Preserving pre-kindergarten; tax breaks for green energy and disabled veterans; and no-excuse absentee voting are among the items on Senate Democrats’ legislative agenda during the 2009 General Assembly session. The 21 members of the Democratic caucus also set as a priority cooperation with their 19 Republican colleagues in the Senate, knowing they must navigate jointly the national recession and a state budget deficit that already has reached $3.2 billion.

President-elect Barack Obama introduced Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine as the new chairman of the Democratic National Committee yesterday, saying the two men share a “pragmatic progressive” political philosophy.

Remember the windfall profits tax? Not that long ago, Barack Obama was proposing to tax the “excessive” profits of energy companies. Hillary Clinton endorsed a windfall profits tax—as did just about any Washington liberal within shouting distance of a microphone.

Election officials have completed their recount in the 5th Congressional District, and it’s official: Democrat Tom Perriello defeated Republican incumbent Virgil Goode. The win means that this year Virginia Democrats took three U.S. House seats from Republicans, thereby giving them a 6-5 edge in the delegation. Democrat Mark Warner also won the Senate seat opened by the retirement of Republican John Warner.

President-elect Barack Obama is likely to name Timothy Geithner, president of the New York Federal Reserve, as Treasury Secretary in a time of intense economic turmoil as he rounds out the upper echelon of his Cabinet, a senior Democratic official familiar with the deliberations said Friday. New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, in line to become Secretary of State, said through a spokesman that discussions were “very much on track” for her appointment but no final arrangement had been made.

In “Animal House”—the movie, not the legislative body—when the Deltas vow revenge on their tormentors, Bluto sputters: “I’m not gonna take this! Wormer, he’s a dead man! Marmalard, dead! Niedermeyer—‘’ Fellow frat boy Otter interrupts: “Dead!“ If these were Democrats plotting for approaching House elections, one might substitute Phil Hamilton for Wormer, Tom Rust for Marmalard and Scott Lingamfelter for Niedermeyer.

Democratic leaders in Congress asked the Bush administration yesterday to provide more aid to the struggling auto industry, which is bleeding cash and jobs as sales have dropped to their lowest level in a quarter-century. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said in a letter to Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. that the administration should consider expanding the $700 billion bailout to include car companies.