male and whiter at a time when the electorate is heading the other way.

But the electorate has been "heading the other way" since 1992. The electorate has reached the point that Democrats can win the Presidency and the Congress with just 40% of the white vote. And that number will keep dropping. More . . .

One thing I do not understand about the ongoing McCain war against Sarah Palin - do they not realize that this is more of a comment on McCain than Palin? As far as I know, she was minding her own business in Alaska when McCain decided to name her as his VP pick. So when they attack her now, as they do, they are basically making it abundantly clear that John McCain was utterly unfit to be President, did not put country first and was the disgraceful figure I always thought him to be. It is quite remarkable.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

As someone who declared war on Larry Summers when he was President of Harvard, I feel comfortable asking Josh Marshall this question - what in the hell are you talking about when you write this?

Just at the level of optics, since the economy is issue number one right now (and not just the real economy of jobs and living standards but the financial architecture itself) and you're trying to look forward not back, why would you pick someone for Treasury who was not only in the Clinton administration but was actually Treasury Secretary in the Clinton administration. Not understanding that.

Let's see Josh - because the Clinton Administration is synonymous with a robust economy and a Presidential Administration that knew how to manage the economy? That being perceived to be like the Clinton Administration on the economy would inspire exceptionally high confidence in the country and on Wall Street? Is Josh Marshall so far gone in his Clinton Derangement Syndrome that he does not know this? Honestly, what is wrong with him?

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

TChris pointed to the fact that John Boehner wants no part of the Post-Partisan Unity Schtick. In some ways, I sympathize with Boehner - he does not agree with the Obama Agenda. Should he go along just for the sake of it even though his constituency voted for his vision of America? There is something nefarious and anti-democratic about the insistence of the High Broderists for bipartisan compromise. In essence, they are demanding that politicians abandon their beliefs and the beliefs they presented to the electorate. But if we are going to do that, it seems to me that the lecturing and hectoring should be directed at the Republicans. After all, they are the party whose ideas have been rejected by the American People. The High Priest of the Beltway and the founder of the Church of High Broderism, the Dean hisself seems incapable of hectoring the Republicans:

[John Kerry] said that the difficulty of the challenges facing Washington is such that the aim should not be to pound out narrow partisan victories but to negotiate for "85-vote majorities," endorsed by all but the most extreme liberal or conservative senators. . . . But it will be up to Obama to signal that this will be his way of doing business, as well.

In posts here and here, TalkLeft explored about the possibility of a Big Ten sweep for Obama. With the final word this afternoon that Obama won Indiana, the sweep was complete. The Big Ten is a blue conference.

Earlier I made some suggestions for President Elect Barack Obama's transition team. One was John Wesley Hall, President of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL), who before getting his own blog, blogged at TalkLeft as Last Night in Little Rock.

John has just released this NACDL Message From the President on Obama's election. Here are some quotes:

[T]here is much work to be done by the new president and the next Congress. The prison camps at Guantanamo Navy Base have become a symbol of shame around the world. President-Elect Obama should close them within hours of taking the oath of office. Those believed responsible for crimes against Americans should be charged and prosecuted in the federal criminal justice system or in traditional military courts under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

[More...]

Three lawsuits were filed today in California courts seeking to have Proposition 8, banning gay marriage, declared invalid.

The principal argument is that Proposition 8 is a constitutional revision that cannot be accomplished by constitutional amendment.

[One] suit filed with the high court in San Francisco this afternoon argues that the California Constitution´s equal protection provisions do not allow a bare majority of voters to use the amendment process to divest politically disfavored groups of constitutional rights. Such a sweeping redefinition of equal protection would require a constitutional revision rather than a mere amendment, the petition argues. Article XVIII of the California Constitution provides that a constitutional revision may only be accomplished by a constitutional convention and popular ratification, or by legislative submission to the electorate.

That lawuit was filed by San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera, Los Angeles City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo and Santa Clara County Counsel Anne C, on behalf of San Francisco, Santa Clara County and the City of Los Angeles [More..]