This really isn't big news or anything, but I thought the description on the official Change.gov site was pretty cool and very symbolic.

Change.gov:

Today we are releasing the new official portrait for President Barack Obama.

It was taken by Pete Souza, the newly-announced official White House photographer.

It is the first time that an official presidential portrait was taken with a digital camera.

Awesome. I imagine John McCain's official photographer would have used something similar to this. I kid. I kid. Click here for the full, hi-res photo.

This comment from a HuffPo reader sums up my thoughts exactly.

I love the moment though. It captures him at this time, a smile for his love of the country, a direct look for his honesty and integrity, a slightly furrowed brow understanding the enormity of what he faces.

I'm a huge fan and advocate of early voting, but even I didn't think the numbers would be this high. Wow.

United States Elections Project:

In the presidential election of 2008, approximately 39.7 million or 30% of all votes were cast prior to Election Day, November 4, 2008. This is a significant increase from 20% in 2004 and part of the upward trend experienced since 1992, when 7% of all votes were cast early. These numbers are likely to increase in subsequent presidential elections as more states adopt early voting and more voters become comfortable with the practice. A summary of these early voting laws can be found at Paul Gronke's excellent Early Voting Center. I discuss the bright future of early voting - among other trends - in this article available at the on-line political science journal, The Forum.

What a beautiful trend line. I hope these numbers keep rising and rising until Congress recognizes that the current system is pretty broken and very antiquated. I'm a fan of declaring Election Day a national holiday and giving everybody the day off to exercise their constitutional right and duty without having to worry about work and whatnot. I'm also a fan of vote-by-mail (see how well it works in Oregon) and expanded Motor Voter efforts. What electoral changes would you like to see?

h/t Markos, who quips, "no more 'election day.'"

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Osama bin Laden crawled out from that hard-to-find rock he's been hiding under today to directly provoke President-elect Obama and urge his followers to continue their attacks on Israel.

ABC News:

In a direct challenge to President-elect Barack Obama, Osama bin Laden questions whether America "is capable to keep fighting us for more years" in a new audio message attributed to him Wednesday morning on an internet website.

A senior U.S. official told ABCNews.com, "There is no reason to doubt the authenticity of the tape."

It is the first time bin Laden has been heard from in seven months and puts to rest speculation he is dead. The al Qaeda leader's last audio message was posted on May 18, 2008.

Bob Woodward scoops another one, this time getting a top Pentagon official to admit, on record, that the United States did indeed torture Mohammed al-Qahtani, a Saudi who allegedly "hoped" to become part of the 9/11 attack.

The Age:

THE official in charge of the military commission process at Guantanamo Bay has become the first senior Bush Administration figure to publicly admit that a detainee was tortured.

Judge Susan Crawford, who was in charge of deciding whether to bring Guantanamo Bay detainees — beginning with Australian David Hicks — to trial, has concluded that the US military tortured a Saudi Arabian who allegedly planned to take part in the September 11, 2001, attacks.

She said Mohammed al-Qahtani was interrogated with techniques that included sustained isolation, sleep deprivation, public nudity and prolonged exposure to cold, leaving him in a "life-threatening condition".

"We tortured Qahtani," Judge Crawford said in her first interview since her appointment by Defence Secretary Robert Gates in February 2007. "His treatment met the legal definition of torture. And that's why I did not refer the case (for prosecution)."

Take special note of that last part. This is exactly why torture is counterproductive. Not only is it morally reprehensible and of dubious efficacy, it ends up prohibiting us from prosecuting these criminals the real American way.

The GWOT really is a "war of ideas." When we torture and imprison indefinitely those those seek to attack us, we drag ourselves down to their level, all the while showing the world that we don't really stand for what we say we do. This is George Bush's true legacy. He and his cronies may be running around trying to convince you otherwise. But I know you're all smart enough to know better.

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The tagline of Campbell Brown's CNN show is "No Bias. No Bull." I'll admit that I don't watch it too often, but if she really cuts through the bull every night like she did on Monday, I may just have to set the TiVo.

Bush: "Don't tell me the federal response was slow when there was 30,000 people pulled off roofs right after the storm passed."

Brown: "Many people will disagree over many aspects of the Bush legacy, but on the government's handling of Katrina... It is impossible to challenge what so many of us witnessed firsthand, what the entire country witnessed through the images on our television screens day and night.

"Mr. President, you cannot pat yourself on the back for that one. We will debate the war in Iraq, debate national security, the economy, and the rest of your legacy. Those debates will continue for years to come. But on how you handled Katrina, there is no debate."

Damn... You tell him, Campbell!

The White House has been in full "re-write history" mode the past few months, but even the brilliant Bush spinmeisters couldn't spin the fact that no one really cares about what Bush has to say anymore.

Washington Post:

With seven days left until he surrenders power, Bush will have to do a heck of a sales job to convince the nation of this. Further complicating his last-minute legacy rehabilitation: Nobody seems to be paying attention. The White House had high expectations for yesterday's final, historic news conference. "ONE CORRESPONDENT PER ORGANIZATION," proclaimed the bulletin sent to reporters. "STANDING ROOM ONLY FOR NON-SEAT HOLDERS." But when the appointed hour of 9:15 a.m. arrived, the last two rows in the seven-row briefing room were empty, and a press aide told White House interns to fill those seats.

You almost gotta feel sorry for the guy. Almost.

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In a somewhat understandably soft ball interview with Chris Wallace, former President George H.W. Bush defends what is by most accounts his son's epic failure of a presidency and defers to "the Google" when asked about which things W could be "fairly criticized for."

Bush: He's gonna come home with his head high, knowing he ran a clean operation and he kept this country strong and free after an unprecedented history attack of 9/11. He'll have a lot too be proud of and he can start by his mother and father being very proud of him...and we always will be.

Wallace: You said there earlier there are some things he could fairly be criticized for. Would you like to tell me any of those?

Bush: "No. You can go back to your, what do you call it.... Your Google, and you figure all that out."

On some level you gotta feel sorry for Papa Bush. It's pretty clear that he always wanted his other son, Jeb, to be the second Bush President.

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I've always had a tremendous amount of respect and admiration for Zbigniew Brzezinski. And after this epic smackdown of the eminently ignorant and simple-minded Joe Scarborough, I know that affection was well-placed.

Scarborough: "You cannot blame what's going on in Israel on the Bush administration."

Brzezinski: "You know, you have such a stunningly superficial knowledge of what went on that it's almost embarrassing to listen to you."

Ouch. Make sure to watch the entire clip because the intellectual beat down continues to the very end.

Former Bush aides go on record saying that Hurricane Katrina was the "tipping point" of George Bush's presidency and that, after the federal government's pathetic response, he couldn't recover. Unfortunately for the residents of the gulf coast, President Bush wasn't the only one.

AP:

Hurricane Katrina not only pulverized the Gulf Coast in 2005, it knocked the bully pulpit out from under President George W. Bush, according to two former advisers who spoke candidly about the political impact of the government's poor handling of the natural disaster.

"Katrina to me was the tipping point," said Matthew Dowd, Bush's pollster and chief strategist for the 2004 presidential campaign. "The president broke his bond with the public. Once that bond was broken, he no longer had the capacity to talk to the American public. State of the Union addresses? It didn't matter. Legislative initiatives? It didn't matter. P.R.? It didn't matter. Travel? It didn't matter."