Just when you thought you were out, you jump back in.

Bill Clinton, the ex-president whose chief political fundraiser now wants to run for office himself, will provide some payback next week in Virginia.

Terry McAuliffe would like to become the next Democratic governor of Virginia, succeeding Tim Kaine, whose gubernatorial career will be terminated by term limits next year.  We noted back in December McAuliffe's prefabricated commonwealth listening tour to confirm that he was going to run and was prepared to spend a whole lot of other people's money to win.

Terry's real good at raking in money for Bill Clinton and also for Hillary, though she lost anyway and is still working on the rest of her 2008 primary debts with some bizarre showbiz gimmicks.

But here's the little trick to Virginia state campaigns: There are no limits on how much anyone can give anyone.

The governor's office is out for bid.

So next Monday Big Bill, who hasn't been out campaigning for someone in days now, will hit the trail for McAuliffe in Richmond and Roanoke. Polls show McAuliffe in a close three-way Democratic June primary struggle with R. Creigh Deeds, a state senator, and Brian Moran.

In a debate last weekend, all three agreed on most issues, but Deeds tried to enhance his profile by making an issue of his opponents' expansive fundraising, especially from wealthy out-of-staters. In fact, the Democratic trio spent much of the intra-party debate time denouncing their Republican opponent, Robert McDonnell, mentioning him 23 times.

So, if you're scoring at home, Bill Clinton, who used to be a governor, is going to help Terry McAuliffe, who used to be chairman of the Democratic National Committee, become governor of Virginia because the new Democratic president, Barack Obama, who beat the former president's wife, the former first lady, has named the current governor of Virginia as the new part-time chairman of the Democratic National Committee, which would seem to make Kaine also a part-time governor of Virginia. But voters can't do anything about it since governors there are only allowed one term anyway.

By becoming full-time DNC chair next year, Kaine will earn some DC creds in case Obama wants a younger fellow Harvard lawyer in 2012 to replace an old VP, Joe Biden, who became a senator way back when Obama was learning about flax in sixth-grade geography class.

In case you're from the Chicago school of politics and think that money has any connection to winning elections, in the first three months of this year Deeds reported collecting $730,000, Moran $800,000 and McAuliffe $4.2 million, including nearly $3.4 million (80%) from people who can't vote in Virginia. With ballots anyway.

"I've got a lot of friends," McAuliffe said.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: Steve Helber / Associated Press (left to right, Deeds, McAuliffe, Moran).

Folksy is always friendlier than flinty when you're the presidential press secretary.

And although Obama newbie Robert Gibbs has gotten some mixed reviews on his handling of the usually obstreperous press in his first month at the White House podium, Gibbs came up with a few rightfully relevant words in an exchange with reporters aboard a westward bound Air Force One today:

Q: Robert, can you just summarize for us to the extent that you can what the (housing) program he's announcing tomorrow is supposed to accomplish?

GIBBS: Reducing home foreclosures.

Q: Is the president --

Q: How?

GIBBS: Since I got 63 million votes less than the president of the United States, I'll wait 24 hours and let him do it.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo credit: Alex Brandon / Associated Press (Robert Gibbs, White House press secretary, talks with reporters before the inauguration).

ABC This Week: President-elect Barack Obama and a round table with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the New York Times' Tom Friedman, Wall Street Journal's Peggy Noonan and ABC's George Will.

CBS Face the Nation: House Minority Leader John Boehner, Sen. Dick Durbin and Sen.-designate Roland Burris. Moderator: Bob Schieffer.

CNN Late Edition: Vice President Dick Cheney, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, ex-presidential advisor David Gergen, Washington Times' Tara Wall, Democratic strategist James Carville, CNN's Gloria Borger and Candy Crowley. Moderator: Wolf Blitzer.

Fox News Sunday: President George W. Bush and former President George H.W. Bush; round table with Bill Kristol, Weekly Standard & Fox News; Mara Liasson, NPR & Fox News; Charles Krauthammer, columnist & Fox News; Juan Williams, NPR & Fox News. Moderator: Chris Wallace.

