From the L.A. Times:

President Obama plans this week to name CIA Director Leon Panetta to replace Defense Secretary Robert Gates, and Gen. David Petraeus, now running the war in Afghanistan, would take the CIA chief’s job in a major shuffle of the country’s top national security leadership, administration and other sources said Wednesday.

All sources spoke on condition of anonymity because the changes are not final.

The changes would probably take effect this summer. Gates has already said he will leave this year, and the White House wants to schedule Senate confirmation hearings in the coming months.

The officials say Obama is expected to also announce that Lt. Gen. John Allen would replace Petraeus as Afghanistan commander, and that diplomat Ryan Crocker will be the next U.S. ambassador in Afghanistan.

The changes are expected to be announced Thursday at the White House. A former U.S. official said all four candidates would stand together with Obama for the announcement.

Both men seem to have been chosen because they are seen as competent and shouldn’t be difficult to confirm. Some in the Beltway are also noting that this also removes any possibility that Petraeus may run for president as a Republican, but I never really took that talk seriously. More interesting is that Panetta will be a rare Democrat at the Pentagon.

Since the Department of Defense was set up in 1947, Democrats have served as Defense Secretary for only 13 years, even though a Democrat has been President for 27 of those 64 years. While I like Gates, it perpetuates the idea that Democrats are “weak” on national security when even Democratic presidents tend to appoint Republicans to the job. Hopefully, that trend ends now.

Disgraced Sen. John Ensign of Nevada has decided to resign on May 3 (ok, this news is a few days old, but I was out of town and unable to blog until now!). He had already decided not to run for re-election after a sex scandal decimated his popularity and put him under the cloud of an ethics investigation. Resigning now is an attempt to help Republicans retain the seat; Gov. Brian Sandoval is expected to appoint Rep. Dean Heller. Heller already intended to run for the seat and was seen as the best potential candidate for that side. Likewise for fellow Rep. Shelley Berkely, a Democrat who recently announced her candidacy. However, Nate Silver questions how much of an advantage the appointment is for Heller whom Silver thinks was already a modest favorite (and this is probably the Democrats best pickup opportunity in the 2012 Senate elections).

This was also set off a special congressional election for Heller’s seat. Sharron Angle had announced her candidacy for the seat (the district actually voted for her in last year’s Senate race, though it will be drawn differently after redistricting), but she is not likely to be the party’s nominee because state party committees will select the candidates instead of through primaries. Republicans will likely not take the risk of losing that would be entailed with an Angle candidacy. While a Democratic win in this election wouldn’t change much as far as votes in the House, it would look bad politically.

UPDATE: Sharron Angle is considering an independent run if she is not put on the ballot as a Republican, opening the way for Democrats to win Heller’s congressional seat.

UDPATE II: Heller is officially named as replacement; Angle says she will run as a Republican.

Didn’t expect this:

Democrats appear to have recruited retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez to run  for the U.S. Senate in Texas, setting the stage for the party to field a  well-known candidate in the 2012 race to replace retiring Republican Sen. Kay  Bailey Hutchison.

Former Texas Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes, a Democrat, confirmed that Democratic  Senate campaign chief Patty Murray, D-Wash., was referring to Sanchez on  Thursday when she said Democrats were close to announcing a candidate in  Texas.

Murrary made the surprise announcement earlier in the week that Texas would be one of six states targeted for Senate pickups in 2012. Other potential candidates – former comptroller John Sharp and former congressman Chet Edwards – had been considered so uncompetitive that an effort was started to draft actor Tommy Lee Jones. But this now could be a serious race.

Sanchez, a Rio Grande City native, said he was shaped by his upbringing.

“It’s my views and my history, having grown up in South Texas, depending on  social programs and assistance, that America has a responsibility to its  people,” he said.

Barnes, one of the state’s last high-profile Democrats, said, “I talked to  him. It sounded to me like he’s close to being a candidate.”

“He’s got a very compelling story,” Barnes said. “He’s the one guy who could  unite the Hispanic vote. He’ll get the conservative Hispanic businessman…

Until now, all the attention in the U.S. Senate race has been on the  Republicans, and Barnes is eager for the Democrats to compete.

Republicans now hold every statewide  elected office in Texas.

“It’s the one candidate that will cause John Cornyn some heartburn,” Barnes  said.

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, is chairman of the Senate campaign committee.

Several congressional Hispanic Democrats, including Reps. Henry Cuellar of  Laredo and Charlie Gonzalez of San Antonio, told the Star-Telegram that they welcome Sanchez’s likely entry  into the race.”

One big flaw in the candidacy is that Sanchez retired under the cloud of the Abu Ghraib scandal which happened while he was U.S. commander in Iraq, though he says he was unaware of what was going on and was cleared by Army investigators.  His 2008 book, “Wiser  in Battle: A Soldier’s Story,” criticized the Bush administration’s  handling of the war.

