That's a lot of balloons: Obama's Inauguration Very Expensive

As the recession continues to wreak havoc on the U.S. economy and inauguration celebrations ramp up, a lot of people are asking: "How much will this shindig cost?"

The short answer? Likely more than $150 million — and yep, that could be the most expensive ever. (George W. Bush was given a hard time for the $42.3 million cost of his inauguration celebrations ... but that number, as Media Matters points out, did not include any security.)

And the long answer includes few balloons and a lot of beefed-up security. For the first time, President Bush has declared an emergency in Washington, D.C. to supplement the $15 million Congress has already allotted for security measures. It's no surprise that security costs are sky-high — Barack Obama received Secret Service protection very early in his presidential run and record crowds (likely anywhere from 1.5 to 3 million people) are expected for the events. In fact, the Secret Service will be in charge of security not just for inauguration day, but for four days, starting Saturday with Obama's train ride from Philadelphia. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told the AP:

"It will be the most security, as far as I'm aware, that any inauguration's had."
Obama's much-discussed (and very cool-looking) custom Cadillac limo certainly couldn't come cheap, though we'll never really know how much it cost. Cadillac spokesman David Caldwell said the car's exact specifications are a big secret, including the safety features and production cost.

But Forbes reports it's not all flak jackets and armored cars:

To manage an event of this scale, the District of Columbia will spend a mammoth $47 million. It is not enough.... Much of the $45 million will go toward creating a dynamic Inauguration experience for the everyday visitor, not just funding exclusive events. "We don't even consider these events to be extravagant," says Linda Douglas, a spokeswoman from the Presidential Inauguration Committee. "With crowds of this size, most of our attention is being devoted to opening up as many events to the public."

The good news for taxpayers: Inaugural celebrations are paid for by the inaugural committee — and Obama has, once again, been a very successful fundraiser — at least $41 million by recent counts. Carole Florman, spokeswoman for the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, told the New York Daily News:

"We're always very budget conscious. But we're sending a message to the entire world about our peaceful transition of power, and you don't want it to look like a schlock affair. It needs to be appropriate to the magnitude of events that it is."

And if you're eager to whoop it up in the same sassy fashion as our government, Washington hotels have come up with tons of ways for you to spend your money. The Washingtonian has made a list of some of the best ... and worst.

"Most unusual item in a hotel package: Round-trip airfare and hotel for four in St. Petersburg, Russia, part of the Omni Shoreham’s Live Like a President package—the trip is aimed at gaining “foreign-policy experience.” The $440,000 package also includes an in-suite dinner with entertainer Mark Russell.

Most controversial item: A puppy—in honor of Obama’s promise to get his daughters a dog — was originally part of the package deal at the Omni Shoreham but was dropped when the hotel caught heat from animal lovers. Instead, the hotel will make a donation to the Washington Humane Society."

So don't feel bad if you're sitting on the couch watching the historic festivities from home — at least you'll be saving some pennies.

Inside the Transition: Women small business owners

The Presidential Transition Team's Office of Public Liaison meets with women small business owners.
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Inside the Transition: Youth groups

The Presidential Transitioin Team's Office of Public Liaison meets with advocates for youth issues.
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President-elect Announces Committee for Economic Oversight

President-elect Obama met with advisers and introduced a comittee for economic oversight and transparency on January 6, 2009 in Washington, D.C.
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President-elect Obama Convenes Emergency Economic Meeting

On his first day in Washington, D.C., President-elect Obama met with his economic advisory team.
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Join the Discussion: Service

Paul Schmitz from the Transition's Innovation and Civil Society Team responds to the thousands of comments we received about national service. Learn more at http://www.change.gov/service

Obama team backs Emanuel in Blagojevich probe--By Steve Holland

A top adviser to President-elect Barack Obama on Wednesday expressed support for chief of staff Rahm Emanuel whose talks with Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich's office about filling Obama's Senate seat have come into question.

Blagojevich has been charged with corruptly plotting to sell Obama's Senate seat and the presidential transition team has been working to distance Obama and his inner circle from the scandal-tarred governor.

The Chicago Sun-Times reported on Wednesday that Emanuel had privately urged Blagojevich's administration to appoint Obama confidant Valerie Jarrett to the Senate seat that Obama vacated when he was elected president November 4.

Emanuel, a Democratic member of the House of Representatives from Illinois chosen by Obama to be his White House chief of staff, had asked the appointment to be made by a certain deadline, the newspaper said.

