Political Appointments

Patricia Clarey, a top healthcare company executive and former chief of staff to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, has been appointed to the board of the California Public Employees' Retirement System, the country's largest government pension fund. Clarey, a Studio City resident, represents the state personnel board on the 13-member panel that manages investments to pay for retirement benefits and health coverage for 1.3 million state, school and local public employees, retirees and their families.

Should Roland Burris show up for duty in the Senate on Tuesday, armed police officers stand ready to bar him from the floor. This cinematic showdown is among an elaborate set of contingencies that Democratic leaders are planning if, as expected, the former Illinois attorney general appointed by Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich shows up with newly elected senators to press his claim that he is the legitimate replacement for President-elect Barack Obama. Democratic leaders hope to avert such a standoff.

Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter Jr. is expected to announce today that he is appointing Michael Bennet, the head of the Denver school district, to fill the state's vacant U.S. Senate seat. The state's Democratic senior senator, Ken Salazar, is leaving to serve as secretary of the Interior in the Obama administration. Speculation has swirled for weeks over whom Ritter, a Democrat, would pick as Salazar's replacement.

Roland Burris and Democratic party leaders headed toward a showdown at the door of the U.S. Senate today as the former Illinois attorney general presses his claim to the disputed seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama. Burris said in an interview Monday evening that he intended to try to walk onto the Senate floor to be sworn in with incoming senators when the Senate convenes, despite declarations from party leaders that they will prevent him from entering the chamber.

Roland Burris gained a powerful ally in his bid to replace President-elect Barack Obama on Tuesday when Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California urged the Senate to seat him, arguing that his appointment was lawful. Her stance could strengthen Burris' position as he meets with Senate leaders today. Burris, appointed by embattled Illinois Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich, came to the Capitol to be sworn in with other senators Tuesday but was barred from the Senate floor.

After promising during the campaign to restore order and accountability to the nation's spy agencies, President-elect Barack Obama has been beset by uncharacteristic blunders in his effort to assemble an intelligence team. His selection of Leon E. Panetta as CIA director marked the first time Obama faced immediate opposition from his own party over a Cabinet nomination.

President-elect Barack Obama has asked Dr. Sanjay Gupta to be the next U.S. surgeon general, looking to a popular television personality to help provide a public face for his healthcare agenda. Best known as a health and medicine correspondent for CNN and CBS, Gupta, 39, is a practicing neurosurgeon in Atlanta and a member of the faculty at the Emory University School of Medicine. The surgeon general oversees some 6,000 officers in the commissioned corps of the Public Health Service.

Thanks a bunch, Mr. President-elect. You've just taken away California's best hope for government and political reform -- reform necessary to save this state. It's understandable because Leon Panetta would excel in practically any job he undertook -- whether reforming Sacramento or retooling the CIA. Bright, personable and pragmatic. Articulate and dedicated. Experienced and knowledgeable in government -- if not as a spy, at least in managing people.

Just days after his prospective colleagues in Washington turned him back from the Capitol, Democrat Roland Burris seized on an Illinois high court decision filed Friday to assert he should be accepted as President-elect Barack Obama's replacement in the U.S. Senate. Armed with the Illinois Supreme Court ruling, Burris' lawyers vowed to return to Washington on Monday and file suit in federal court unless top Senate Democrats reverse their rejection of impeached Democratic Gov. Rod R.

Senate Judiciary Committee staffers vetting Eric H. Holder Jr.'s nomination for attorney general said Friday they are seeking testimony from the Justice Department's former pardon attorney as they inquire into Holder's role in the 1999 grant of clemency to members of a Puerto Rican terrorist organization.