There is, of course, no perfect Democratic candidate to run in Texas, but Sanchez is a much better one than expected and it seems like he will have more national party support than Rick Noriega, the former state house member who served in Afghanistan, when he ran against Sen. Cornyn in 2008. With control of the Senate on the line, it can only be a good thing that Republicans will be forced to spend time and money in Texas when they didn’t think they’d have to.

All but four Republicans and zero Democrats in the House of Representatives voted for budget chariman Rep. Paul Ryan’s 2012 budget proposal that turns Medicare into a voucher program, slashes education funding and further cuts taxes for the rich (amusingly, House Dems almost caused Republicans to vote for an even harsher budget). Needless to say, this plan is DOA in the Senate.

Yesterday, Congress approved the budget deal worked out by President Obama, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and Speaker of the House John Boehner last week to avoid a government shutdown. In the House, dozens of Republicans defected and it only passed with the help of Democrats (though of majority of the caucus voted against it). The Senate also easily defeated bills to defund Planned Parenthood and health care reform – votes which were promised as part of the same budget deal.

Yes:

State Sen. Jeff Wentworth, R-San Antonio, hoped to bring up his bill to allow some individuals to carry concealed handguns on college and university campuses today, following a false start on Thursday. But the search for votes is proving more difficult than anticipated.

Texas Senate rules require the consent of 21 members to suspend the rules and bring a bill up for debate. When Wentworth tried to bring the bill up for consideration last week, he thought he had the support of 22 members. But after debate got under way, state Sen. Eddie Lucio, D-Brownsville, and state Sen. Mario Gallegos, D-Houston, withdrew their support, leaving Wentworth — who described the move as a “complete surprise” — one vote short.

Public pressure seems to have worked on the two senators. Sen. Gallegos says the has found universities and colleges in his district are overwhelmingly opposed to the bill and he will be against suspending the rules from this point on.  Sen. Lucio says he would be willing to suspend the rules if an amendment was accepted allowing each institution to vote on whether or not to allow concealed weapons on their individual campus, but Wentworth is saying no to that for now. Unless an opposing senator from either party agrees to let the bill come to the floor, it’s stalled. Let’s hope it stays that way!

A deal to fund the federal government through the rest of fiscal year 2011 has been reached, avoiding a shutdown that was scheduled for midnight eastern time. Details are still emerging (a short-term spending bill will be passed to cover the time into next week they need to work it all out), so we’ll keep you updated. To catch you up, the fight had mainly moved on from spending cuts (Democrats have agreed to $39 billion of $61 billion in cuts Republicans wanted) to policy “riders” Republican insisted on to defund Planned Parenthood and prevent the EPA from regulating green house gases. The Senate rejected the latter earlier and Republicans seem to have finally dropped their insistance on cutting all family planning funds (federal funding for abortion has, of course, long been banned) as well. Now we have much bigger fights with the 2012 budget and debt ceiling to get to.

Meanwhile, House Republicans voted against internet freedom by voting for a bill that would overturn FCC “net neutrality” rules which prevent internet providers from blocking or interfering with traffic on their networks. This is unlikely to go anywhere in the Senate and President Obama has said he would veto it if it came to his desk.

UPDATE: Part of the deal includes pledges for Senate votes on repealing health care reform and cutting funding for Planned Parenthood (both of which will not survive Democratic majorities and is nothing but base politics for Republicans). Congress passed a stopgap measure that lasts through Friday easily (though some very conservative Republicans and some very liberal Democrats voted against it).

Former Virginia Governor and current DNC chairman Tim Kaine has officially announced he is running for the seat being vacated by Sen. Jim Webb. Kaine is seen as the most likely candidate to keep the seat and if he wins he’d join his Democratic gubernatorial predecessor Mark Warner in the Senate. Former Sen. George Allen, who lost the seat to Webb in 2006, is running on the Republican side. There’s no word yet on who might replace Kaine as head of the Democratic National Committee.

Democrats got another top-tier recruit recently in Rep. Martin Henrich, who is running in New Mexico to replace retiring Sen. Jeff Bingaman, and might possibily end up facing former Republican Rep. Heather Wilson should they win their respective nominations. Keeping both of these seats is absolutely necessary if Democrats are to retain control of the U.S. Senate.

UPDATE: President Obama has chosen Florida Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz to be the new head of the DNC. Former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland was also in the running. The first woman to be selected as chair of either party, she was “chosen for strength as a fund-raiser and television messenger, and for her clout in the crucial swing state of Florida.” She will not have to give up her House seat. Good choice!

UPDATE II: Donna Brazile will serve as interim chair as Wasserman Schultz can not be elected DNC chair by the committee members until April 20th at the earliest, per the rules.