Obama senior adviser David Axelrod strongly backed Emanuel on MSNBC a day after Obama refused to answer a question about the case at a news conference because the U.S. attorney has the case under investigation.

"I've known Rahm ... for a very long time. I've worked with him closely. He is someone who I think has enormous integrity and unparalleled skill. And I think we're lucky to have him," Axelrod said. "I have no concerns about Rahm. He is an enormous asset to us and will be an enormous asset to the country, as he has been in the Congress."

The scandal has been an unwelcome distraction for Obama as he focuses on plans to rebuild the U.S. economy when he takes power on January 20.

Last week Obama said his office would release details within days about the contacts between his team and Blagojevich's office. But on Monday he said he would delay the release until next week at the request of the federal prosecutors.

He said he had no contact with Blagojevich about the Senate seat and any discussions his team had were not inappropriate.

At a news conference on Wednesday, Obama said it was a "little bit frustrating" that he was unable to release the information now but he was abiding by the request of the U.S. attorney's office.

"There has been a lot of speculation in the press that I would love to correct immediately," Obama said.

Discussing the Senate seat would not be illegal. But it in unclear whether Emanuel or Jarrett, who removed herself from consideration for the Senate seat, knew Blagojevich was seeking a financial reward from whomever was picked.

Axelrod said Obama's report would clear up the doubts.

"It will corroborate what the president-elect has said, which is that he never spoke with the governor or any of his aides about this and that. There were no inappropriate discussions between members of his staff and the governor's office in this manner. And that, I think, will be very clear," he said.

(Editing by David Wiessler and Alan Elsner)

Join the Discussion: Economy

Thousands of you joined the discussion on the economy at change.gov. Now the Economic Policy Team's Brian Deese responds. For more information, visit http://change.gov/economy

Obama: Probe shows no contact in Ill. gov scandal

President-elect Barack Obama said Monday a review by his own lawyer shows he had no direct contact with Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich about the appointment of a Senate replacement, and transition aides "did nothing inappropriate."

Obama said he is prepared to make the review public, but decided to hold off because prosecutors asked for a delay and "I don't want to interfere with an ongoing investigation."

Controversy has swirled around the president-elect and his incoming White House chief of staff, Rep. Rahm Emanuel, following Blagojevich's arrest last week on charges he schemed to trade Obama's Senate seat for personal gain.

Obama, fielding questions at a news conference, sidestepped when asked whether Emanuel had spoken with aides to the governor.

Emanuel was one of several aides who watched the news conference from the wings.

The president-elect pledged the results of the investigation by his incoming White House counsel, Gregory Craig, would be released "in due course."

He said the probe was complete and thorough, but did not say which of his aides Craig interviewed, whether any of them was under oath at the time, or any other details.

Inside the Transition: Service

The Transition's Service Team is hard at work finding new ways for people to participate in getting our country back on track. With Martin Luther King Jr. Day -- traditionally a national Day of Service -- right around the corner, we went inside the Transition so you could get to know a few members of the Service Team (officially called the Innovation and Civil Society subgroup of the Technology, Innovation and Government Reform policy working group) and see how they're approaching these issues.

Inside the Transition: Meeting with energy and environmental leaders

We went inside the Transition and put together a short video of a meeting between the Energy and Environment Policy Team and a group of energy and environmental leaders, including representatives from the Nature Conservancy, the World Wildlife Fund, and the Pew Environment Group. Learn more at Change.gov.

Panel urges Obama to consider hacker-response plan--By TED BRIDIS, Associated Press Writer

President-elect Barack Obama should create a new White House office to protect cyberspace from hackers, thieves and foreign agents, coordinating security efforts across U.S. military, intelligence and civilian agencies, according to a new report from a panel of leading government and industry experts.

The report, expected to be made public Monday on Capitol Hill, also urges Obama's new administration and Congress to pass new laws to allow for speedier investigations — and in some cases quicker retaliation once intruders are identified. It proposed online "data warrants," for example, rather than traditional search warrants, which it said "may be increasingly impracticable in the online environment."

Chances are good Obama will be receptive to many of the proposals: At least five members of the panel that produced the report also are working for his presidential transition team. They include former White House official Paul Kurtz, advising Obama on national security matters, and Obama technology advisers Dan Chenok and Bruce McConnell.

