Thursday morning, House Democrats voted 137-122 to make California Rep. Henry Waxman chair of the House Energy and Commerce committee, replacing longtime Chairman John Dingell of Michigan.

The vote wasn't just mundane political infighting -- it could have major implications on energy and environmental policies. Dingell represents a state that depends on the auto industry; if he were chair of the committee, he likely would have posed a major obstacle to the Obama administration's goals on both fronts.

As Salon's Andrew Leonard wrote in a post over at How the World Works on Wednesday, "Many activists consider Dingell to have been a steadfast opponent of tougher fuel economy standards. His 2007 proposal to tax carbon emissions was widely viewed as a sneaky political maneuver aimed at equating climate change action with big new taxes. Waxman, on the other hand, favors an aggressive approach to tackling climate change and other environmental issues."

Opponents of Proposition 8 may not have won at the ballot box, but they will get their day in court.

The proposition, which California voters approved on Election Day, overturned an earlier state supreme court decision and banned same-sex marriage. Now, the court will consider lawsuits brought by proponents of same-sex marriage who are asking that the initiative be invalidated. According to the Los Angeles Times, California's governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, has said he thinks the court will rule for the plaintiffs, and he supports that result.

The court's seven justices voted against a stay of the initiative, meaning that same-sex marriages can not continue while the case is considered. A hearing may be held as soon as March.

The recount in the race for one of Minnesota's Senate seats began Wednesday morning. By the end of the day, it was already about 18 percent complete, and challenger Al Franken had gained on incumbent Republican Sen. Norm Coleman.

Before the recount, Franken trailed Coleman by 215 votes. Now, according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, that gap is down to 174 votes.

CNN is reporting late Wednesday night that President-elect Barack Obama wants Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano to head the Department of Homeland Security.

In Arizona political circles, talk has been building since before the election about what Napolitano might do in an Obama administration -- she endorsed Obama early, though she wasn't able to deliver Arizona in the state's Feb. 5 primary. Some people in Phoenix had speculated that Napolitano might be up for consideration as attorney general, but now that seems to be going to Eric Holder.

A big part of the DHS job would be dealing with illegal immigration; the department includes all the federal border security and immigration agencies. Napolitano has already made that a major focus back home. More undocumented immigrants cross the border in Arizona than in any other state, thanks to years of federal policy that has funneled migrants into the state's harsh desert (where they're more easily tracked by Border Patrol agents before they reach urban areas, though the crossing is far more dangerous). Napolitano surprised some immigration advocates when she endorsed a state law last year that calls for Arizona to strip business licenses from companies that knowingly employ undocumented workers, and she was calling for the federal government to send National Guard troops to the border well before President Bush finally did so in 2006.

Obama transition sources didn't answer e-mailed questions about Napolitano late Tuesday night, but Arizona political observers believe it's all but a done deal. Napolitano, apparently, is not talking about an appointment back home -- which, given the secrecy the transition team has said it's aiming for, could mean she is up for a job. If she leaves the statehouse in Phoenix, Republican Secretary of State Jan Brewer would replace her.

What this rumor does to the other big rumor in Arizona politics -- that Napolitano wants to run for John McCain's Senate seat in 2010, whether McCain retires or not -- is a little uncertain for now.

With Mark Begich winning in Alaska, Jeff Merkley victorious in Oregon and Al Franken hot on Norm Coleman’s heels, it looks like the Democrats' quest for 60 Senate seats is headin’ on down to Georgia, where early voting has begun in a run-off between Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss and Democratic challenger Jim Martin. 

Democrats are fighting an uphill battle in the red state: A Rasmussen poll shows Martin 4 points back and Georgia’s secretary of state reports a decrease in African-American turnout. But the party is doing its best to take the seat, and hoping that some of the residual enthusiasm from Barack Obama's win will help Martin.