UPDATE III: New Mexico state auditor Hector Balderas has also announced his intention to run for the Democratic senate nomination.

Funding for the federal government currently runs out on April 9th, but no deal has been reached as of yet even though Senate Democrats have already offered to meet House Republicans more than halfway on desired cuts. Buoyed by a Tea Party rally of dozens, freshman Republicans in particular are refusing to compromise, meaning that Speaker Boehner is probably going to have to rely heavily on Democratic votes to get this passed (which ain’t gonna happen in either chamber if many of their deep cuts remain) and avoid a shutdown that didn’t go well for his party in 1994. For now, they have passed a bill that declares their already rejected $61 billion in budget cuts somehow “law of the land” if the Senate and Pres. Obama don’t pass another spending measure (this, of course, has no practical effect since House bills can’t become laws by themselves). 

Meanwhile, the Texas House’s proposed budget is even worse: cutting jobs, gutting eductation, closing nursing homes and ending some hospital services, and a lot of other conservative political objectives (even underming the preservation of our proud Texas history). Another proposal is to privatize all state jails. But this is the kind of thing that happens when you take taxes off the table as a source of revenue. But hey, at least we’ll have guns on college campuses.

UPDATE: The Texas House budget has passed.

On the heels of that deceptively edited video we’ve all heard about, House Republicans voted to defund NPR (violating their own pledge to provide 72 hours for consideration of a bill in the process) - but it is a symbolic move given that it will not make it through the Senate, let alone the President’s desk. It was mainly an effort to restore party unity after fifty-four conservatives defected Tuesday to vote against a second short-term spending bill that would forestall a government shutdown for three more weeks. That bill passed with the help of Democrats and then cleared the Senate.

Also, all Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee voted against an amendment that states that global warming exists, regardless of cause. Next on their agenda? I’m not sure you want to know:

Under a GOP-backed bill expected to sail through the House of Representatives, the Internal Revenue Service would be forced to police how Americans have paid for their abortions. To ensure that taxpayers complied with the law, IRS agents would have to investigate whether certain terminated pregnancies were the result of rape or incest. And one tax expert says that the measure could even lead to questions on tax forms: Have you had an abortion? Did you keep your receipt?

Oh, and let’s not forget they also want to rollback Wall Street reform.

Here in Texas, the “campus carry” gun bill passed in the House Homeland Security and Public Safety Committee and is all but assured to pass the full House and be signed into law (it already passed the Senate). A public hearing on the bill was suspiciously scheduled during spring break week, when many students were unlikely to be around to make their voice heard (many, if not most, college administrations and student communities have come out the legislation, including conservative Texas A&M). A good letter in opposition by three respected medical scholars and administrators, two of which are published experts on campus mental health, was published in the New York Times yesterday.

Over on the Senate side, a  finance subcommittee voted Thursday to put $6 billion more into public education than budget writers included in their proposal. $5.6 billion would go to direct aid to school districts and $389 million to textbooks and other classroom materials. And Gov. Perry finally relented on using some of the $9.4 billion Rainy Day Fund, but only $3.2 billion for the Fiscal Year 2011 budget gap. He continues to oppose using any of the funds to help close the 2012-13 biennium budget shortfall.

Commerce Secretary Gary Locke has been tapped by President Obama to be the next U.S. ambassador to China (replacing former Utah Gov. John Huntsman, who is hoping having worked for the Obama administration won’t derail him in the Republican presidential primaries). He’ll be the first Chinese American in that role. And word is our own Ron Kirk, the current U.S. Trade Representative, may replace him at the Commerce Department:

President Obama is naming Commerce Secretary Gary Locke to succeed his ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman, who’s leaving April 30. Officials say a top candidate to replace Locke is Ron Kirk, the U.S. Trade Representative. Under that scenario, look for Mike Froman, the deputy national security adviser for international economic affairs, to replace Kirk as USTR. A twist: The Commerce Department is expected to be the hardest-hit department in the first wave of the government reorganization President Obama announced in his State of the Union address.

–Also mentioned: 1) Jeff Zients, the first federal Chief Performance Officer, and the OMB deputy director for management, who’s running the government reorganization. Zients is former CEO and chairman of The Advisory Board Company and former chairman of the Corporate Executive Board. 2) Tom Nides, deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources, and former chief operating officer of Morgan Stanley. 3) Neil Wolin, deputy Treasury Secretary. Deputies are logical because they’ve been confirmed and some have good administrative skills.

–Outsider possibilities: defeated House or Senate Dems with high profiles in the business community.

–Kirk, 56, a lawyer and Austin native, was the first African-American mayor of Dallas, was Texas Secretary of State under Gov. Ann Richards, and a legislative aide to former Sen. Lloyd Bentsen.

The DMN reports Kirk has declined to comment so far on the speculation.