"Responding to a cyber attack is a tough issue," said James Lewis of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think-tank that organized the commission. "Do operators respond with law enforcement, espionage or military actions? The guidelines are really unclear. The rules designed in the 1980s are slow, and the Internet is fast."

The proposals by the Commission on Cybersecurity for the 44th Presidency were being delivered to Capitol Hill during a period of increasing exasperation within the U.S. government over embarrassing computer break-ins at the Pentagon, White House, State Department, Commerce Department and elsewhere that have been traced in recent years across foreign borders, notably to Russia and China.

The report urges the Obama administration to make clear to America's enemies and allies how it will respond when it detects and traces such attacks, depending on whether break-ins are blamed on hackers, criminals or foreign governments. U.S. options could include trade or financial sanctions or military attacks.

"We have to have a solid cyber doctrine," said Jerry Dixon, former deputy director for the U.S. National Cyber Security Division at the Homeland Security Department. "When does a cyber attack rise to the occasion of requiring military action? Or maybe it's something that law enforcement or the intelligence community can deal with?"

It was unclear how the commission's new recommendations will compare with the Bush administration's proposals because President Bush chose to classify as secret most provisions of his cyber initiative, which was launched late in his second term. Bush's plans have included reducing the number of the government's Internet junctions to minimize the number of targets for attackers and monitoring federal Internet traffic more aggressively under a surveillance program it calls "Einstein."

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On the Net:
Cyber Commission: http://www.csis.org/tech/cyber/

School buds: 20 Harvard classmates advising Obama--By Carrie Budoff Brown

As Barack Obama puts together his administration, more than 20 Harvard Law School classmates dot the ranks of his transition team — solidifying the Crimson connection as his most enduring, yet least-known, personal network.

Eyeing the presidency as a freshman senator, Obama turned to his classmates first for their high-level contacts, and then to help raise campaign cash. Now, they’re putting their day jobs on the backburner to help their friend build a government.

“If you think about the progression of the president-elect’s national career, initially he didn’t have a national network of people who he could call on,” said Cassandra Butts, general counsel for the transition. “The Harvard group was helpful on that front — helping him make introductions on policy, political and financial fronts.”

Besides Butts, other top Harvard grads around Obama include Chris Lu, who will serve as Obama’s liaison with Cabinet departments; Tom Perrelli, who works on the Justice Department transition team; and Julius Genachowski and Michael Froman, who sit on the 12-member Transition Advisory Board.

Turning to decades-old personal relationships is nothing new for presidents. But the depth of Obama’s Harvard ties is notable, potentially outstripping the levels seen during alum John F. Kennedy’s administration, said Julian Zelizer, a presidential historian at Princeton University. “The numbers seem very large to me,” he said.

Harvard was one of just three major touchstones for Obama at the beginning. The world of Chicago politics produced his most influential advisers, including chief campaign strategist David Axelrod and businesswoman Valerie Jarrett. Obama also relied on Washington veterans from his Senate office.

But it’s the Harvard relationships that reach two decades back, forged during a popular constitutional law class, at the financial aid counter in Pound Hall, in Butts’ kitchen during a dinner party, through long nights at the Harvard Law Review. As distance separated them, Obama was the one to try to stay in touch — penning personal letters in the days before e-mail, picking up the phone to congratulate a friend on the birth of a child.

Still, the Harvard chapter of his life wasn’t the one highlighted on the campaign trail, where Republicans attempted to cast Obama as an elitist. In the gauzy details of biography, he was the son of a single mother who gave up cushy corporate jobs to work the Chicago streets as a community organizer — not the product of Harvard and Columbia University, where he attended college.

Yet now, as Obama stitches together a government, the Harvard crew is taking a prime role. They get up early and go to bed late at night, spending the hours in between sifting through resumes, providing legal advice, and receiving briefings on the inner workings of a vast federal bureaucracy.

The network, although loose, looks like the cross-section of a tree trunk, with a small group of the oldest friends occupying the innermost ring.

Butts, the transition general counsel, bonded with Obama as they filled out the financial aid forms guaranteeing years of debt for their Harvard education. As a Washington operative, Butts would later connect Obama to key figures such as Dick Gephardt during the infancy of his national political career. On the presidential campaign, she served as a domestic policy adviser.

At Harvard, Butts was moot court partners with Perrelli, who first met Obama at the dinner party and served as his managing editor on the Harvard Law Review. Perrelli, a Washington lawyer who had never been a fundraiser, would go on to collect more than $500,000 for Obama’s presidential campaign. He is now part of the Department of Justice transition team.

