Obama Said to Name Jack Lew to Replace Geithner at Treasury  —  Obama Said to Name Lew Tomorrow to Replace Geithner  —  President Barack Obama plans to name White House Chief of Staff Jack Lew tomorrow as his choice for Treasury secretary, replacing Timothy F. Geithner, a person familiar with the process said.

McConnell to take lead in entitlement talks, with Boehner in back seat  —  Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is poised to play a bigger role in negotiations to reform entitlement programs in the wake of the tax deal he helped forge last week.  —  Lawmakers see the passage of a bill …

Revealed: The Massive New Liberal Plan to Remake American Politics  —  A month after President Obama won reelection, America's most powerful liberal groups met to plan their next moves.  Here's what they talked about.  —  It was the kind of meeting that conspiratorial conservative bloggers dream about.

In U.S., Democrats Re-Establish Lead in Party Affiliation  —  In 2012, 47% identified or leaned Democratic, 42% Republican  —  PRINCETON, NJ — An average of 47% of Americans identified as Democrats or said they were independents who leaned Democratic in 2012, compared with 42% who identified as or leaned Republican.

Rage Against the Coin  —  (From Talking Points Memo).  —  Well, the trillion-dollar-coin thing — deal with the debt ceiling by exploiting a legal loophole to have the Treasury mint one or more large-denomination coins, deposit them at the Fed, and use the cash in the new account to pay bills — has really taken off.

Biden: Obama exploring executive orders to combat gun violence  —  On Wednesday night, Piers Morgan goes one-on-one with firearms lobbyist Larry Pratt over guns in America.  “Piers Morgan Tonight” airs nightly at 9 ET.  —  (CNN) — President Barack Obama is exploring executive orders …

Hagel pick: Final snub of George W. Bush  —  The final insult to George W. Bush's foreign policy may have come in the form of a Republican ex-senator from Nebraska.  —  Chuck Hagel's nomination for secretary of defense has stirred opposition on both the left and the right …

At 100, still little love for Nixon  —  Richard Nixon would have turned 100 Wednesday, but about the only people marking the occasion are historians, family members and loyalists from the disgraced 37th president's administration.  —  And even they're slowly dying off.

DC Sex Workers Prepare for Huge Influx of Inauguration Partiers  —  If you require the services of a stripper or dominatrix over inauguration weekend, be prepared to pay extra.  —  Image by Shutterstock  —  When Steve Baker talks about the inauguration, he gets a little giddy.

Inaugural committee announces lunch menu, poet  —  President Obama's second inauguration will feature a poem from the youngest-ever inaugural poet and a lunch featuring lobster and bison, organizers announced Wednesday.  —  The president selected Richard Blanco, an openly gay Cuban American …

Transcript of Nate Silver's ‘Ask Me Anything’ on Reddit  —  Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight took questions Tuesday on the popular social news site Reddit's “Ask Me Anything” section.  What follows is an edited transcript, with the questions and answers sorted into several subject areas.

Why Republicans Won't Bargain With Obama Again  —  James Capretta, writing at National Review, lays out what looks like the emerging Republican strategy on the debt ceiling.  Rather than take up President Obama's offer to cut Social Security and Medicare in return for higher revenue through tax reform …

Chuck Hagel Expanded On ‘Aggressively Gay’ Slur In 1998  —  Then-Sen. Chuck Hagel's remark to the Omaha World-Herald in 1998 that Clinton ambassadorial nominee James Hormel was “openly aggressively gay” was only a part of what Hagel told the paper about his opposition to Hormel's nomination.

Ferry Crashes in Lower Manhattan, Dozens Injured  —  A rush hour commuter ferry with more than 300 passengers aboard crashed Wednesday as it approached a Wall Street pier, injuring more than 50 people, police said.  —  Officials had initially said the injuries were minor …

Why can't Republicans enforce law against Harry Reid?  —  WASHINGTON, DC - DECEMBER 11: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) arrrives for a weekly policy luncheon with Democratic members of the U.S. Senate December 11, 2012 in Washington, DC.  The U.S. Congress is still negotiating pending …

Scalpers hawking members' inaugural tickets online  —  Free presidential inauguration tickets given out by Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Sen Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and other lawmakers are being hawked online for thousands of dollars.  —  The scalping of the tickets technically is not illegal …

Images of NRA, Congressional Republicans on the decline  —  PPP's newest national poll finds that the NRA's image has declined over the last three weeks following Wayne LaPierre's controversial press conference the week before Christmas.  —  The NRA now has a negative favorability rating …