Paterson Picks Gillibrand for Senate  —  ALBANY — Gov. David A. Paterson has selected Representative Kirsten Gillibrand, a 42-year-old congresswoman from upstate who is known for bold political moves and centrist policy positions, to fill the United States Senate seat vacated by Hillary Rodham Clinton …

Obama flashes irritation in press room  —  President Obama made a surprise visit to the White House press corps Thursday night, but got agitated when he was faced with a substantive question.  —  Asked how he could reconcile a strict ban on lobbyists in his administration …

Freed by U.S., Saudi Becomes a Qaeda Chief  —  BEIRUT, Lebanon — The emergence of a former Guantánamo Bay detainee as the deputy leader of Al Qaeda's Yemeni branch has underscored the potential complications in carrying out the executive order President Obama signed Thursday that the detention center be shut down within a year.

Fair-Wage Bill Clears The Senate  —  High Court Decision Would Be Overturned  —  A wage-discrimination bill that narrowly failed less than a year ago moved closer to becoming law last night, when the Senate passed the legislation and sent it back to the House for final consideration.

Stimulus Plan Meets More GOP Resistance  —  Obama to Reiterate Appeal for Bipartisanship  —  Just days after taking office vowing to end the political era of “petty grievances,” President Obama ran into mounting GOP opposition yesterday to an economic stimulus plan that he had hoped would receive broad bipartisan support.

Bush's ‘War’ On Terror Comes to a Sudden End  —  President Obama yesterday eliminated the most controversial tools employed by his predecessor against terrorism suspects.  With the stroke of his pen, he effectively declared an end to the “war on terror,” as President George W. Bush had defined it …

The Frigid Fingers Were Live, but the Music Wasn't  —  It was not precisely lip-synching, but pretty close.  —  The somber, elegiac tones before President Obama's oath of office at the inauguration on Tuesday came from the instruments of Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman and two colleagues.

EXECUTIVE ORDER — ENSURING LAWFUL INTERROGATIONS  —  By the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, in order to improve the effectiveness of human intelligence gathering, to promote the safe, lawful, and humane treatment of individuals …

Worm Infects Millions of Computers Worldwide  —  A new digital plague has hit the Internet, infecting millions of personal and business computers in what seems to be the first step of a multistage attack.  The world's leading computer security experts do not yet know who programmed the infection, or what the next stage will be.

Submission in the Netherlands  —  “The Freedom Party (PVV),” read yesterday's press release, “is shocked by the Amsterdam Court of Appeal's decision to prosecute Geert Wilders for his statements and opinions.  Geert Wilders considers this ruling an all-out assault on freedom of speech.”

Obama ready to cut Karzai adrift  —  As support for Afghan leader wanes, rivals go to Washington for meeting with new President  —  Barack Obama's arrival in the White House and the wind of change sweeping through Washington could lead to the ousting from power of Hamid Karzai, President of Afghanistan, The Independent has learnt.

Obama to Lift Family-Planning ‘Gag Rule’  —  Move Would Restore Funds to International Groups Involved With Abortion; Timing Shows Sensitivity to Foes of Roe v. Wade  —  WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama will issue an order restoring U.S. funding for international family-planning groups involved with abortion.

Ill. gov tells AP that strain is like Pearl Harbor  —  CHICAGO (AP) — Illinois' embattled but defiant governor turned to the history books to describe the emotional strain on him and his family, comparing his arrest last month to Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.

Grand New Party: Republican ‘rebuilding’ begins today  —  Washington, DC:  —  Built on a swamp by a Frenchman.  —  Gee, how could that go wrong?  —  Well, how about entrusting self-appointed beltway insiders and “experts” with the harrowing task of rebuilding a fractured, demoralized Republican Party?

The right and wrong way to bail out the banks  —  According to reports in Washington, the Obama administration may be close to devoting as much as $100bn of the second tranche of the troubled asset relief programme funds to creating an “aggregator bank” that would remove toxic securities from the balance sheets of banks.

The 25 Most Influential Liberals In The U.S. Media  —  Edited by Tunku Varadarajan, Elisabeth Eaves and Hana R. Alberts, 01.22.09, 04:02 PM EST  —  Listen for their voices during the Obama era.  —  Barack Obama's inauguration was the formal point at which the reigning ideology in Washington changed from “conservative” to “liberal.”