“We have all been friends together, and we found a common enterprise through Barack,” Perrelli said.

Perrelli occupied seat 151 of professor Laurence Tribe’s constitutional law class in the fall 1989 semester — just a few feet away from Obama (seat 26) and two others who would prove vital to his ambitions: Julius Genachowski (93) and Michael Froman (103).

Froman, a managing director at Citigroup, would later introduce Obama to Robert Rubin, the former treasury secretary who became a key adviser. Genachowski would become a technology policy adviser. Both men now serve on the 12-member transition advisory board.

Genachowski also raised more than $500,000 in the past two years. Froman, who bundled $50,000 in contributions for John F. Kerry in 2004, brought in more than $200,000 for Obama.
Another key figure is Lu, who lost touch with Obama until he arrived in the Senate. Obama hired Lu as his legislative director, then as the executive director of the transition. Lu was announced last month as the Cabinet Secretary-designate, the liaison between the White House and the heads of executive departments.

Just beyond this innermost ring are more than a dozen classmates whose years at Harvard overlapped with Obama’s and who are also working for the transition. More are providing counsel on an informal basis.

If Bill and Hillary Clinton heightened the mystique of Yale Law School in the 1990s, Barack and Michelle Obama, who earned a Harvard law degree three years before her husband, appear poised to do the same for their alma mater in the new administration. In addition to Obama’s former classmates, dozens of people with Harvard ties can be found working on the transition.

Yale University, which consistently edges out Harvard in law school rankings, counts several alumni among those assisting Obama, as do dozens of public and private universities, including Ohio State; the University of California, Berkeley; and Georgetown. But their numbers do not match those from Harvard, according to a Politico review of transition team lists.

Others are in the wings. The Harvard Law Record, a weekly paper produced by law students, lamented the school’s popularity in an editorial last month headlined, “Obama’s gain is Harvard’s Drain. Exodus to D.C. threatens Cambridge quality.”

Singling out the potential loss of the dean, Elena Kagan, who has been mentioned for a Justice Department post, the paper wrote: “It is with a mix of enthusiasm and regret, therefore, that we anticipate the Crimson tide about to engulf the White House and Capitol Hill.”

David Dante Troutt, a professor at the Rutgers School of Law-Newark, met Obama during their first year at Harvard, where they shared the same class section and cigarette breaks. “We were both skinny and cold and full of tobacco outside the buildings during the Cambridge winters,” he said.

Troutt said he knows about a half-dozen fellow classmates who have tried to volunteer their services to Obama, but couldn’t be accommodated.

“There is almost a un-Harvard-like desire to contribute collectively to whatever it may be,” said Troutt, who is dabbling on policy issues on an informal basis. “It can be a little tough sometimes for high-achieving folks to bask in another’s great achievement. There were many people who had political ambitions out of that class. … Barack has received an outpouring of support which is uncharacteristic in its breadth and its strength.”

AP IMPACT: Donors, lobbyists help Obama get ready--By RITA BEAMISH, Associated Press Writer

Faced with hiring a new administration, President-elect Barack Obama is learning how hard it is to keep his promise to avoid aides who have been entangled with the capital's lobbying scene.

An Associated Press review of more than 400 members of Obama's transition team identified at least 34 who have registered in recent years to lobby government officials on behalf of clients or employers — some as recently as this summer. The AP's review represents the most comprehensive examination to date of people working on Obama's incoming administration.

During the campaign, Obama promised to keep lobbyists at arm's length, and he has taken steps aimed at keeping out the taint of the influence business. He imposed first-ever rules that prohibit anyone on his transition team from working in policy areas on which they had lobbied in the past year — an arbitrary time period — and a withdrawal system was set up for anyone who might run afoul of the rule.

"By moving lobbyists out of the particular matters they lobbied, our policy distances them from the interests of their clients," transition spokesman Tommy Vietor said.

Yet, as Obama is finding out, it is impractical to plan and fill up a new government without connections to lobbyists.

Among the AP's findings:
--An Obama adviser on immigration issues, Maria Echaveste, lobbied for the United Farm Workers this year to protect immigrant agricultural workers as the Bush administration sought to ease hiring of seasonal farm labor and Congress debated an immigration overhaul. Echaveste, who worked in the White House and Labor Department under President Bill Clinton, assured Obama she will not weigh in on the farmworker visa issue that was her lobbying focus.

