The Situation Room reported the breaking news that Eric Holder is Barack Obama's choice for Attorney General.

The AP:

Washington attorney Eric Holder is President-elect Barack Obama's top choice to be the next attorney general and aides have gone so far as to ask senators whether he would be confirmed, an Obama official and people close to the matter said Tuesday.

Holder, a former U.S. attorney who served as the No. 2 official in the Justice Department under President Bill Clinton, would be the nation's first black attorney general.

Update [2008-11-18 17:53:30 by Todd Beeton]:CNN.com reports that "Holder has accepted the position but must still undergo a vetting process by the Obama transition team."

What's up tonight?

The Guardian tonight announces with great confidence that Hillary Clinton intends to accept the Secretary of State position in an Obama administration.

Hillary Clinton plans to accept the job of secretary of state offered by Barack Obama, who is reaching out to former rivals to build a broad coalition administration, the Guardian has learned.

Obama's advisers have begun looking into Bill Clinton's foundation, which distributes millions of dollars to Africa to help with development, to ensure that there is no conflict of interest. But Democrats do not believe that the vetting is likely to be a problem.

So if the vetting of Bill goes well and Clinton is officially offered the job, she'll take it!? Wow, ya don't say.

Interesting that US media outlets aren't reporting the same thing and aren't even picking up The Guardian's story. In fact, this is up on the front page of CNN.com right now:

Former President Bill Clinton's international business dealings, global foundation and penchant for going off script could present a significant obstacle to Hillary Clinton becoming secretary of state, observers say.

On the one hand, his established relationships with world leaders could instantly make the New York senator a welcome face in embassies around the world.

On the other, his complicated global business interests could present future conflicts of interest that result in unneeded headaches for the incoming commander-in-chief.

I'm with Josh. I think it likely will happen but is this Guardian story actual confirmation of anything? Probably not.

With the Minnesota vote certification set for tomorrow and the recount to commence on Wednesday, Al Franken's campaign is fighting to make sure that absentee votes that were wrongfully disqualified are counted. Franken had originally requested voter information on all excluded absentee ballots but when two counties rejected the request, citing privacy concerns, Franken took it to court.

Franken has sued to get access to a roster of voters whose absentee ballots were invalidated. The campaign says it would use the information to investigate whether the rejections were proper.

The hearing on this lawsuit is set for Wednesday morning, shortly after the recount is scheduled to begin, so the Franken campaign has requested that the certification -- and hence the recount -- be pushed until all valid votes are counted.

The Franken campaign filed a brief with the five-person board Monday, demanding that every vote be counted.

"We would ask them to not certify the vote count," Marc Elias, a Democratic election lawyer working for Franken, said in a news conference Monday.

As Elias said on a conference call with reporters today:

"I don't think that they have a vote count to certify."

It's important to note that, despite the Republican party line on this, this is not some futile fishing expedition by a campaign desperate for any vote it can get. This is a legitimate enfranchisement issue.

Franken's advisers say they know of hundreds of voided absentee ballots based on their surveys of Minnesota counties that voluntarily supplied information, but they wouldn't give a precise number. [...]

One of the affidavits is from James Langland of Thief River Falls, who voted absentee in person because he was traveling on Election Day. Langland said he was told his ballot was invalidated because it lacked proper documentation. He said he learned nine days after the election that a county official failed to sign the envelope.

Langland said in the document that he voted for Franken, as did the other three voters who submitted sworn statements.

"In an election this close, every vote matters and every vote should be counted," said Franken attorney Marc Elias. "Whether it's a close election or not, these individual Minnesotans have a right to have their vote counted."

Elections officials in the state have said that the absentee ballot issue could potentially be dealt with during the recount, so it doesn't look as though an official certification of the vote would spell the end for those wrongfully disenfranchised absentee voters, but clearly, the Franken campaign would like to add them to the official pre-recount tally to minimize any lead Coleman has and hence any premature claims of victory.

Whenever it actually starts, the recount is going to be expensive, so help Al out over at the Road To 60 ActBlue page.

This is great. Barack will be releasing his weekly address on YouTube as well as on the radio.

What's going on in your world this weekend?

Today, all over the country, Join The Impact organized rallies to protest the passage of Proposition 8. We in California saw Prop 8 awaken a sleeping giant as thousands of people gathered, seemingly spontaneously, all over the state in the wake of the news that it had passed. It was an amazing sight but little did we know that that truly was just the beginning. A national people-powered marriage equality movement seems to have sprouted up virtually overnight.

As I'm in here in the Chicago suburbs for a friend's wedding (no, I wasn't invited by Barack...) I went into town to check out the Chicago Join The Impact protest at Federal Plaza. The Facebook event had more than 3200 RSVPs and there had to be twice that many people there today. At one point, I heard an announcement that the police were extending the area where people were permitted to stand; this place was bursting at the seams.

