Rick Warren — Out of the Closet!  —  Rick Warren, the pastor who will deliver the invocation next month for Barack Obama, apparently is doing a little image-adjusting in West Hollywood.  —  We got this pic, taken yesterday at Out of the Closet thrift store.

Seattle refuses to use salt; roads “snow packed” by design  —  To hear the city's spin, Seattle's road crews are making “great progress” in clearing the ice-caked streets.  —  But it turns out “plowed streets” in Seattle actually means “snow-packed,” as in there's snow and ice left on major arterials by design.

THERE IS NOTHING ANYONE CAN DO ABOUT IT.  —  Over at BoingBoing, Clay Shirky engages in a bit of self-congratulatory schadenfreude for predicting the collapse of the newspaper business model back in 1993.  And no doubt: He was prescient.  But like a lot of folks (many of them named Jeff Jarvis) …

Emanuel Heads To Africa As Blagojevich Report Drops  —  With the Obama transition team set to release an internal report regarding the extent of its interactions with embattled governor Rod Blagojevich, one of the key figures in the mix is heading out of the country.

Bush pardons man who helped Israel during wartime  —  Featured Topics: - Barack Obama - Presidential Transition  —  WASHINGTON - In a gesture of forgiveness for an American considered a hero in Israel, President George W. Bush on Tuesday granted a pardon posthumously to a man who broke …

Joe the Plumber Laughs at CNN Anchor Who Insists He's Fair, He's Not Pro-Obama  —  Just before 8 am Eastern time on the Tuesday edition of CNN's American Morning, anchor John Roberts interview Joe “the Plumber” Wurzelbacher, and something unusual happened.  After a battery of questions …

Conservative Snobs Are Wrong About Palin  —  I know Maggie Thatcher.  The two women have a lot in common.  —  Being listed in fourth place for Time magazine's “Person of the Year,” as Sarah Palin was for 2008, sounds a little like being awarded the Order of Purity (Fourth Class).

EXCLUSIVE: Obama wants Bush war team to stay  —  Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates is asking many of the Bush administration's 250 Pentagon political appointees to remain on the job until the incoming Obama administration finds replacements — a move designed to prevent a leadership vacuum …

New York Is Semi-Sweet On Caroline, Quinnipiac University Poll Finds; Cuomo Is Favored By Upstate Voters  —  New York State voters split 40 - 41 percent on whether Caroline Kennedy is qualified to be a U.S. Senator, but they expect by a 48 - 25 percent margin that Gov. David Paterson will name …

Why Obama Really Might Decriminalize Marijuana  —  The stoner community is clamoring to say it: “Yes we cannabis!”  Turns out, with several drug-war veterans close to the president-elect's ear, insiders think reform could come in Obama's second term — or sooner.

Flood of sludge breaks TVA dike  —  Collapse poses risk of toxic ash  —  HARRIMAN, Tenn. — Millions of yards of ashy sludge broke through a dike at TVA's Kingston coal-fired plant Monday, covering hundreds of acres, knocking one home off its foundation and putting environmentalists on edge …

Quirky Festivus holiday gains followers  —  Those who celebrate Festivus display a pole instead of a tree and air grievances instead of exchanging gifts.  —  JBURNETT@MIAMIHERALD.COM  —  Alexandra Casuso was only 11 years old when Festivus made its TV debut on Seinfeld in 1997 …

Obama to use Lincoln Bible  —  From the transition team:  —  “Washington, D.C. - On January 20th, President-elect Barack Obama will take the oath of office using the same Bible upon which President Lincoln was sworn in at his first inauguration.  The Bible is currently part of the collections of the Library of Congress.

O, MY BOD!  IT'S BEACH BARACK  —  NEXT PREZ HEATS UP HAWAII  —  Just call him “Ab"-bama.  —  Buff-bodied President-elect Barack Obama put his chiseled frame on full display - as seen on Page 1 - during a stroll in Hawaii while on vacation with his family.

Friedman Would Be Roiled as Chicago Disciples Rue Repudiation  —  A A A  —  Dec. 23 (Bloomberg) — John Cochrane was steaming as word of U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's plan to buy $700 billion in troubled mortgage assets rippled across the University of Chicago in September.

Top Clinton Advisor Wolfson Joining Team Bloomberg  —  In an exclusive interview with NY1, top Democratic strategist Howard Wolfson announced today that he will be joining Mayor Michael Bloomberg's re-election campaign as a senior communications advisor.  —  “Around the time of the term limits extension …

NPR Rewrites Rathergate History to Cover Up Fraud  —  National Public Radio does their best to rewrite history in this shockingly disingenuous piece on the Rathergate affair, told from Dan Rather's perspective as he openly states (and NPR doesn't challenge) that the memos in his infamous 60 Minutes II piece …

Child porn investigation catches California lawyer  —  (CNN) — A lawyer who served in the Clinton administration and more recently was an adviser to California's lieutenant governor pleaded guilty to a child porn charge in a San Diego federal court Monday.  —  Wade Rowland Sanders admitted …