--The former Agriculture Department official leading Obama's agricultural policy review, Bart Chilton, lobbied until last year as vice president of the National Farmers Union. It spends hundreds of thousands of dollars each year to press for farm subsidy programs, fighting the North American Free Trade Agreement and reducing taxes on farms and ranches.

--A lawyer working on Indian issues for Obama, Keith Harper, has worked as a lawyer for Native American tribes, and wrote in a 2006 article that the Interior Department's handling of Indian trust matters has been a "national disgrace." Obama initially assigned Harper to be his lead adviser on the department, but now Harper is advising the campaign more narrowly on Indian gaming. Harper was registered to lobby on sovereignty issues for a tribe as recently as this year but did not personally lobby, transition aides and a tribe official said.

--An Obama transition adviser for health and human services, Bill Corr, lobbied to prevent children from smoking as executive director of the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. The group has spent $675,000 this year trying to influence policymakers. Corr has told Obama he will not offer advice on tobacco issues.

--A transition advisory board member, Mark Gitenstein, was registered until August to lobby on behalf of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, AT&T Inc. and financial firms such as Ernst & Young LLP and Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc. Gitenstein is working on transition management issues, not specific policies, but has agreed not to deal with topics on which he lobbied.

Overall, the people Obama is relying on to build his administration have represented unions; energy, environmental groups, insurance, and drug companies; Wal-Mart; the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; and the lobbying arm of the Washington-based Center for American Progress. The center is a think tank headed by John Podesta, former chief of staff to Bill Clinton and now co-chairman of Obama's transition.

Also prominent on Obama's new team are his big-money fundraisers. At least 18 of Obama's major financial backers are helping him create his administration. They collected at least $50,000 each from friends and associates to help pay for the most expensive presidential campaign in history.

A few raised at least $500,000 each. They include two former officials from the Federal Communications Commission: Donald Gips, a one-time aide to Vice President Al Gore who is co-chairman of Obama's teams reviewing government agencies; and Julius Genachowski, who was an executive at Barry Diller's IAC/InterActiveCorp, when the Internet giant owned Ticketmaster and Home Shopping Network. Genachowski is working on technology and government reform policy for the new administration.

A former Justice Department official advising Obama on the department, Thomas Perrelli, raised at least $500,000 for Obama. Perrelli is managing partner of a Washington law firm, Jenner & Block LLP. He lobbied pro bono in 2002 on behalf of victims of the 1998 Africa embassy bombings. His firm's law clients have included the mortgage company Fannie Mae, General Motors and the husband of Terri Schiavo, the brain-damaged woman at the center of a bitter right-to-die battle.

Perrelli, a copyright expert, has represented Hollywood studios and the music industry cracking down on Internet piracy — a lingering problem facing the department.

This is how Washington works: People work for the government or seek to influence it, and often pass from one role to the other through what is known as "the revolving door." Policy experts routinely use their expertise to influence the government.

Gary Andres, a lobbyist who was a White House aide in the first Bush administration, said it is unrealistic to cut out lobbyists when recruiting policy experts for a new administration.

"A lot of the people you're going to draw upon, if they're not in government, are involved in lobbying," he said.

Despite Obama's efforts to insulate his new administration from what might be tainted advice, lobbyists' involvement in the new government warrants close scrutiny, said Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan institute that studies the influence business.

"They are taking a risk by taking these people on board," Krumholz said. "If they're viewed as being in the pocket of industry, that is not going to be beneficial to this administration that is trying so hard to claim a new mantle."

A former State Department official, Tom Donilon, is helping Obama on foreign policy. Donilon worked as a registered lobbyist at Fannie Mae from 1999 until 2005, when the current mortgage crisis was quietly brewing. Donilon was part of the team reporting more than $40 million in lobbying activity during that period.

Another Obama adviser, Michael Strautmanis, worked for trial lawyers as recently as 2005 on issues related to medical malpractice and health care liability, and in 2004 on asbestos issues. Strautmanis is a former aide to Obama in the Senate. He heads public liaison and intergovernmental affairs at Obama's transition office.

In addition to the 12-month restriction, Obama bars lobbyists from making donations to cover transition costs and will restrict access to his administration for transition team members who later take up lobbying. Podesta has called the self-imposed limits "the strictest, most far-reaching ethics rules of any transition team in history."

