We've covered earlier about Googlers and former Googlers making big donations to Barack Obama's inauguration. Now Google's taking it up a notch, throwing its first ever party in for a US president's inauguration, in conjunction with its YouTube video site and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights.

It's not a ball. In fact, the invitation specifically avoids calling it that, saying:

Join Google/YouTube and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights to honor the incoming Obama Administration, welcome a new era of open government, and take a break from traditional Inaugural balls.

So if it's not a ball, what exactly is it? Adam Kovacevich, who heads public relations out of Google's Washington DC office, told me:

I would characterize the event as an "alternative to traditional balls" -- it's not black tie, for example, and will have more of a lounge-like atmosphere.

And can we expect newly sworn-in President Obama to lounge by?

I don't expect that Obama will make it to this party - he's got enough of the "official" events to hit.

Indeed, Obama has one of 10 official inaugural balls to attend that evening. So who will be there? Who has been invited? How many will attend? Will there be Google execs meeting and greeting?

I don't have a final number of people invited because the invitation process is ongoing. And it's pretty much impossible to say who's showing up until that night -- we just don't know for sure. I am pretty confident that a handful of Google execs will be at our party, although it's still too early to give you a precise lineup.

And why do the event at all?

We've done a lot over the past two years to help Google users get involved in the election, from the YouTube debates to polling place data in Google searches, and we felt that an inaugural event would be a fitting culmination of our election projects.

As said earlier, this is a first for Google. Why didn't they do something similar in 2004? Google didn't even have a Washington DC office then, Kovacevich noted. That didn't happen until 2005.

If the latest events and the negative role of US diplomacy has shown anything it is that we can't have the same US policies in regards to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

The news leaks that former Clinton advisor Dennis Ross might be getting the nod to be involved in the new administration as an advisor to the Middle East is certainly not the change that President elect Barack Obama promised during his election campaign.

The prevailing impression in the region and especially among Arabs is that, Dennis Ross was nothing more than a postman for the Israelis. On more than one occasion Arab negotiators have complained that Ross in his job as an American envoy was given them a carbon copy of documents or proposals that the Israelis had sent to their Arab interlocutor.

Perhaps Ross's biggest problems happened after he left the White House as he led the, now disproven myth about what actually happened during the Barack-Arafat-Clinton Camp David talks in the last days of the Clinton administration. At that time Ross led the chorus of Israeli apologists placing all the blame for the failure of the talks on the Palestinian leader. Ironically, Ross, himself, was the person who convinced Arafat to go to Camp David after solemnly promising him that neither side will be publicly blamed if the talks fail. Palestinian president Arafat had told Ross that the time was not ripe for a summit but Ross, in connivance with Barack, attempted to railroad a bad deal down Arafat's throat. Arafat who felt that the deal was very bad for Palestinians asked his US hosts if they can get the support of Arab leaders, they were unable to.

Dennis Ross's lexicon is one reflection of his bias. In a speech he gave to the Seeds for Peace organization, last April, Ross refused to use the universally accepted word "occupation" in describing Israeli army's presence in the Palestinian territories. Instead he used the word "Israeli control."

After he left his job as senior Mideast negotiator continued to work and speak mostly on behalf on behalf of pro Israel Jewish organizations. If the US wants an honest broker, they can certainly find many other much more neutral and respected individuals to Arabs and Israelis including well qualified and politically honest and neutral American Jewish academics and diplomats.

America is poised on a new course when the champion of change, Barack Obama takes office on January 20th. Those who totally believe in a nonviolent solution to the Arab Israeli conflict and wish for true and lasting peace, wish on America's new president to apply his change mantra to the position of his special advisor to the Middle East.

CHICAGO - US Sen. Dick Durbin: Senate won't seat Burris without Ill. secretary of state signature.

KIEV, Ukraine — Russian and Ukrainian officials bickered into the night Friday over a deal leading to the resumption of Russian gas supplies, squelching hopes for an end to a dispute leaving parts of Europe in the cold and dark.

European Union representatives started work in Ukraine's capital, Kiev, to monitor the flow of gas, offering an independent assessment that was critical to sealing a bargain. But Russia said it would only restart pumping gas to Europe via Ukraine after a written deal is signed.

Russia wants monitors in place to prevent what it described as Ukraine's theft of supplies meant for Europe _ a charge Kiev hotly denies.