NBC Meet the Press: Bill Cosby, D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty, Dr. Alvin F. Poussaint, Rep. Maxine Waters; round table of former Rep. David Bonior, Wall Street Journal's Paul Gigot, CNBC's John Harwood, Vanity Fair's Bethany McLean and McCain economic advisor Mark Zandi. Moderator: David Gregory.

And if those folks aren't sufficient to get you angry after church, John Cardarelli e-mails us that someone named Ann Coulter is going to be on that network's "Washington Journal" program Sunday morning. As with Cosby, a new book. (UPDATE: John e-mails that the Coulter appearance has been cancelled. So, you'll have to scroll back through some of our previous items to get your weekend ire going. Or there's always the editorial page; but they use such big words over there.)

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo credit: Eric Draper / White House

This weekend The Ticket is republishing some items from the past political season. This one appeared here originally on Sept. 12, 2008. Biden and the Obama ticket would seem to have survived these gaffes:

When Barack Obama took Joe Biden to be his lawfully vetted running mate, the freshman Illinois senator took the veteran Delaware senator loose lips and all. And Republicans took note.

The same day Obama tapped Biden, the famously verbose Delaware senator who's been in in the Senate since Obama was 11, the Republican National Committee launched a website to monitor Biden's future gaffes. But with so much attention focused on the shooting star of the GOP's vice presidential nominee, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, and watching for her first big mistake, less attention has fallen on Biden's accumulating missteps.

During his first several weeks as the Democratic vice presidential candidate, Biden did a surprisingly good job of keeping his foot out of his mouth. Sure, he slipped occasionally (like the time he asked a crowd to welcome his running mate "Barack America" to the stage. Or the time he said "Hillary Clinton is as qualified or more qualified than I am to be vice president of the United States of America"). But they're not the sort of bungles that start wars.

Now, however, the honeymoon appears over.

Biden has blundered badly several times in the past several days, often on issues relating to the economy.

He's been caught contradicting his running mate, which is among every political ticket's Ten Commandments of no-no's.

And on one occasion, he got his facts wrong. With voters closely watching and worrying about the financial crisis, these inconsistencies could have consequences come Nov. 4, now less than six weeks away.

And they distract badly from the message the Obama campaign is trying to push on John McCain (namely, that the Arizona Senator is out of touch on the economy).

Biden made one mistake last week, when NBC's Meredith Vieira asked him whether the federal government should bail out ailing....

Maybe you remember Joe the Wurzelbacher, an Ohio plumber who so sincerely quizzed a campaigning Barack Obama on a Toledo cul-de-sac that his videotaped answers about the Democrat's damaging "tax cuts" attracted the opportunistic eye of Republican John McCain's aides.

Obama, apparently thinking Joe was genuinely concerned about the tax cuts' effect on his professed dream to someday own a small plumbing business, provided a full answer that included mention of redistributing wealth.

The GOP senator promptly took the occasion of the next debate to make Joseph an instant national celebrity as the ultimate regular guy (who's about 6-2, bald and a little behind in some taxes), opining on tax policies, etc., who'd be hurt by Obama's plan.

And McCain invited him to ride the campaign bus, apparently thinking Joe was genuinely concerned about the tax cuts' effect on his professed dream to someday own a small plumbing business.

And Joe got to meet Sarah Palin and speak at rallies to large cheering crowds and be interviewed lots of times like a real celeb. Perhaps that was a lot more entertaining than fixing plugged toilets. (And you don't need a license to do it.)

Joe seemed to really like the campaign. He said he did anyway. But now Joe's writing a book, or maybe a book's being written with Joe's name on it, that Joe says is going to analyze the 2008 campaign and his role in it. About time too.

So Joe's out promoting himself and the unfinished book already on Glenn Beck's radio show (audio tape below).  Don't tell Joe but, frankly, he's museum-grade history as far as 2008 politics are concerned.

