President-elect Barack Obama on Saturday outlined his plan to create 2.5 million jobs in coming years to rebuild roads and bridges and modernize schools while developing alternative energy sources and more efficient cars.

“These aren’t just steps to pull ourselves out of this immediate crisis; these are the long-term investments in our economic future that have been ignored for far too long,” Obama said in the weekly Democratic radio address. The economic recovery plan being developed by his staff aims to create 2.5 million jobs by January 2011, and he wants to get it through Congress quickly and sign it soon after taking office. On this score, Obama and his transition team already seem to be working with Congressional leaders to have a bill ready to pass and enact.

All good stuff but I’m not sure if the above qualifies as immediate. Infrastructure investments, while desperately needed, are normally out-year expenditures not first year stimulus investments. But all this points to a problem with the delay in the transition of power. In the 19th century and until 1936, Inauguration Day was March 4th. FDR moved it up to January 20th. The delay between Election Day and Inauguration Day is much too long given the fast-moving world we live in. Gail Collins in her New York Times op-ed thinks that President Bush should resign immediately:

Putting Barack Obama in charge immediately isn’t impossible. Dick Cheney, obviously, would have to quit as well as Bush. In fact, just to be on the safe side, the vice president ought to turn in his resignation first. (We’re desperate, but not crazy.) Then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would become president until Jan. 20. Obviously, she’d defer to her party’s incoming chief executive, and Barack Obama could begin governing.

In effect, she is arguing for a puppet Presidency. How stupid can you be? This from a New York Times columnist? Sheer lunacy. The real answer is to shorten the interval. In France, it’s ten days. Sounds about right.

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Glenn Thrush over at Politico looks at five top Democratic movers and shakers on the outside looking in so far at least at a Cabinet appointment in an Obama Administration:

John Kerry, State—The Massachusetts Senator and former Democratic presidential nominee was a passionate, articulate and early supporter of Obama, a fixture on both conference calls and the Sunday talk show circuit. Kerry’s people say he never had any expectations of being named Secretary of State but other Democrats say he made no secret of his Foggy Bottom aspirations. “He’s crushed,” said one Senate aide. Kerry would have been a fine pick, sources say, but Obama apparently had his eye on Hillary Clinton since the early fall. He does get an impressive consolation prize: the chairmanship of the Foreign Relations Committee vacated by Joe Biden.

Howard Dean, HHS—He’s stepping down as DNC Chairman with a revitalized reputation, thanks to Obama’s validation of his 50-state strategy. But Dean, a physician by training and rebel by inclination, has a keen interest in health care refrom and was considered a top candidate for the top job at Health and Human Services. That is, until the gig went to former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, a less volatile player who is expected to be the administration’s health-care point man on the Hill. What did Dean in? It could have been his frosty relationship with Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, who was frustrated with Dean’s efforts on behalf of House Dems, according to the Wall St. Journal. The former Vermont governor, though, has a good relationship with Obama, and is likely to pop up somewhere.

Richard Holbrooke, State—Oy, did he get big-footed. The Clinton administration’s foreign policy Mr. Fix It lobbied for the State Department job with a fury, according to the L.A. Times, but wasn’t apparently under serious consideration due to previous clashes with Obama’s international team. Holbrooke, known for his intellect and pit-bull demeanor, was a top advisor to Clinton during her primary campaign and could get a role in the Clinton state department.

Bill Richardson, State—New Mexico’s governor and former Clinton U.N. Ambassador-cum-energy secretary dearly wanted State. And Obama owed him big-time, both for his primary endorsement and for Richardson’s now-forgotten decision to swing his delegates to Obama during the Iowa Caucuses. If he’s upset, though, his tears will apparently fall on the cabinet table. He’s reportedly the new Commerce secretary, and was apparently offered Interior too.

Susan Rice, NSA—Not a done deal, but retired Marine General James Jones and Clinton White House alum James Steinberg have emerged as the two top candidates for the national security adviser job, according to numerous press accounts. That would leave Susan Rice, a top Obama national security adviser long rumored for the post, out in the cold. Rice’s prospects may have dimmed because she is one of the few Obama insiders who has been skeptical of a quick withdrawal from Iraq. But centrists, including Brookings Institution fellow Michael O’Hanlon, are still making the case she would provide a valuable counterweight to more dovish Obama aides. It’s likely, though, that she’ll be given a major role in the new administration somewhere else, if she wants one.