"Our goal is to show who is to blame for stealing gas," Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said. "Such thievery can't be left unaccountable."

Ukraine's President Viktor Yushchenko rejected the notion.

"Ukraine is not stealing gas," he told reporters angrily.

Gazprom halted all natural gas shipments through Ukraine on Wednesday, ending or reducing gas supplies to more than a dozen European nations amid a pricing dispute with Kiev.

Russia in the past has sold gas to Ukraine and some other ex-Soviet neighbors at prices significantly less than European prices.

Medvedev said Friday that Ukraine should pay a European price for the Russian gas. Last year, Russia charged Ukraine $179.50 per 1,000 cubic meters, about half what it charged its European customers.

Russia's last offer before talks broke down was $250, but Gazprom said the offer no longer stands after Ukraine rejected it and that it will charge Ukraine $450.

EU governments have criticized both Russia and Ukraine for the gas crisis, saying it was unacceptable to see homes unheated, businesses closed and schools shut down in the middle of winter because of the commercial squabble.

Russia, Ukraine and the EU all said the final agreement could be finalized soon, but officials remained coy about what prevented the deal from being completed Friday as hoped.

Ukraine's Natftogaz state gas company spokesman Valentyn Zemlyansky said it was resisting what he described as the Russian push for control over Ukraine's gas transportation network.

Gazprom's CEO Alexei Miller pledged Gazprom would resume shipments to Europe once the monitoring teams deploy to pipeline pumping stations across Ukraine _ a country roughly the size of South Africa or Texas.

But Medvedev emphasized that Russia will resume deliveries to Europe only after a written agreement is in place. "Regrettably, we don't have any faith left in Ukraine's good intentions," he said.

Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek, whose country holds the EU presidency, visited Kiev on Friday to help wrap up the monitoring deal.

"We want to help overcome the crisis of confidence," Topolanek said after talks with Ukraine's president. "Russia wants to ship gas, Ukraine wants to transit it. This problem must be solved."

Yushchenko insisted that his nation "religiously fulfills its transit mission." "But there is one problem: this gas must be supplied from Russia," he said.

Ukraine had initially opposed including Russians in the EU monitoring team, but finally accepted their presence on Friday, Miller said. Ukrainian and the EU officials confirmed that Russians officials were welcome to join the mission.

"It is now imperative that the gas starts to flow," the EU said in a statement.

Once gas shipments resume, it "will take at least three days" for the first gas to reach European consumers, EU spokesman Ferran Terradellas said.

The halt in gas supplies has left European nations struggling to cope during a harsh winter. At least 11 people have frozen to death this week in Europe, including 10 in Poland, where temperatures have sunk to minus 13 F (minus 25 C).

Fifteen countries _ Austria, Bulgaria, Bosnia, Croatia, the Czech Republic, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Turkey _ said their Russian supplies ceased Wednesday. Germany and Poland also reported substantial drops in supplies.

Ukraine's Naftogaz promised the first gas supplies would go to Bulgaria, where thousands of homes are without heating and factories have been shut.

The Sofia Zoo in the Bulgarian capital declared an emergency Friday after being left with no central heating. The zoo was using electric heaters for its 1,300 animals, some of which needed temperatures of at least 68 F (20 C), director Ivan Ivanov said.

___

Associated Press Writer Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow contributed to this story.

It wasn't long ago that Bosnia was held up as a great success story for U.S. intervention. Yet news emanating from the increasingly forgotten corner of Europe has not been good of late. Ethnic tension is on the rise, accompanied by a marked increase in religiosity.

Visiting Sarajevo today, one finds many of the same multicultural, multi-confessional traits as have always graced the city's streets. Minarets and steeples stand tall in the same neighborhoods, and people sip beer or coffee in cafes during the call to prayer, validating the once familiar nickname of "European Jerusalem."

But Milorad Dodik, the increasingly bellicose prime minister of Republika Srpska, Bosnia's Serb entity, has called Sarajevo the "new Tehran", with mosques and madrassas becoming a central part of daily life for a visibly more religious Muslim population. Dodik's hostile rhetoric -- most notably his calls for Bosnian Serb secession -- have been met with equally tense replies from the Bosnia's president, Haris Silajdzic.

The Balkans are unlikely to rest amidst the ever growing multitude of 'top priorities' that the Obama administration articulates in coming months. A global financial crisis, violence in Gaza, instability in Pakistan, and a measured withdrawal from Iraq will all require the utmost attention and care.

