Chancellor Forever was created in coordination with the Deutsches Institut für Public Affairs.

WHAT'S NEW IN POLITICS

"Obama: Stimulus needed now" - Politico.com

With the country facing the “greatest economic challenge of our lifetime,” President-elect Barack Obama said Friday that Congress should enact a financial stimulus package before he takes office — and if not, he will make it his first priority after his inauguration.

In his first formal interaction with the media since winning election Tuesday, Obama focused primarily on the financial crisis, but also pivoted between his response to the first congratulatory note from an Iranian leader to a U.S. president-elect in 30 years, his approach to filling Cabinet posts and his search for a family dog.

Cautious in his language on policy but looser than he'd been on the campaign trail when he wasn’t discussing matters that could move markets or affect international diplomacy, Obama sought to shape expectations about the speed and ease of an economic recovery. But he also said he could do “an enormous amount to restore confidence” on the economy in the first 100 days.

"Secretary of State post looms large" - Politico.com

In the last several presidential transitions, there was a clear choice for the position of Secretary of State. In 1992, former State Department official Warren Christopher was seen as Bill Clinton's leading candidate. Eight years later, in 2000, Colin Powell was an almost prohibitive favorite to get the nod from President-elect Bush.

Barack Obama, on the other hand, has a longer list of possibilities to choose from - and at least three of them are longtime powerhouses in the Democratic Party.

The names are the top of Obama's list: New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, former United Nations ambassador Richard Holbrooke and Massachusetts Sen. John F. Kerry. Adding to the complexity of this decision is the role of another of the party's longtime foreign affairs experts: Vice President-elect Joe Biden.

All three are getting signficant buzz and all three have serious credentials. Richardson, who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination earlier this election cycle, has one of the longest diplomatic resumes of any elected official. A seven-term veteran of the House of Representatives, Richardson served in the Clinton administration as ambassador to the United Nations and Secretary of Energy. "Emanuel pick sends powerful signal" - Politico.com

President-elect Barack Obama’s selection of Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) as his White House chief of staff is the latest demonstration of a quality Obama showed repeatedly over the course of his campaign: He’s willing to do what it takes to win.

If his goal had been to create a cordial bipartisan tone in Washington — much less a calm, profanity-free West Wing — Obama would have looked elsewhere.

The selection of Emanuel, one of the Democratic Party’s most effective operatives over the past two decades, was a powerful signal of Obama’s determination to be effective under the existing rules of the Washington game.

[...] Republicans immediately attacked Emanuel as a partisan and as a contrast to Obama’s pledge of a “new politics.”

“Barack Obama’s first decision as president-elect undermines his promise to ‘heal the divides.’ Rahm Emanuel is a partisan insider who played a lead role in breaking Washington,” said Republican National Committee spokesman Alex Conant, and House Republican leader John A. Boehner called the choice “ironic.”