From back here on the frigid East Coast, I’ve been envying the reporters who drew pool duty for the President-elect’s vacation in Hawaii, and I’ve been enjoying the idea of traveling with them vicariously through their regular reports. Until this one… :

Pool Report – No. 3
Waimanalo, Hawaii
Dec. 21, 2008

President-elect Barack

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The Associated Press has crunched the numbers: “Banks that are getting taxpayer bailouts awarded their top executives nearly $1.6 billion in salaries, bonuses, and other benefits last year, an Associated Press analysis reveals.”

The CEO of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd Blankfein: $54 million. The CEO of Merrill Lynch, John A. Thain: $83 …

The NYT reports today that cobblers from Lebanon, China and Iraq are claiming to have made the shoes that an Iraqi journalist tossed at President Bush, but one in Turkey seems to be gaining the marketing edge with Ducati Model 271, since renamed “The Bush Shoe”:

A new run of 15,000 pairs, destined for Iraq, went into production on

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This one from our White House Photo Blog seems like it is crying out for a weekend-edition Swampland Commenter Caption Contest:

UPDATE: The Washington Post has this story on the unveiling of the portraits of the President and First Lady. I’m no art expert, but I do prefer the Bush portrait to the Clinton one of a few years back, …

On his website, Change.gov, Barack Obama lists his gay and lesbian agenda under the heading of “Civil Rights.” It is, without any doubt, a very liberal plan: allow gays to serve openly in the military, expand hate crimes statutes, support same-sex civil unions, oppose a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage, and expand adoption rights …

Pew has an interesting new report out on the religious affiliations of the incoming Congress. It turns out they are more religious than the rest of us, and more likely to be Jewish, Catholic or Mormon.:

…a comparison of the religious affiliations of the new Congress with religious demographic information from the Pew Forum’s

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The President-elect hails it as “a necessary step to help avoid a collapse in our auto industry that would have devastating consequences for our economy and our workers,” and warns, “The auto companies must not squander this chance to reform bad management practices and begin the long-term restructuring that is absolutely required to …

The Anchorage Daily News reports:

WASILLA — A 42-year-old Wasilla woman was arrested Thursday at her home by Alaska State Troopers with a search warrant in an undercover drug investigation. Sherry L. Johnston was charged with six felony counts of misconduct involving a controlled substance.

Johnston is the mother of Levi

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In Minnesota, a round of ballot rulings has (at least temporarily) put challenger Al Franken ahead of incumbent Norm Coleman.

UPDATE: Commenter wvng passes along a link where we can follow this in real time.

A brief article on Page 3 of the Washington Post tells us that the Pentagon is working on how to shut down Guantanamo. And that’s not all:

Any plan will probably address whether to also abolish the military commission system and, if so, what kind of legal framework can be substituted to put detainees on trial. The U.S. government

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In fact, he used it five times this morning in an appearance before the American Enterprise Institute:

And what makes this issue difficult to explain is — to the average guy is, why should I be using my money because of excesses on Wall Street? And I understand that frustration. I completely understand why people are nervous

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