Just kidding, but close to it. Apparently, the Senate has created a Youtube channel and the first recipient of Senator of the week is none other than our own John Cornyn. Not to allow any press opportunity pass by, Cornyn immediately posted a video to his site–just to let you know how much he cares.

If you love interactive news gathering, then you will love KXAN today. We have a live blog at our station website, our news crews will be tweeting all day long and we will be taping video blogs and uploading them to KXAN’s youtube site as well. As for me, I’ll be roving to and from various locations. There is a big watch party at Scholz’s, which I will be heading to now, and then the gala tonight at the Four Seasons. Keep it here as various reporters will be uploading blogs all day to give us their impressions of each location.  I’d love to hear what you are thinking as you watch the inauguration as well… so post away!

Carla Castano and the rest of the KXAN newsroom are getting ready for a busy day.

“We’re heading to UT to see what students have to say about the election. Students are a demographic largely credited in getting Obama elected. We’re wondering are these students going to stay active in politics. We’re also wondering what it will take in the next four years to get Obama re-elected and what are Obama supporters afraid of? Also, hopefully we’ll find some McCain supports on campus and see what they are doing today.”

Gov. Perry announced today that he has $6 million in his gubernatorial campaign fund. Meanwhile, Hutchison has already transferred $1 million from her Federal account to the her State account and is expected to transfer millions more today. This is interesting, considering Perry said last week that he didn’t believe Hutchison would really run for Governor. Considering the letters I’ve received in the mail asking for money and asking that I be a part of her cabinet (whatever that means) I’d say she’s still considering it pretty seriously.

What an adventure!This week, we traveled to Washington, DC to interview President Bush and first lady Laura Bush.  Photographer Mark Batchelder and I were fortunate to be one of four Texas news teams to have the opportunity to visit the White House one week before the historic transition of power in Washington.

Our first job was getting to the White House gate. As you can imagine, Washington is busy preparing for the inauguration of Barack Obama.

Crews are constructing risers down Pennsylvania Avenue and throughout Washington where VIP guests will sit to watch the Inaugural parade.  We made our way through the construction, stopping to talk to Secret Service Officers along the way.

I passed through one of the northwest White House security gates and was escorted to the Press Briefing Room.  (It’s much smaller than it looks on television…)

Read Rhode’s full report here. 

Sen. McCain is asking to delay Friday’s debate and says he plans on suspending his campaign for the time being in order to do his Senatorial duties in dealing with the country’s economic crisis. He is asking Sen. Barack Obama to do the same. Obama said no and this is the time the American people need to hear from leaders. He went on to say a president will need to be able to handle more than one thing at once.

Apparently, all the “liberal media and bloggers” have jumped on the rasmussen reports of Cornyn and Noriega in a tight race for Senate. So, the Cornyn camp is now appealing to voters to buck up and pitch in some cash to help him debunk the “myths.”

Here’s a snippet from the e-mail I received:

Please contribute $10, $25 or $50 to help debunk the myths our opponent and his liberal allies are trying to tell about Senator Cornyn.

The facts are clear, the extreme left is energized and unscrupulous, and our opponent is shamelessly aligned with them and will say and do anything it takes to gain much needed relevance and resources.

Your contribution of $10, $25 or $50 will go a long way towards setting the record straight. It will also send a loud and clear message to national Democrats that Texans won’t fall for their dirty tricks, deceit and deviousness.

***If you would rather receive some cash than give it out, see a Cornyn post below that offers $250 bucks for knocking on a few doors.

I’m not going to say I told you so because I think most of us assumed that John Edwards was waiting for just the right moment to throw his support behind the man he believes could name him second in command if he gets the nomination. In case you missed it, John Edwards officially endorsed Barack Obama this afternoon because, he says, Obama is willing to fight poverty.

On another note, Lou Dobbs made a couple of good points tonight. The democrats kept saying over and over they didn’t want a brokered convention and yet, that is exactly what is happening. They are allowing superdelegates to determine the candidate because neither Obama nor Hillary have the number of committed delegates needed to secure the nomination. Dobbs was saying the Democratic party is breaking some of its own rules while it strictly adhered to other rules that threw out the Florida and Michigan votes…states that could have taken this primary in a much different direction. What happens next is anybody’s guess but fine, I will say I told you so on this one.

It looks like with 10% of the precincts reporting, Clinton is winning Indiana’s primary so far…

Election Results

Clinton

58%

Obama

42%

This time, however, no funny Hardball clips. Apparently, Cornyn didn’t have any entertaining slip-ups but here are the “highlights” (according to his pr folks) of his intervew with Wolf Blitzer today.

On progress in Iraq

BLITZER: How worried are you about the current situation in Iraq unraveling? 

CORNYN: Well, I’m very concerned. And that’s why I think we need to continue to make sure that we leave Iraq in a condition that it can govern and defend itself. 

I was last there in January, and very encouraged by the progress on the military front. The Iraqis are stepping up, taking more responsibility, paying more of the bills. And about two-thirds of the benchmarks, on the political side, that Congress set in 2007 have now been met. 

And finally, I would say the initiative that the prime minister — that President Maliki took in Basra, recently, without American support, except in follow-up, the initiative he took against the Shiite militias, criminals and gangs, I thought was encouraging. 

So we need to see more of that, and need the Iraqis to stand up so we can stand down and bring our folks home….

On the economic Stimulus Package

BLITZER: How important is a second economic stimulus package, Senator Cornyn? 

CORNYN: Well, I think we need to be careful here. We need to do what we can. And of course, contrary to what Senator Schumer has said, we just passed a stimulus package on a bipartisan basis. 

What concerns me is that it resulted in $150 billion added to the national deficit. And we need to be careful and make sure what we do is targeted in a way that will actually help people who need it the most. 

I’m glad to hear Senator Durbin talk about the cost of gasoline and the cost of health care. We have frankly done nothing in Congress recently to deal with either of those issues which, even in places where the economy is doing relatively well, like here in Texas, those are areas where people are really feeling the pinch. And I think we would do well to target some of our efforts on bringing down the price of gasoline and making health care more affordable. 

BLITZER: What about extended unemployment benefits, Senator Cornyn? 

CORNYN: Well, you know, unemployment in Texas is about 4.1 percent. It’s almost a full employment economy, it’s 5.1 percent nationally. We need to help I think people with job training and help them get back into the economy if they’re having a hard time. 

But I don’t think spending a lot of extra money and adding to the debt — I mean, everything I hear coming from my friends on the other side of the aisle is let’s have the federal government spend more money. And that money comes from your pocket and mine. And I think we ought to be careful.