However the greatest dangers facing the United States in the next decade may come from their inability to consolidate past successes. Bosnia is the poster-child example of a place where small amounts of measured attention and steady care go a long way toward increasing political stability and economic progress. Neglect, on the other hand, may threaten the hard-fought gains of the past several years.

The United States, if it so chooses, can leverage the favor it already enjoys from the young Muslim populations of southeast Europe. It need not view Bosnia's Islamic resurgence as a threat to order in the region. Bosnia's tradition of Islam is precisely the moderate Muslim voice that deserves the attention and support of the international community.

During and immediately following the Bosnian war of the early 1990s, Wahhabism threatened to accompany Saudi-financed building projects and charities. Many western observers, including top U.S. and European diplomats, made it very clear to the Bosniak Muslim leadership that support during the late stages of the war was contingent upon an outright rejection of any Islamist rhetoric that would have had Bosnia as yet another frontline in the jihadist war against the West.

This was largely successful. The moderate Bosniaks have accepted lavish new Saudi-financed mosques -- funded to the tune of $700 million since the end of the war - yet they have been quick to condemn the Islamist ideology that might have accompanied it.

During a trip to the northwest town of Sanski Most in 2006, Ismir Harambasic, 21, told me over beers, "Before the war, people weren't that religious. But after the war...well, it's more a part of community life." In subsequent returns to visit with Ismir in 2007 and 2008, we noted the differences in the community, from an increased number of minarets on the local mosque to the fact that our conversations were no longer shared over beer -- Ismir had stopped drinking due to religious observance.

Today in Bosnia there remains both a strong secular base that rejects foreign extremism, along with a pro-reconciliation, pro-Islam caste of Bosnian social workers and peace builders that use the multicultural aspects of Bosnia's history to aid in the healing process.

The huge amounts of Western aid and attention that followed the Dayton Accords played a critical role in cementing the role that the West could play in helping Bosnians of all ethnicities shape their future. Since 1995, USAID has given over $1 billion to fund economic growth, governance, and security projects within Bosnia.

The aid had a very clear, immediate effect. In order to continue receiving funds, Bosnia's politicians would have to work together to settle some of their most intractable grievances. And the international community's attention would hold them to their public promises, assuring accountability rather than mere rhetoric.

Over the past eight years, however, international attention has shifted away from Bosnia as it struggles to consolidate gains and establish a functioning government. The USAID budget decreased by 23% from 2007 to 2008, from over $42 million to $33 million. One expects post-conflict funding to taper off with time, but this decrease in aid has not accompanied conditions-based gains.

Perhaps as a result, ethnic tension is on the rise and many have even forecasted the possibility of renewed violence. The lack of international attention is perhaps most apparent when one leaves the streets of Sarejevo, heading north or east to those communities that were never the main target of international aid. And with Dodik calling for the possible secession of Republika Srpska, my friend Ismir tells me, "People are not afraid yet, but they should be."

In the next few years, the international community once again runs the risk of neglecting Bosnians in a time of need.

The Obama administration need not expend great effort and resources on behalf of Bosnia, but must realize the fantastic return it can get for such a small investment of time and energy. It can ensure that fragile agreements are implemented, that political rhetoric is backed with action on the ground, and that Bosnia's moderate voices are heard.

By keeping Bosnia in the international spotlight, the United States can keep it on a track of development and political progress. And in the greater public relations campaign that Obama is preparing for renewed US engagement in international diplomacy, pointing out an example where the US continues to support its moderate Muslim friends is surely never a bad thing.

Richard Bennet is a research associate in national security studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and has worked and traveled extensively throughout Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Friday morning's unemployment report revealed that 524,000 jobs were lost in December, bringing the 2008 net total to 2.6 million jobs lost. That's the highest number of jobs lost since 1945, and there were 11.1 million Americans unemployed in December. The unemployment rate has climbed to 7.2%, but not every industry is feeling the pain equally. Here's how it breaks down.

Taiwan remains one of the most sensitive and divisive issues between the United States and China. What should Chinese President Hu Jintao expect from Barack Obama when he is president on this critical issue? Until the new president is sworn in and key personnel are confirmed, the new administration's policy will remain uncertain.