But he's still out there talking. Joe admits he's a little more educated than other people about politics. So his insights are worth more. He finds Palin to be "the real deal."

But Joe says after talking with McCain in depth on the bus and quizzing him in depth about the bailouts that Joe doesn't like and neither does McCain if they've got pork though he voted for it, which Joe apparently doesn't like. Joe says he was "appalled" at some of the things he saw in politics.

Joe promises the Democrats are really gonna like what he has to say about the Arizona senator they already beat. But Glenn didn't tell him that part.

Joe said he felt dirty after being on the bus with politicians and wanted to get off. Glenn asks the obvious question: So why didn't you?

Joe thinks a second to find an answer, which Democrats won't like.

(Hat Tips to old pal Jimmy Orr over at the refreshing VoteBlog and the always insightful LittleGreenFootballs.)

The interview tape is available for bipartisan listening below.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo credit: The Blade via Associated Press 

The president-elect, no-drama Barack Obama, is expected to name his new secretary of State, all-drama Hillary Clinton, as early as tomorrow as part of the week's rollout for his national security team.

But can he?

As pointed out by a number of bloggers in recent hours, including our eloquent friend Susan over at Wake Up America, there's a clause in the U.S. Constitution (Article One, Section Six) that prohibits senators (or representatives) from taking a civil office if the legislator has voted to increase the pay for that job.

"No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time; and no Person holding any Office under the United States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance in Office."

A president-elect who's a former part-time constitutional law professor, even one without his BlackBerry, presumably is aware of this prohibition, obviously designed to prevent double-dipping and raising your own salary, which is only allowed in Wall Street banks.

And Obama surely knows of its historical precedents.

And if Obama makes the appointment of his former bitter rival, she'll no doubt take office as the point person for U.S. foreign policy.

But the appointment of the loser of the Democratic presidential nomination by the winner of that nomination and of the subsequent general election wouldn't be properly Clintonian without some extra dramatic flourishes. This is likely only the beginning of such chapters.

Apparently, President Nixon ran into the same problem when he wanted to appoint Ohio's Republican Sen. William Saxbe as attorney general.

The solution back then, since dubbed the "Saxbe fix," was for Congress to pass another law (not without some outspoken dissent from Democratic senators, by the way) reducing the AG's pay so Saxbe wouldn't benefit financially from the higher salary he'd previously voted on.

Similar fixes occurred when President Jimmy Carter named Edmund Muskie secretary of State and H. Clinton's own husband Bill named Lloyd Bentsen to head Treasury.

So much for the actual money aspect and strict construction.

We're not lawyers. But we do speak English. And to our eyes that constitutional clause doesn't say anything about getting around the provision by reducing or not benefiting from the increase of said "Emoluments."

It flat-out prohibits taking the civil office if the pay has been increased during the would-be appointee's elected term. Period. Which it has.

This seems more like a TV scriptwriter's trick to keep everyone hanging around through the commercials starting tomorrow.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo credit: Associated Press

Incoming Barack Obama senior advisor David Axelrod issued a fairly stern warning to American automakers today that they'll have to come up with a plan to restructure themselves before the industry receives a federal bailout.

"They're going to have to retool and rationalize their industry for the future. And if they don't do that, then there's very little that taxpayers can do to help them," Axelrod said on ABC News' "This Week."

For emphasis, former Bill Clinton Commerce Secretary Bill Daley, an Obama economic transition advisor and brother to Richard M., the mayor of Chicago, echoed the warning, speaking as a surrogate for the incoming White House Obama team on another Sunday morning news show.

"They have to do it," Daley declared on NBC's "Meet the Press." "The responsibility is on the auto industry and the unions to come back with a plan."

Congress last week delayed any vote on any kind of auto industry bailout plan until next month. Congressional leaders told the three major U.S. auto manufacturers to draw up plans by Dec. 2, with Congress returning to Washington the following week to consider a taxpayer assistance package.