Obama's aides said they are focused on each adviser's policy credentials. But watchdog advocates say vigilance will be needed. "The question always is, with that kind of money, what is the influence and the interest they bring?" said Bill Buzenberg, executive director of the nonprofit Center for Public Integrity.

There are roughly 15,000 registered lobbyists in Washington. But there are probably six times that many who meet a common-sense definition of lobbyist, said James Thurber, who teaches lobbying at American University. For example, Obama health policy adviser and likely health secretary, former Sen. Tom Daschle, has worked for the lobbying and law firm Alston & Bird, but does not register personally because he advises clients rather than directly contacting government officials.

That is a technicality based on the narrow "lobbyist" definition, Thurber said.

The transition recognized potential conflicts could arise even beyond the strict legal definition of lobbying. Thus, Pamela Gilbert, who is working on consumer product safety issues for Obama, has withdrawn on an issue that was part of her law practice rather than her lobbyist work: federal pre-emption of state laws.

"If someone is paid to try to change public policy or stop something, that's a lobbyist," said Thurber, adding that lobbyists are a constant. "I don't think you can govern without them. The important thing is to be honest and transparent."

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Associated Press writers Jim Drinkard, Larry Margasak and Frank Bass contributed to this report.

Your Seat at the Table

We're inviting the American public to take a seat at the table and discuss documents and materials provided during meetings between outside groups and our Transition team.

Inside the Transition: Health Care

We sat in on a meeting of the Transition's Health Policy Team to introduce you to some of the team's members and give you a feel for how they make decisions -- and Senator Tom Daschle, the leader of the team, sat down to tell us how he plans to tackle health care.

Obama is delivering diversity, but some seek more--By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer

Barack Obama, soon to be the first black U.S. president, is on the road to making good his pledge to have a Cabinet and White House staff that are among most diverse ever, although some supporters are asking him to go even further. He added to the minority representation at the top of his administration Wednesday when he named New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Hispanic, as Commerce Secretary.

But some Latinos are grumbling it is not enough after all the support they gave him in the campaign, and gays and Asian-Americans are pushing for some representation in remaining Cabinet announcements. But overall Obama is allaying some early concerns that a black president wouldn't need to put so much importance on diversity of those working under him.

"The question was: Because he's black, how much pressure would he feel to be more traditional with appointments?" said Jamal Simmons, a Democratic consultant who worked with the Obama campaign. "The leadership of the campaign in the beginning wasn't very diverse, so there were questions about that. But I don't hear those questions any more."

In Obama's seven Cabinet announcements so far, white men are the minority with two nominations — Timothy Geithner at Treasury and Robert Gates at Defense. Three are women — Janet Napolitano at Homeland Security, Susan Rice as United Nations ambassador and Hillary Rodham Clinton at State.

With Clinton set to replace Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, former Secretary of State Madeline Albright was jokingly asked at an appearance this week whether there will ever be a male secretary of state again. There probably will be "someday," she told her audience of business executives at the Fortune 500 Forum.

The United Nations ambassador is not a Cabinet position under President George Bush, but it was under former President Bill Clinton and Obama said it will be in his administration. His nominee, Susan Rice, is black, as is attorney general nominee Eric Holder.

Bush and Clinton also made a point of diversity in their Cabinets when they moved into the White House. Bush's first Cabinet had four women, two Asian-Americans, two blacks and one Hispanic. Clinton, who promised to appoint a Cabinet that "looks like America," had three women, two Hispanics and four blacks when he first took office.

Latino groups applauded the selection of Richardson, although some were disappointed that the Mexican-American governor was not chosen for secretary of state after Obama interviewed him for the job. A reporter from Spanish-language television network Telemundo asked Obama to respond to Hispanics' concerns that there aren't more Latinos advising him and that Richardson got the "consolation prize."

Obama responded that he's only appointed about half the Cabinet so far and when he's done, "I think people are going to say, this is one of the most diverse Cabinets and White House staffs of all time."

Obama transition head John Podesta has been meeting with Hispanic groups and hearing their suggestions for other Latinos who could be considered for high-level administration positions. Democratic officials say Rep. Xavier Becerra, D-Calif., is the leading contender to be U.S. trade representative.

Latinos are the largest minority group in the country, comprising 15 percent of the U.S. population, and helped Obama win in key battleground states such as New Mexico and Florida.
"I definitely don't think we should characterize it as a consolation prize, but it's not enough," said Brent Wilkes, executive director of League of United Latin American Citizens.