Moreover, the overall framework as well as detailed policies will emerge gradually; a comprehensive policy statement on Taiwan is unlikely to be issued. Nevertheless, it may be useful to make some predictions. Below are eight policy objectives that are likely to be pursued by the Obama administration. They represent the musings of an independent scholar and interested observer with no special inside knowledge or access to the president-elect.

Beijing is so desperate to get high-polluting cars off the roads, the city has devised a scheme that will pay citizens as much as $3600 to give up heavily polluting vehicles -- and even give drivers more money to purchase cleaner cars.

The scheme by the environmental protection bureau is only one part of a massive plan to get Beijing's more than 350,000 high-polluting vehicles out of the city during 2009. China's capital has already banned cars from the roads on one of five weekdays based on their license plate number as part of a six-month trial that follows broader anti-traffic restrictions during the 2008 Olympic Games. The pay-off, say officials, is a 7 percent rise in blue sky days this year (although as we've mentioned, that statistic remains suspicious).

The initiative would take about 10 percent of the city's 3.5-million registered cars off the roads -- an amount that is estimated to account for 50 percent of the city's notorious vehicle pollution.
Read the full story here.

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Originally published on GroundReport.com, the citizen journalism platform that covers world news at the local level.

By Charles Rukuni

United States President-elect Barack Obama will have a lot of homework to do. The people of Africa are expecting him to be more understanding and sympathetic to their cause. They consider him one of their own because his father was born in Africa.

One of the issues he would have to address urgently is the United States Africa Command (Africom), a unified combatant command of the US Department of Defense responsible for military operations in Africa.

Africom was mooted in 2007 but came into full operation in October 2008. Its headquarters is in Stuttgart, Germany.

Its mission looks simple. "United States Africa Command, in concert with other U.S. government agencies and international partners, conducts sustained security engagement through military-to-military programs, military-sponsored activities, and other military operations as directed to promote a stable and secure African environment in support of U.S. foreign policy," the Africom website says.

Africom is being sold as a humanitarian guard in the global war against terror, but Byran Hunt says "the real objective is the procurement and control of Africa's oil and its global delivery system."

US foreign policy towards Africa according to Letitia Lawson seems to be largely defined by "international terrorism, the increasing importance of African oil to American energy needs, and the dramatic expansion and improvement of Sino-African relations".

Alexander von Peleske said the United States already gets 18 percent of its oil from Africa. This should increase to 25 percent by 2015 according to the African Oil Policy Initiative Group report.

Though Assistant Secretary of Defence for African Affairs Theresa Whelan said Africom's mission would be "diplomatic, economic and humanitarian aid, aimed at prevention of conflict, rather than at military intervention," African leaders are sceptical about this.

Wafula Okumu, a research fellow at the Institute for Security Studies in South Africa, told the United States congress that there was growing resistance and hostility towards Africom. Only one out of the 53 African countries- Liberia- was willing to host Africom's headquarters.

This is the sad reality that Obama will have to face.

African leaders are against Africom because they think that the command is meant to benefit the United States and not their countries. In Nigeria there is growing resentment from the locals that they are not benefiting from the oil.

The United States has not helped because of its double standards. Though an icon of democracy, it has supported repressive regimes in Africa as long as they worked in its interests. It has also fueled conflicts in order to access resources of African countries.

African leaders perceive the war on terror as a ruse to interfere with their administrations should they oppose US foreign policy. There is also a feeling that the money that the US is spending on Africom could have been better utilized if it had been ploughed into other projects that directly benefit African countries.

The US congress has approved $500 million for the Trans- Saharan Counter-terrorism Initiative over the next six years. The US government has invested more than $500 million in Africom itself. The command had a budget of $50 million in 2007. This rose to $75.5 million last year. This year Africom has applied for $392 million.

Go to GroundReport.com for more coverage from Zimbabwe. GroundReport is a citizen journalism platform that allows anyone to publish global news and earn money.

JERUSALEM — With fighting all around them, Israeli troops knocked on the door of the Samouni clan in Gaza City last weekend and told them to leave, directing them to the building owned by a relative. Twenty-four hours later, three shells slammed into the structure where dozens of people were huddling, according to survivor accounts Friday.

A newly released United Nations report said 30 people died in the shelling, citing four unidentified survivors who spoke by telephone. It called the shelling "one of the gravest incidents" to happen since Israeli infantry and armored troops entered Gaza Jan. 4 to quell Hamas rockets on Israel.

