Andrea Mitchell says that Clinton will be SoS. According to her, Clinton and Obama had decided a while ago and that they kept it from their staff.

Jonathan Capehart says that the delay in the announcement has helped flesh out the sources of the leaks.

Later Updated: in response to JNagarya commentary:

I think the pundits are really perplexed as to how Obama could bury the hatchet with Lieberman and Clinton. As you remember, during the election Clinton said that while she and McCain had foreign policy cred, all Obama had was a speech. She also when asked by a reporter if Obama was a Christian, responded that as far as she knew he was, the implication being that maybe he isn't.

After Andrea Mitchell confirmed that Clinton would be nominated after Thanksgiving, the Morning Joe crew struggle to explain how Obama forgave Lieberman and Clinton their election "trespasses" and why he would name Clinton as SoS.

Chris Matthews said (paraphrased) "this guy is really a christian. This is loving your enemies, real Christian values that (addressing Buchanan) are hard to find in the world." Buchanan laughed that one off. Joe Scarborough (paraphrase) "this is New testament in action. He believes in unity and forgiveness."

Additionally, the nonsense question that has been repeated ad infinitum in the media echo chamber as to why so many former Clinton era appointees are being nominated and whether this is really change or a return to Clinton politics was finally addressed. Scarborough and others finally acknowledged that it is common to have appointees from previous administrations reappointed and that having Obama as president makes this administration different. Scarborough commented that although Reagan brought in Nixon's people into his administration, in a top down fashion, Reagan set the policies they were to execute, in effect putting his brand on his presidency.

Michelle Obama has chosen Jackie Norris to be her chief of staff. Jackie was President-elect Barack Obama's Iowa state director.

From the Des Moines Register.

Norris, 38, is married to John Norris, a longtime Democratic operative and chairman of the Iowa Utilities Board. The couple have three young sons.

Prior to taking on her role as a top Obama adviser in Iowa, Jackie Norris was a high school government and history teacher.

However, she has been involved in Democratic politics in Iowa for more than 10 years. She was finance director to Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack's 1998 campaign and worked as former Vice President Al Gore's political director during the Democrat's 2000 caucus campaign.

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This video is very sad. I am sad for our country and for the world. I hope the 20 or so percent who still approve of Bush get to see this. These leaders blame Bush for the global financial crisis, the effect of which has yet to be be fully realized. If he has not felt any shame before this, I think he must of felt it in this situation.

I think this says more about the state of the world economy then anything else I have seen or read so far.

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The Lieberman decision is making more sense to me now. I'm still upset, but the Lieberman issue was lite. Energy, health care, economy are monumental. Having an historical inauguration without the political infighting, that the Lieberman confrontation would have fueled, is what we need. A political confrontation would have set a different tone then what Obama has been promising and projecting. He is forgiving everyone's old bads, as they were part of the old way of doing politics in Washington, and giving everyone an opportunity to do better.

There are four million people who are estimated to be attending the inauguration. Imagine Obama setting the stage for a peaceful cooperative transition. He has the potential of drowning out and marginalizing all the extreme "divide and conquer" methods that had become 'politics as usual' in D.C. and replacing it with civility, respect for those who differ with you, honest debate, and the ability to disagree without being disagreeable.

Isn't that what we signed up for? Then why are so many of us (myself included) angry at Obama's decision to forgive Lieberman? Maybe because we are focusing on petty issues, the same petty issues that we have been trained to focus on over the past 16 divisive years?

The leader sets the tone.

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