Wilkes said the Richardson pick gets the Obama team on its way to mollifying some of the concerns raised "and if you trust what the transition team is saying, Latino leaders should be pleased" after all nominations are made. "And we do trust them," Wilkes said.

Floyd Mori, chair of the National Council of Asian Pacific Americans, said with blacks and Hispanics chosen for the Cabinet, "what is missing now is an Asian-American." He said given Obama's upbringing in Hawaii and his understanding of their community, they are optimistic he will appoint at least one. He suggested Illinois veterans affairs director Tammy Duckworth, former Washington Gov. Gary Locke or Rep. Mike Honda, D-Calif.

Joe Solmonese, president of the gay rights group Human Rights Campaign, sent a letter to Obama this week asking him to name labor leader Mary Beth Maxwell, a lesbian, as labor secretary. Solmonese said that he did not believe there had been an openly gay Cabinet member before, but he's confident that will change with Obama.

"Not only will we expect it, but we fully believe that it will happen," he added.

An analysis by New York University's Wagner School of Public Service and The Washington Post found that of the 28 White House staffers Obama has appointed so far, 43 percent are women and 29 percent are a racial minority. The analysis examined other areas of diversity — a third have a tie to Obama's hometown of Chicago, half worked on his campaign and two-thirds have advanced degrees.

Obama also promised to have Republicans in his Cabinet, but so far only has one in Gates. He declined to promise any more when asked if that would be it.

Todd Harris, a Republican operative, gave Obama credit for how he is handling appointments.

"He really seems to be reaching out to people that he doesn't need to reach out to politically," said Harris, who worked for Sen. John McCain's 2000 presidential campaign. "He is not filling his administration with a bunch of Illinois cronies and he really is getting people with a diverse set of views. As an American, that's a breath of fresh air."

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Associated Press writers Suzanne Gamboa in Washington and Ann Sanner and Liz Sidoti in Chicago contributed to this report.

Inside the Transition: Economy

A behind-the-scenes look at the Obama-Biden Transition's economic team, including interviews with Paul Volcker, Austan Goolsbee, and Peter Orszag. Learn more at http://change.gov/economy

Join the Discussion: Health Care

We invited you to join the discussion on health care, and thousands of you did. Now, the Health Policy Team's Tom Daschle and Lauren Aronson respond. For more information, visit http://change.gov/healthcare

Obama adviser once critical of Clinton is back--By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer

An adviser to Barack Obama's presidential campaign who was forced to resign earlier this year after calling Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton a "monster" is now working on the transition team for the agency Clinton is expected to lead.

State Department officials said Friday that Samantha Power is among a group of foreign policy experts that the president-elect's office selected to help the incoming administration prepare for Clinton's anticipated nomination as secretary of state. The Obama transition team's Web site includes Power's name as one of 14 members of the "Agency Review Team" for the State Department.

Clinton's role at State is expected to be announced after the Thanksgiving weekend. Power's apparent rehabilitation is another sign of that impending move.

Clinton's office declined to comment on Power's inclusion in the State Department transition, but an official close to the Obama transition team said Power had "made a gesture to bury the hatchet" with Clinton and that it had been well-received.

Power has been given an official State Department e-mail address and has been seen in the building, said the State officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak publicly about the transition. A State Department spokesman referred questions to Obama's transition team, which later declined to comment.

Power, a Harvard professor, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and noted commentator on genocide, is dealing with global humanitarian issues as part of the team, according to the officials. It is not clear if she is in line for any State Department job, they said.

Power made headlines in March during the height of the fierce fight for the Democratic presidential nomination when she called Clinton "a monster" in an interview with a Scottish newspaper, setting off angry exchanges about the tenor of the campaign.

Power told the Scotsman newspaper that Clinton would stop at nothing to defeat Obama. "She is a monster, too," Power said in the interview. "She is stooping to anything." Power added that "the amount of deceit she has put forward is really unattractive."

A few hours after her comments were published, Power announced her resignation, saying the remarks were inexcusable and contradictory to her admiration for Clinton.

At the time, Power said that Obama had rebuked her for the comment and "made it absolutely clear that we just couldn't make comments like this in his campaign."

Clinton's campaign seized on the remark, sending an e-mail to supporters telling them about the "monster" comment and asking for contributions to "show the Obama campaign that there is a price to this kind of attack politics."