Other accounts given to The Associated Press and an Israeli human rights group provided lower casualty figures, but all agreed that shells hit the large, unfinished warehouse-like building a day after Israeli troops told them to get inside it for their safety.

The shelling allegedly occurred Monday, two days after Israel launched its ground operation into Gaza. It took place in the Zeitoun neighborhood, which suffered massive destruction from airstrikes and shelling from the ground.

The report, by the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, offered no evidence that the attack was deliberate.

The Israeli military denied troops had forced civilians into a particular building, which was then shelled.

"We don't warn people to go to other buildings. This is not something we do," said spokeswoman Maj. Avital Leibovich. "We don't know this case. We don't know that we attacked it. It's not confirmed that we attacked it."

Allegra Pacheco, a senior U.N. official in Jerusalem who helped draft the report on the incident for OCHA, added: "We are not making an accusation of deliberate action" by the Israelis.

"We are just saying the facts. In Gaza, no civilian is safe. As long as violence continues, civilians will be injured and killed," she said.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said the U.N. report should be the basis for an investigation of "war crimes elements." Her spokesman, Rupert Colville, said the "war crimes elements" would refer to allegations that Israel impeded medical teams trying to care for wounded civilians and failed to care for those injured in the attack.

Pillay told an emergency meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva that any harm to Israeli civilians by Hamas rockets was unacceptable, but it did not excuse abuses carried out by Israeli forces in response.

Pillay went further in an interview with the British Broadcasting Corp., saying the incident "appears to have all the elements of war crimes."

If an investigation found that Israel intentionally attacked a building it knew was filled with civilians, that also could constitute war crimes. U.N. human rights and humanitarian officials declined to comment on that possibility, saying a full examination of the facts was needed.

Another Israeli military spokesman, Maj. Jacob Dallal, said an investigation of the U.N. allegations showed the building was not deliberately targeted. "What we understand there was no pinpoint attack on that building in question. There is a lot of exchanges of fire. Gaza is a war zone. It's combat."

The incident highlighted the perilous situation of Gaza's 1.4 million residents, trapped in a narrow strip of land and wedged between two determined armed forces, Israel and Hamas.

Further limiting the ability to find out what happened, the casualties were sent to at least two hospitals, and surviving relatives were scattered through Gaza City and could not account for each other. Palestinian journalists have not risked visiting the site where fighting continues, and Israel has not allowed foreign reporters into Gaza.

On Monday, the AP interviewed survivor Salah Samouni at the hospital. He said the family had been ordered to go to the building Sunday by Israeli forces to avoid nearby fighting.

As he spoke, Samouni was distraught, banging his head in mourning for of his three nephews whose bodies he brought to the hospital.

The U.N. report differed in detail from an account to the AP on Friday by Ahmad Samouni and from Meysa Samouni, who told her story to the Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem. But they all concurred that Israeli troops directed dozens of members of the Samouni clan into at least one building, which was shelled the next day.

Ahmad Samouni, 23, said Israeli troops forced him and his extended family to leave their three-story home on Sunday. Once on the road, another squad of soldiers told them to go into another building belonging to Wael Samouni _ and stay there.

He said at least 60 people were in the building, while the U.N. said 110 people were inside when the shells hit.

Ahmad Samouni said a missile slammed into the door. The explosion threw him to the ground and he heard another two loud bangs, he said.

With the dust still swirling, he recalled fleeing in terror from the building, shouting to those still alive to follow him and leaving behind the bodies of his mother and at least eight other relatives.

In Meysa Samouni's account, the clan stayed there Sunday night without food or drink. In the morning, two relatives opened the door to search for other family members.

"The moment they left the house, a missile or shell hit them. Muhammed was killed on the spot, and the others were injured from shrapnel," she said, according to the transcript. "My husband went over to them to help, and then a shell or missile was fired onto the roof."

Ahmad Samouni said that when he lifted his head, he saw a gruesome sight: his mother's face was ripped off, his cousin was burned beyond recognition, and his sister-in-law's back was ripped open. Other relatives lay in heaps. Samouni said he counted nine unmoving bodies.

His face covered with blood and dust, Samouni said he stood and screamed "'Whoever is alive, come outside. If we raise our hands up, they won't shoot us, but we have to go.'"

Samouni said about 40 relatives walked out, many with hands raised. He said Israeli forces, watching them from nearby rooftops and positions on the ground, allowed them to pass, neither helping nor attacking them.

