Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) is President-elect Barack Obama’s first choice for secretary of State but his aides are becoming exasperated by the Clinton camp’s pokey response to demands for extensive information about former President Bill Clinton’s finances, according to numerous Democrats involved in the process.
“The sense among the no-drama Obama world is: This is well on its way to winning best Oscar for drama,” said one well-connected Democratic official.
Continue reading ‘Bill vetting could cost Hillary her Cabinet post’

The Bush White House stressed Monday that it supports help for the struggling auto industry, but believes it should not be taken from the $700 billion financial system rescue program.
As lawmakers were returning to a lame duck session to focus on the troubled industry, President Bush’s chief spokeswoman issued a statement saying the administration “does not want U.S. automakers to fail.” Press secretary Dana Perino complained that reporting on the White House’s on this issue has involved “attempts to shorthand the administration’s position.”
Continue reading ‘White House refines position on auto industry help’

A hijacked supertanker with two British crew members was being taken to a Somali port this afternoon after pirates seized their biggest vessel yet off the African coast.
Acts of piracy in the shipping lanes of the Arabian Sea have become increasingly violent and commonplace in recent months, but this is the first time hijackers have seized an oil tanker.
Continue reading ‘Somali pirates hijack Saudi oil tanker with Britons on board’

Australia is about to get a new entry into national politics — a party devoted to sex.
The brains behind the Australian Sex Party, which will be launched in Melbourne on Thursday, believe that politics has become too stuffy and conservative Down Under.
Continue reading ‘Sex party set to heat up Australian politics’

U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe said Saturday that Congress was not told the truth about the bailout of the nation’s financial system and should take back what is left of the $700 billion “blank check” it gave the Bush administration.
“It is just outrageous that the American people don’t know that Congress doesn’t know how much money he (Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson) has given away to anyone,” the Oklahoma Republican told the Tulsa World.

“It could be to his friends. It could be to anybody else. We don’t know. There is no way of knowing.”
Continue reading ‘Inhofe: Cancel the ‘blank check’’

AP Special Correspondent WASHINGTON The Bush administration has told top lawmakers it does not plan to use at least half of the $700 billion bailout fund that Congress approved this fall to aid the financial industry, congressional officials said Monday.
These officials said Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson passed the word over the weekend that he intends to leave $350 billion untouched when the administration leaves office on Jan. 20. That would mean the incoming Obama administration would decide whether and how the funds should be spent.
Continue reading ‘White House may let Obama decide part of bailout’

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev plans to travel this month to Cuba and Venezuela, which have increasing military and trade ties with Moscow.
The U.S. has objected to Russia’s greater links with the two countries that have antagonistic relations with Washington.
Continue reading ‘Russian leader Medvedev heading to Cuba, Venezuela’