It was an extremely moving event because it was clear that I was witnessing nothing less than the birth of our generation's civil rights movement. Sign after sign said it all: "gay rights are civil rights." As a Californian too, it was fascinating to see so many people in Illinois rise up against what my fellow citizens did on November 4th. Someone was even holding a No on Prop 8 sign re-jiggered to read "Vote No On Pro-H8." There was a distinct "We are all Californians now" vibe to the whole thing but I think also that this national movement might not have sprung up if it had been any other state. People think of California not only as a bastion of liberalism but also as a bellwether for the rest of the country. They see gay marriage go down in California, for many, it is a sign that it could mean the end of gay marriage everywhere else, before it's even begun.

The passion in the voices of the speakers was moving as well. One of the organizers of the event stood up and expressed great frustration with Illinois Democrats at not having passed a marriage equality bill, not even a civil unions bill. "There is no state bluer than Illinois! There is no excuse!" I expect we'll see pressure all over the country for state legislatures to pass marriage equality legislation and if we don't, we should. He also acknowledged the importance that this movement not end today, which is a really important point. "We're not just blowing off steam here today, as good as that feels. This needs to continue!" In Chicago, the next action will be next Saturday outside the Century Theatre in Evanston, IL to protest the fact that Cinemark CEO Alan Stock donated $10,000 to Prop 8. Considering the intensity on display at the protest today, I suspect Stock is going to deeply regret that donation.

One man stood up and confessed that despite being a gay man, he wasn't really on board with gay marriage until recently. What did it for him: Keith Olbermann's special comment the other night. Another activist read from a well-written script and at a certain point was like "OK, I have to put this down. It's a beautiful speech but I have to speak to you from my heart" and he went on to speak personally and passionately about his refusal to allow his country to treat him as a second class citizen. "Not anymore! Not anymore!"

All over downtown Chicago there were banners on lampposts congratulating "Chicago's own Barack Obama" and it seemed rather appropriate that this protest should be surrounded by these banners. As Barack has said throughout his campaign for the presidency, "this is not about me, this is about you...change can only come if you demand it...change doesn't come from the top down, it comes from the bottom up." President-elect Obama may not be in favor of marriage equality as a policy, but the spirit of our first community organizer president was there at Federal Plaza today.

This has only just begun...

(more pics over the jump)

What else is going on tonight?

I flew to Chicago today (all the cool kids are doing it) for a wedding and on the flight as I was watching CNN it was announced that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton did indeed meet yesterday where, as Gloria Borger put it, President-elect Obama gauged whether Senator Clinton would be interested in the job of Secretary of State and while an explicit offer was not made, that Clinton left with the impression that it was hers if she wanted it. This is pretty much exactly the story that is on CNN.com right now.

Interestingly, HuffPo reports that a more overt offer was made:

President-elect Barack Obama offered Sen. Hillary Clinton the position of Secretary of State during their meeting Thursday in Chicago, according to two senior Democratic officials. She requested time to consider the offer, the officials said.

Keith Olbermann's updates to his DailyKos diary would appear to confirm that CNN's take is more accurate:

Jake Tapper's reporting: "no firm offer" was made, but "the job is hers if she wants it," per one unidentified source.  

Chip Reid's reporting: that Obama also met to discuss the State post with Governor Richardson.

There's been a lot of speculation about whether she would take it if actually offered and what such an offer says about Barack. The consensus seems to be that Clinton would probably take it as otherwise she'd just be 1 of 100 Senators, and the junior Senator from her state at that; and with other Democrats making plays on healthcare, it's not clear that she would have the leadership role she might want on that issue. As for what it says about Barack, refreshingly, a lot of the analysis has agreed that it demonstrates a lot of confidence that he would surround himself with a former rival, one who might, as some speculate, still have designs on his job some day, leading to the inevitable comparison to Lincoln's "Team of Rivals" strategy of building a cabinet. There was also some more cynical analysis that posited that this is Barack "keeping his friends close and his enemies closer" although I will agree with one thing that Republican strategist Alex Castellenos said (alone among a litany of stupid shit that came out of his mouth.) By bringing Clinton into his inner circle, Barack is establishing the Democratic Party as Barack Obama's party and eliminating any claim the Clintons may have to a "Clinton wing of the Democratic Party."

I am really intrigued by Clinton ascending to Secretary of State. I think on many levels it's a perfect role for her, as she ran partly on rebuilding our image abroad and she and Bill are beloved around the world. It also just sort of feels right in a certain way. I do understand people's reservations about her more hawkish tendencies and the attacks she levied against him in the primary over diplomacy, but I think their differences are actually much less stark than they seemed during a contest that was about making distinctions with your opponent. And I think at the very least, Clinton has proven to be a team player and I have no doubt that as Secretary of State she would advance the policies of Barack Obama's around the world, not her own.

Consider this a thread to discuss the possibility of Clinton as Secretary of State.