On four of the five, I am actually relieved and thankful. The sole exception is Richard Holbrooke who is a tenacious diplomat and would make an exceptional Secretary of State though his combative style is probably not a good fit with the President-Elect with his cool and detached view of policy. There are others on the down and out so far.

John Edwards, HHS or Attorney General–Pity that the most populist of the leading contenders for the Democratic nomination and whose endorsement was highly sought after is now a pariah in the Democratic party.

Lawrence Summers, Treasury–The former Clinton Treasury Secretary and former President of Harvard wanted a return to the Treasury Department. It’s likely that opposition from women’s groups scuttled any chance of his nomination. His abrasive character likely didn’t help either. However President-elect Obama is expected to name him as his pick to head the National Economic Council. So there is a consolation prize and perhaps down the road a Federal Reserve Governorship.

Franklin Raines, Housing & Urban Development–Ignominy if not jail is the destiny of this high profile former CEO of Fannie Mae.

Jim Johnson, Housing & Urban Development–Another former CEO of Fannie Mae headed for pariah status.

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After the initial disappointment at not being named one of OUT 100 for the 14th straight year, I was more shocked and dismayed that out of the OUT 100 I could only recognize 15 of the people named, honoured and profiled. I have never been nor do I aspire to be an A-list homo, still I have always prided myself on being knowledgeable about the world around me though frankly the vacuous and hedonistic aspects of being gay are largely behind me at this point in my life. I mean what does it say about being gay in 2008 when Francis Kurdkdjian, a perfumer, is named one of the OUT 100. A perfumer? Pretty damning in its irrelevance.

Not that all the 86 others unknown to me are so unworthy of being one of the top 100 influential homosexuals of 2008. I was impressed to learn of Denise Simmons, the lesbian African-America mayor of Cambridge, Massachusetts. That’s an achievement worthy of wider recognition. Still of the OUT 100, I’d say fully two-thirds of them are wholly irrelevant to my life and I’d daresay to the overwhelming mass of humanity. If this is the state of gay culture and society in 2008, then we are truly damn pathetic as the creative cutting edge of humanity.

The 15 I managed to recognize: Gus Van Sant, Katy Perry, Dean & Dan Caten, Bishop Gene Robinson, Rachel Maddow, Edward Albee (who is dead), Steven Hildebrand, Mark Walsh, Alan Ball, Anthony Goicolea, Ian McKellen, Bruce Vilanch, George Takei, and John Barrowman.

Who in gay heaven is:

Cory Benton?
Jamal Brown?
Wilson Cruz?
Missy Higgins?
Michael Bastian?
Ari Shapiro?
Hermes Mallea?
Robin Gans?
Sandy Sachs?
Jodie Harsh?

I must live in a very different world from most of my gay brethren because none of these top A-list homos have any bearing on any matter of importance to me.

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This episode of Al Jazeera’s The Listening Post looks at the asymmetrical media coverage of the conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

In the News Divide, we turn our attention to a subject that has been eclipsed in recent weeks and months by the US presidential election and the global banking meltdown: the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Despite being branded as ‘Africa’s world war,’ a ‘humanitarian catastrophe’ and the human exodus of refugees that it has precipitated, the headlines in the Western media have been slow to emerge. We look at the disproportionate amount of airtime that General Laurent Nkunda and his band of rebels are enjoying thanks to their comparatively sophisticated public relations machine and how the m#
edia are largely buying into their narrative.

Of course as with much in Africa, the problem is tied to natural resources and the influence of outside powers primarily France and China.

General Laurent Nkunda, the rebel leader of the National Congress for People’s Defence (CNDP), has said he wants to re-examine a $5 billion dollar deal the Congolese government has struck with China.

The deal gives China access to Congo’s vast mineral riches in exchange for infrastructure development, including hospitals and football arenas.

However, critics say China is behaving just like the imperial powers of the past.

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