They made their way to the center of town, to the hospital or to other relatives.

The bodies of at least one Samouni man and his three children killed in the explosion were found in a Gaza City hospital. Desperate relatives pleaded with doctors to send rescue teams to find their kin in the rubble.

On Thursday, the International Committee of the Red Cross in Geneva accused Israel of "unacceptable" delays in letting rescue workers reach three Gaza City homes hit by shelling, where they eventually found 15 dead and 18 wounded, including young children too weak to stand.

The Red Cross statement referred to the same Zeitoun neighborhood, but it was unclear if it involved the incident with the Samouni clan, or if it was the same building.

The rescue team "found four small children next to their dead mothers in one of the houses. They were too weak to stand up on their own. One man was also found alive, too weak to stand up," the statement said. "In all, there were at least 12 corpses lying on mattresses" in one of the buildings, it added.

"The Israeli military must have been aware of the situation but did not assist the wounded," the Red Cross said. "Neither did they make it possible for us or the Palestine Red Crescent to assist the wounded."

The Israeli military said it is closely cooperating with international aid groups to assist civilians caught in the crossfire.

"The Israel Defense Forces are engaged in a battle with the Hamas terrorist organization that has deliberately used Palestinian civilians as human shields," a military statement said. "The IDF in no way intentionally targets civilians and has demonstrated its willingness to abort operations to save civilian lives and to risk injury in order to assist innocent civilians."

___

Associated Press writers Ibrahim Barzak in Gaza City and Bradley Klapper in Geneva contributed to this story.

(This version CORRECTS New approach. RETRANSMITTING to correct spelling of `Leibovich' and `Allegra Pacheco' in grafs 6-7.)

I never thought I'd say it, but I agree with Exxon on an environmental issue. The CEO, Rex Tillerson, called for a carbon tax yesterday. As the Wall Street Journal reported...

Rex Tillerson said that a tax was a "more direct, a more transparent and a more effective approach" to curtailing greenhouse gases than other plans popular in Congress and with the incoming Obama administration...Mr. Tillerson has become an unlikely member of a club that includes former Vice President Al Gore, consumer advocate Ralph Nader and President-elect Barack Obama's designated head of the National Economic Council, Larry Summers.

Does "wow" cover it? While skeptics may believe that Tillerson is just throwing the idea out there because he knows it won't happen politically, I'm not so sure. I think he means it. And not just because it's by far the most efficient method to reduce emissions, which pretty much every economist of any political stripe agrees with (for example, Bush's former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors, Greg Mankiw, is a big proponent...see here and here).

But I think Tillerson knows that a carbon tax would likely be cheaper for Exxon than a cap-and-trade, or at least not as specifically targeted. The wrangling over a cap-and-trade system - who will pay for permits, who's included in the "cap", and so on - will be ugly. But you can bet that energy and utility companies will face the most traumatic changes and restrictions. A tax, on the other hand, would wind its way through the economy to the places that the supply and demand curves dictate (those with "inelastic" demand are more likely to pay the price). Basically, even if it's taxed at the pipeline or refinery, the actual cost could be passed on to consumers. But isn't that the point? A tax or a cap should reduce consumption, which won't happen without a higher price signal. Only when gas hit $4 a gallon, did people demand more energy-efficient cars.

At any rate, while many say a tax is nearly impossible to pass, especially in a recession, maybe now's the best time. All bets seem to be off in D.C. these days. Conservative economists are ok with $1.2 trillion deficits and some Republican congressmen have indicated support for energy taxes (and lower income taxes - a policy called 'tax shifting' that other countries have used for years).

It's ideological anarchy out there right now. Maybe while the slate is clean and the economy is at rock bottom, we can explore those hard-to-pass, but ultimately superior, policies. I can dream, can't I?

Andrew Winston helps companies use environmental thinking to grow and prosper. He is co-author of the best-seller Green to Gold, writes a monthly e-letter Eco-Advantage Strategies, and regularly blogs on green business.

President-elect Barack Obama has requested that the words "so help me God" be added to the end of the oath of office to be administered by Chief Justice John Roberts on Inauguration Day.

Congressional Republicans may have forged a fragile peace with President-elect Obama as he pushes his stimulus plan. But they face an insurgency on their right flank.

