All Blog Posts from Couric & Co.

The president hosted his first lunch for newspeople (more accurately newsmen and one newswoman) in the private dining room of the residence. It is always a thrill to be part of this lunch. I was first invited in 2006 with President Bush. It’s an opportunity for some frank conversation in a relaxed, informal setting. Of course sports was the initial topic (guys) but I was able to direct the chit chat more towards the Oscars and movies. President Obama said he had watched "Slumdog Millionaire" at the White House and loved it … in many ways, he said it reminded him of growing up in Jakarta, where he lived between the ages of 6 and 10. He also really liked "Gran Torino," and the table pretty much agreed that Clint Eastwood was enormously talented in acting, as well as directing and composing. He missed the Oscars because the governors were at the White House for a formal dinner. That was about it in terms of small talk. The discussion soon moved to something much bigger: the economy.

The conversation was on background with a number of White House officials, so I'll spend the next few minutes characterizing what they had to say. I think it’s safe to say we’ll hear from Dr. Obama tonight. He’ll level with the American people and explain that the patient is sick, here’s the diagnosis and that the prognosis is good. I got the impression he’s going to try to explain these complicated issues in layman’s terms without sounding too professorial or as if he’s lecturing at an Introduction to Macroeconomics class.

But he will try to connect the dots and explain why the credit crisis is impacting people on a personal level, whether it’s plant layoffs, college loans or home foreclosures. When asked about nationalizing the banks ...

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Did Senator Judd Gregg, R-N.H., "flake out," or did the Obama administration err by choosing him as Commerce Secretary?

That’s the question "Washington Unplugged" guest moderator John Dickerson of Slate asked at the top of his roundtable discussion with Politico's Eamon Javers and CBS News' Political Director Steve Chaggaris.

"I think he had a change of heart," Chaggaris answered.

Gregg said he'd "thought about it over the last 10 days and realized, I can't work with these guys. I don't agree with them about a lot of this stuff, especially on the stimulus."

Politico's Javers cut the former Commerce Secretary appointee little slack.

"Whether Gregg had good intentions or not ...

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Complete Inaugural Coverage

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After it was noted in the broadcast that William Henry Harrison, America’s ninth president, caught pneumonia during his lengthy inaugural address in 1841, KatieCouric noted that he is a distant relative of hers. Also, she said his story “is a cautionary tale to every president following to keep it short when it comes to the inaugural address.”

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When speaking to Gen. Colin Powell, Bob Schieffer asked what he thinks the inauguration of Barack Obama will do for America's reputation abroad.

“I think it’s already helped. It’s really been a remarkable event in terms of getting everybody to stand back and say ‘look at what we have seen here in America. The America we remember is back again.’ So I think it was a reaffirmation of American principles and values that will help us overcome some of the difficulties of recent years with respect to the attitude of the world towards us.”

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At the inaugural platform: "We saw Denzel Washington, we saw … Sen. Jim Bunning, a former hall of famer," said CBS News Capitol Hill correspondent Chip Reid said. "Governors, senators, you name it, we got it."

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Looking at a view of the crowd of millions attending the inauguration, Schieffer said: "The star of this show is the wide shot."

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Complete Inaugural Coverage

eporting from the seating area closest to President-elect Barack Obama's inaugural stage, CBS News Capitol Hill correspondent Chip Reid asked renowned director Steven Spielberg what brought him to the inauguration.

"What inspires me is what inspires everybody. He is young, he has tremendous … courage," he said. "What's more, he has tremendous ideas. He is the president of ideas."

"This is more than just a presidential election. This is a new beginning," he continued. "Two of my kids are here. I just wanted them to rub up against history."

Mark Knoller is a White House correspondent for CBS News.

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Press Secretary Dana Perino said President Bush was in the Oval Office at 6:55 a.m. this morning.

He made some phone calls, talked to National Security Advisor Steve Hadley, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and took a call from his former Chief of Staff Andrew Card.

Mr. Bush then talk a last walk around the South Lawn, and is now spending his last moments in the White House with his family until the Obamas arrive just before 10 a.m.

Perino herself was in the press room giving out her last supply of M&M's with the presidential seal and Mr. Bush's signature on them.

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Click Here For All Of CBSNews.com's Special Inauguration Coverage

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Complete Inaugural Coverage

Christina Ruffini is a CBS News broadcast associate based in Washington.