Meanwhile, Republicans are doing their best to make sure this ends up as more than a war of Democratic aggression. Both parties have begun diverting significant resources, including some big names, to the peach state. John McCain and Mike Huckabee have already stumped for Chambliss. Bill Clinton is putting his weight behind Martin. And Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani and Al Gore are on their way, as are a host of Obama campaign operatives. The Republican National Committee has committed 2 million dollars to helping the Chambliss campaign, and the National Republican Senatorial Committee has begun airing ads that claim Martin helped create the biggest tax hike in Georgia history.

The run-off was mandated by Georgia election rules, which say that a candidate needs to receive a majority of the vote in order to be elected. On Nov. 4th, Libertarian candidate Allen Buckley kept both Chambliss and Martin from hitting the 50 percent plus one mark. Buckley -- who will not be on the ballot this time around -- is embracing his spoiler status and showing, as they say in Georgia, a bit of chutzpah. He's has now said that in order to receive his endorsement Chambliss and Martin would have to sign on to a lengthy statement of principles. Neither is likely to do so.

Update: Due to an editing error, the original version of this post mistakenly identified Senator-elect Jeff Merkley as Gordon Merkley. Our apologies, and thanks, to the readers who pointed out the mistake.

With Jan. 20th approaching fast, the Bush administration is racing to weaken air-quality standards in and around parks and wilderness areas.

The move could pave the way for two dozen new coal-fired power plants to be built near national parks. And of all the Bush administration's attacks on clear-air regulations, this one is so egregious that half of the regional managers within the Environmental Protection Agency have formally dissented from it, according to documents obtained by the Washington Post. Senior agency officials in the Southeast, West and Great Lakes areas have voiced fierce resistance to the proposal, which would have the effect of legalizing temporary spikes in pollution from coal-fired power plants, oil refineries and other big polluters.

While air quality in national parks isn't as important to public health as more general soot and airborne lead pollution regulations, it's of huge symbolic and ecological value. Many parks, such as the Shenandoah National Park, struggle with poor air quality, shrouding stunning vistas from view. At that park, visitors in the 1930s reported seeing the Washington Monument more than 70 miles away. These days visibility is often barely a mile.

The ugly news: the EPA could issue a final rule as soon as this week, over the objections of many of its managers. But if the rule is enacted, the National Parks Conservation Association plans to petition the agency for reconsideration. That would provide a window for the Obama administration to throw the sooty policy out.

Here in San Francisco, the lines to buy pot at our many neighborhood cannabis clubs are even longer than the lines to vote for socialist Barack Obama were on Nov. 4.

Homeless people, high on drugs, freely roam the streets, escorted by police officers who know everyone by first name and distribute special Cracker Jacks with actual crack as the prize.

If you think I'm kidding, then you haven't seen this segment from Bill O'Reilly's show, which was first spotted by the Huffington Post. Yes, people, Bill wants his viewers to know what Obama is going to do to the country. He's going to destroy "traditional America" and turn it into "secular progressive America" -- just like San Francisco, the capital of drugs, homeless, hippies and degenerates of all shapes and sizes.

Unfortunately, as hilarious as it is to see O'Reilly's contorted Reefer Madness vision of San Francisco, it's also offensive. Fox used blacks and Latinos, transgenders and gays, and poor people to represent the progressive Obama nightmare that his "radical left" government is supposedly going to unleash. And the good "traditional" America? Yup, white mothers with strollers.

Right-wing San Francisco-bashing is hardly new or even notable. But O'Reilly has taken it to new extremes of paranoia in this little production. You gotta see this for yourself. 

It only took two weeks, but we can finally say officially -- if not yet with complete certainty -- that John McCain won Missouri and its 11 Electoral College votes on November 4th. The Associated Press made the call on Wednesday.

McCain's margin over Barack Obama in Missouri stands at just 3,632 votes, the equivalent of 0.12 percentage points. Because the two men are separated by less than one percentage point, Obama could ask for a recount. Obviously, that's unlikely to happen.