"You can sense a lot of frustration -- from listening to Rush Limbaugh to reading at RedState -- with Republican members of Congress being ready to fall all over themselves to help him," says Erick Erickson, editor of the conservative blog RedState.

When Republicans dominated Congress and the White House, the liberal blogosphere made a daily habit of chiding Democrats for capitulating to the President Bush. It's happening all over again on the right.

The conservative blogosphere worries that the Obama administration is setting a trap for Republicans: by supporting the stimulus, the GOP simultaneously gives Obama bipartisan cover and further erodes the Republicans' reputation as the party of spending discipline.

If the stimulus package fails to turn the economy around, argue Erickson and others, Democrats will be able to spread the blame around. Erickson thinks that the trap was most likely being set by chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, rather than Obama himself. "I don't think Obama's smart enough to set it," Erickson says. "I think he really believes his own rhetoric" about post-partisanship.

AllahPundit, writing on HotAir, posited that Obama knows "that the ship's going down and want[s] Republicans on deck with him so that they don't capitalize in the midterms. For reasons that escape me, the GOP's evidently going to play along even though they're powerless to stop the stimulus anyway."

Rich Lowry, over at National Review's The Corner, seconded the idea that Obama "wants to suck them into supporting his bill as a political cover against its perceived or actual failure."

The problem with supporting the recovery package, as both sides see it, is that it's never easy to vote for something intended to prevent harm rather than to do good. If it works, no one knows that it worked. Or, as Rep. Barney Frank put it during the financial bailout debate in October, "It's like wearing dark pants and p---ing down your leg. It gives you a warm feeling, but no one knows you did it."

Warm feeling or not, Erickson warns that right-wing blogs will soon begin directing readers to call members of Congress to pull them off the Obama pile. "We haven't really revved it up," he says.

Maybe not, but the rhetoric has certainly been revving.

"The Wealth Redistributor-Elect just wrapped up his fear-mongering speech on behalf of the Generational Theft Act of 2009," Michelle Malkin wrote shortly after Obama's speech on the stimulus at George Mason University.

Don Surber at DailyMail called Obama's plan simply "EVIL."

House Republican leadership responded by gathering a list of a couple dozen economists who say that government spending isn't proven to be an effective economic policy in times of recession. "We can't simply borrow and spend our way back to prosperity," Minority Leader John Boehner said in a statement accompanying the list. "The American people have real doubts about the notion that massive increases in government spending will spur economic growth. So do many economists."

Yet Republican leadership remains at the table with Obama and continues to express broad support for a stimulus. Senate Leader Mitch McConnell said Friday morning that he didn't think the bill would have trouble getting the 60 votes needed to pass.

While they're angry at congressional Republicans, conservative bloggers acknowledge that, as far as Obama's concerned, he's keeping a campaign promise. "He's doing nothing more than what he told Joe the Plumber he'd do, spreading the wealth," says Erickson. "It'll probably be the only campaign promise he'll keep."

I'm working on my Happiness Project, and you could have one, too! Everyone's project will look different, but it's the rare person who can't benefit. Join in -- no need to catch up, just jump in right now. Each Friday's post will help you think about your own happiness project.

Everyone says, and it's true, that one of the most effective ways to handle negative emotions is to lighten up. If things are sad, try to find a reason to laugh. If you're angry, joke around. Easier said than done, however.

I had a chance to keep my resolution to "Make a joke of it" last night. As a consequence of certain marital negotations last year (not conducted in the most happiness-boosting way, I must confess), my husband took on the job of dealing with my daughter's adventure in orthodontia. The orthodontist's office is right around the corner from his office, and he agreed that he'd schedule the appointments and take her. Which was GREAT!

On our flight to Kansas City for the holidays, the Big Girl lost her "functional applicance" (the new-fangled thing she wears in her mouth, except when she's eating). We looked everywhere on the plane; it was gone. We got back home a week later, and the Big Man didn't call to make an appointment. Days went by. I reminded him periodically, but nothing happened.

Whenever I thought about this delay, I became extremely annoyed. Last night, I stomped into our bedroom ready to turn on my anger at full volume. "This really matters, this is important, she's growing now, what's the point, it's expensive, she'll only have to have braces longer, you promised you'd do it," etc., etc., etc. Then I thought, "Make a joke of it."