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During Tuesday’s festivities, when cabs are scarce, limos are expensive and buses are downright confusing, everyone from the Metro police to the sandwich artists at Subway seem to agree that if you can’t walk it, the rails are your best bet for inauguration transportation.

As someone who rides the train for an hour everyday, twice a day, five days a week and occasionally on weekends, I have become nauseatingly familiar with the unwritten rules of the rails. They are not difficult to figure out. Anyone who is paying the slightest bit of attention to their surroundings or has a modicum of respect for their fellow human beings should be able to deduce the basics.

For example, when heading into a station - or trying to escape from one - people usually stand on the right side of escalator. This is not some en mass form of street performance art. It is so that the lazy, the high-heeled, the elderly and the injured can get out of the way of the running-lates, the highly caffeinated, and the ambitious showoffs who feel the need to climb what are literally some of the tallest moving stairways in North America. Stand right, walk left, and keep you luggage, purses or overcoats on your side of the stair. Nobody likes an escalump.

Once on the train, please do hold on. There is nothing worse than ...

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Peter Maer is a White House correspondent for CBS News.

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The old Frank Sinatra song "My Way", especially the refrain "Regrets I had a few...." comes to mind following President Bush's final news conference.

It was a defiant, wistful and sometimes unusually introspective performance.

Mr. Bush elaborated on his intention to let history be the final judge of his White House years. He told reporters, "I've had my time in the klieg lights." But as he heads into his last full week in office, the president clearly hopes to control the focus of those lights on his legacy.

Reflecting on the sour economy, Mr. Bush said, "I readily concede I chucked aside some of my free-market principles when I was told by chief economic advisers that the situation we were facing could be worse than the Great Depression."

He said, "I inherited a recession. I'm ending on a recession." But Mr. Bush also inherited a balanced budget. There was no mention of the massive budget deficits that have piled up over the past eight years as he defended the tax cuts that some critics blame for much of the red ink. Mr. Bush insisted the cuts were "the right course of action." In something of an understatement, he said his successor "would have his hands full with the economy."

He was surprisingly frank ...

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Mark Knoller is a White House Correspondent for CBS News, temporarily reporting from the CBS News Pet Desk at the White House.

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You had to feel sorry for India the Cat as the least-known member of the First Family. She never got quite the same level of public attention or affection as the Bush Family dogs Barney and Miss Beazley.

Quietly this morning, the First Lady’s press office let it be known that India, a black American Shorthair, died yesterday in the White House at the age of 18.

The story goes that India got her name from one of the Bush’s twin daughters, Barbara. When she was nine, she named the cat for former Texas Ranger baseball player Ruben Sierra – who was called “El Indio.”

The Bush Family also took to calling the cat “Willie” or just plain “Kitty.”

One of India's favorite pastimes, according to First Lady Laura Bush, was to sun herself on a chair near the Palladian window at ...

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You've seen him assaulted with a shoe, but care to see President Bush "hung?" That's a scenario Mr. Bush decided was worthy of a joke this morning in Washington.

"I suspected there would be a good-size crowd once the word got out about my hanging," the president said at the unveiling of his portrait at the National Portrait Gallery. The portrait by Robert Anderson – a classmate of Mr. Bush at Yale – will be hung in the exhibition “America’s Presidents," and available for viewing starting tomorrow.



White House correspondent Mark Knoller writes: "Since the gallery now has portraits dating back to George Washington, he noted the symmetry - from George W. to George W."

Mr. Bush also noted that the artist said he had a lot of trouble with Mr. Bush's mouth "and I told him that makes two of us," the president said ...

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Mark Knoller is a White House Correspondent for CBS News.

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Want to stay up drinking 'til five in the morning to celebrate the Obama inauguration? It’s okay with the City Council in the nation’s capital.

By a 9-to-4 vote yesterday, the council approved a bill that will let any bar or restaurant with a liquor license serve alcoholic beverages until 5:00 a.m. starting three days before the inauguration and running until the day after the big night. A spokesperson says Mayor Adrian Fenty intends to sign the measure into law.

The council was acting at the behest of the Restaurant Association of Metropolitan Washington, which sees an opportunity to boost revenue for its members by offering expanded hours of service to the millions of visitors expected to be in Washington for the swearing-in of Barack Obama as the nation’s 44th president.

The council action was news to Stephanie Cutter, chief spokesperson for the Obama Transition Team, and she thought it best not to ...

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