Our blogger buddy Mike Dorning has the rest of this developing story over here on the Swamp.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo credit: Model T Ford Club of America

President-elect Barack Obama announces more White House staff, including the anticipated appointment of chief campaign strategist (and former politics reporter) David Axelrod as senior advisor.

Here's the statement:

Obama-Biden Transition Team Announces More White House Staff

President-elect Barack Obama today announced the following key White House staff: David Axelrod, Lisa Brown, Greg Craig and Chris Lu.

David Axelrod will serve as Senior Advisor to the President.

Lisa Brown will serve as Staff Secretary.

Greg Craig will serve as White House Counsel.

Chris Lu will serve as Cabinet Secretary.

"I am pleased to announce these new additions to our team, and I'll be relying on their broad and diverse experience in the months ahead as we work to strengthen our economy, reform Washington, and meet the great challenges of our time," said President-elect Barack Obama.

David Axelrod, Senior Advisor to the President

"David Axelrod served as President-elect Obama’s Chief Strategist during the presidential campaign, and led Obama’s 2004 Senate campaign.

"A native of New York City, Axelrod graduated from the University of Chicago and spent eight years as a reporter for the ...

(UPDATED: The ABC and CNN guest lists have been updated.)

ABC This Week: Rahm Emanuel, White House chief of staff-designate. George Will, Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Cynthia Tucker, Newsweek's Fareed Zakaria and former White House adviser David Gergen.

CBS Face the Nation: Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, New York Times' David Brooks and Politico's John Harris.

CNN Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer: Sen. Harry Reid, Senate Majority Leader; Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger; former British prime minister Tony Blair; former U.S. Civil Rights Commission member Mary Frances Berry and NBA player Grant Hill; roundtable with Jessica Yellin and Gloria Borger of CNN and Richard Stengel of Time.

Fox News Sunday: Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) and Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.).

NBC Meet the Press: Obama-Biden transition team co-chair Valerie Jarrett; House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-S.C.); Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) and a roundtable with White House historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, Newsweek's Jon Meacham and Chicago Sun-Times' Mary Mitchell.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo credit: Office of Rep. Rahm Emanuel

ABC's "This Week": David Axelrod (Obama's chief strategist -- see photo); Rick Davis (McCain campaign manager); roundtable with Mark Halperin of Time magazine, Democratic strategist Donna Brazile, Republican strategist Matthew Dowd and George Will of ABC News.

CBS' "Face the Nation": David Axelrod (Obama chief strategist) and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C./McCain supporter); Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y./chairman, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee) and John Ensign (R-Nev./chairman, National Republican Senatorial Committee).

CNN's "Late Edition" (three-hour special, starting  at 10 a.m. ET, 7 a.m. PT): Sens. Bob Casey (D-Pa./Obama supporter) and Arlen Specter (R-Pa./McCain supporter);  Govs. Tim Kaine (D-Va./Obama supporter) and Mark Sanford (R-S.C./McCain supporter); Govs. Tim Pawlenty (R-Minn./McCain supporter) and Deval Patrick (D-Mass./Obama supporter); GOP strategists Alex Castellanos and Leslie Sanchez and Democratic strategists Donna Brazile and James Carville; Candy Crowley, Campbell Brown and John King of CNN; Democratic strategist Paul Begala, former White House advisor David Gergen, CNN political analysts Bill Schneider and Gloria Borger, Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post, GOP strategist Ed Rollins, Tara Wall of the Washington Times editorial page and Hilary Rosen of HuffingtonPost.com

"Fox News Sunday":  Rick Davis (McCain campaign manager); David Plouffe (Obama campaign manager); Karl Rove (GOP strategist); roundtable with Brit Hume of Fox News' Washington bureau, Mara Liasson and Juan Williams of NPR, and Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard.

NBC's "Meet the Press": Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass./Obama supporter); former Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn./McCain supporter); roundtable with David Broder of the Washington Post, Michele Norris of NPR, and David Gregory and Chuck Todd of NBC News.

-- Leslie Hoffecker

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Photo credit: Associated Press