So I went over, put my arm around the Big Man, and said nicely, "You know what? If you don't call the orthodontist's tomorrow, I'm going to be furious, I'm going to be enraged, I'm going to be beside myself. I'm not threatening, just giving you fair warning." And I laughed while I said it.

"I know, I know!" he said, shaking his head. "I'll send myself an email right now." And he did. And today he made the appointment.

I'm not sure if making a joke of it was more effective than getting angry, but I don't think it was less effective. And it was a much nicer way to have that unpleasant exchange. I was happier about it, and the Big Man was happier about it.

I used the same technique on myself last weekend. I had a bunch of dreaded, dull tasks to take care of. I told myself, "I'm going to clear away a lot of these chores in the next two days. It's going to be the 'Weekend of the Dreaded Tasks'! Like the 'Rodents of Unusual Size,' in The Princess Bride." As I groaned to myself as I put away the holiday decorations, organized my address list for our Valentine's cards, finally dealt with the mail that came when we were out of town, and other things too dull to mention, I repeated to myself, "Oh well, this is the Weekend of the Dreaded Tasks." And just making that little joke to myself made it easier to tackle those tasks.

Of course, I recognize that in neither case when I kept my resolution to "Make a joke of it" was I really funny. My jokes weren't funny at all. But just the attempt to take a humorous attitude made a huge difference.

It's easy to say "make a joke of it," but it's hard to do when you're feeling angry, scared, bored, or upset. Have you found a way to get yourself to make a joke?

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Interested in starting your own Happiness Project? If you'd like to take a look at Gretchen Rubin's personal Resolutions Chart, for inspiration, just email her at grubin, then the "at" sign, then gretchenrubin dot com. No need to write anything more than "Resolutions Chart" in the subject line.

I thought what spies thought of the Panetta choice was important, so I conducted a poll, albeit a very unscientific one.

The results: "Obama was wise" to choose someone out of the torture loop to run the CIA. The problem: Not everyone in the clandestine service has spent the past six years waterboarding prisoners at Guantanamo.

"The job requires the sort of knowledge of intelligence collection that comes from experience," a veteran CIA operations officer told me. "There's no time that clandestinely acquired intelligence is more important than now."

Some would have preferred Steve Kappes, the Marine Corps officer who joined the CIA in 1981, distinguished himself as an operations officer, and now serves as Deputy Director. Others recognize Kappes lacks the political might of a Panetta to recapture support outside of Langley and extricate the CIA from the mire of the past eight years. However, spies play well by themselves, and they don't necessarily mind mire--when done properly, spying is "a dirty business." Which bring us back to their desire for someone accustomed to getting his uniform dirty.

No surprise there. Spooks are comfortable with spooks. Brush salesmen would probably respond similarly to a vacuum cleaner salesman being brought in to boss them around.

But what about the historical precedents in the intelligence business where experience was not a prerequisite for success in the director's job: John A. McCone and George H. W. Bush?

Answers: "Not good examples." McCone's highly relevant Atomic Energy commission experience was among the primary reasons President Kennedy appointed him. And Bush the First had been the "de facto ambassador to China"--due to American relations with the PRC at the time, there was no official embassy. The point: in that job, you're officially thisclose to clandestine operations. Unofficially, closer. And China, not France, a close ally whose free press does a better job providing "product" than any intelligence service could, or Britain, where, in deference to "cousins" MI6, the Agency's fundamental guiding principal is "stand down."

What about Panetta's résumé listing as White House chief of staff? In that position, you're thisclose to the President's Daily Brief, essentially the CIA's raison d'être.

Answers: The chief of staff experience helps but also, as it happens, accounts for two more perceived strikes against Panetta in Spook City:

1. The CIA's relationship with the White House was so distant at the time that "when a small plane crash-landed on the White House lawn in 1994, the joke was that it was [then-CIA-director] Jim Woolsey just trying to get a meeting with the president."

2. Panetta's legacy as "a strong manager" is tainted by his "arrogance."

As to Woolsey, Panetta already knows his way around, and presumably into, the West Wing. As for arrogance, Niccolo Machiavelli was unavailable for comment for this article, but it's probable he would have said, "We'll take it." Again unlike Woolsey, Panetta reportedly had no difficulty getting Clinton's attention.

Mr. Panetta also was unavailable for comment for this piece. Here's hoping it was because he was busy catching up on case files--or in a meeting with Kappes. And that Barack Obama's intelligence is better than Langley's.