With Missouri in McCain's column, the final Electoral College count stands at 365-173 in Obama's favor, though of course that could change if there are any faithless electors.

As of this post, it's been about nineteen hours since the Associated Press called the Alaska Senate race for Democrat Mark Begich, and we’ve heard not a peep from Sen. Ted Stevens. No defiant demand for a recount, no resigned statement about looking forward to private life -- no concession.

Hoping to get some word on the Senator's plans, Salon e-mailed a Stevens campaign spokesman. He has not yet responded.

Update: About ten minutes after this post was published, Stevens conceded. A Stevens aide e-mailed reporters this statement:

Given the number of ballots that remain to be counted, it is apparent the election has been decided and Mayor Begich has been elected.

My family and I wish to thank the thousands of Alaskans who stood by us and who supported my re-election. It was a tough fight that would not have been possible without the help of so many Alaskans -- people who I am honored to call my friends. I will always remember their thoughts, prayers, and encouragement.

I am proud of the campaign we ran and regret that the outcome was not what we had hoped for. I am deeply grateful to Alaskans for allowing me to serve them for 40 years in the U.S. Senate. It has been the greatest honor of my life to work with Alaskans of all political persuasions to make this state that we all love a better place.

I wish Mayor Begich and his family well. My staff and I stand willing to help him prepare for his new position. 

It's always dangerous for a conservative to mess with the Republican Party's evangelical Christian base. During his 2000 presidential campaign, John McCain criticized Jerry Falwell and lost to George W. Bush in the Republican primary. Prior to his 2008 presidential run, McCain made peace with Falwell. Apparently, conservative columnist Kathleen Parker hasn't learned McCain's lesson, and she isn't in a conciliatory mood.

Parker had first stirred up controversy on the right back in September, when she said that Sarah Palin wasn't qualified to serve as vice president. That position earned her brickbats from her readers and even some colleagues. But Wednesday, in a column for the Washington Post, she went all in, arguing that the GOP needs to shake off its association with evangelicals to maintain it's long-term electoral viability. While she was at it, she tossed in a few insults directed at the faithful within the party, writing:

Three little letters, great big problem: G-O-D...To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn't soon cometh.

Simply put: Armband religion is killing the Republican Party. And, the truth — as long as we’re setting ourselves free — is that if one were to eavesdrop on private conversations among the party intelligentsia, one would hear precisely that...

Which is to say, the GOP has surrendered its high ground to its lowest brows. In the process, the party has alienated its non-base constituents, including other people of faith (those who prefer a more private approach to worship), as well as secularists and conservative-leaning Democrats who otherwise might be tempted to cross the aisle.

The columnist also used her latest piece to go after her old target, Palin, writing, "Let's do pray that God shows Alaska's governor the door."

Parker's larger argument is that while Republicans are increasingly becoming white Christians, the nation is not, meaning that unless the GOP can appeal to other types of voters, they will struggle at the polls in coming decades.

Needless to say, the reaction on the right hasn't been particularly positive. Philip Klein at the American Spectator called Parker "absolutely nuts to blame the Republican defeat" this year on evangelicals. And in a post entitled "Quit It Kathleen" on the National Review's Corner blog, Jonah Goldberg attacked his "friend" Parker, writing: 

I don't know what's more grating, the quasi-bigotry that has you calling religious Christians low brows, gorillas and oogedy-boogedy types or the bravery-on-the-cheap as you salute — in that winsome way — your own courage for saying what (according to you) needs to be said. Please stop bragging about how courageous you are for weathering a storm of nasty email you invite on yourself by dancing to a liberal tune...For the record, I have no problem with arguments about how the GOP has become too religious...But please drop the nonsense about how the G-O-D people  or the Palin people are low brows and beasts. There are low brows and beasts everywhere, on every side of the ideological spectrum. Maybe if you got more ecumenical hate email you'd realize that.