The partisan gridlock in Washington combined with a slow moving vetting process has led to many of the key posts in the Obama Administration remaining vacant. Even as the administration asks for more power to police the internet and meddle in other country’s affairs abroad it lacks the staff to meet current responsibilities.

Has the mask finally come off the Obama presidency? After a campaign in 2008 that won him Marketer of the Year in which Obama hurled progressive rhetoric while having Goldman Sachs as his biggest campaign contributor and then having a presidency marked by antagonism to progressive reforms, it seems Obama is finally dropping the hope and change act and giving away government offices to his financial benefactors.

Billionaire Penny Pritzker, of the plutocratic Pritzker family, has been floated by the Obama Administration as a candidate for Commerce Secretary.

Randi Weingarten, President of the American Federation of Teachers, smacked Rahm Emanuel around last night on Bloomberg TV for his perceived mishandling of the Chicago teacher’s strike.

Tell the Boys and Girls Club of Chicago Board of Directors: Time to give Rahm Emanual the boot. Remove him as Honorary Chair.

My antenna suddenly shot up when I got to the bottom of yet another otherwise innocuous, gossip-filled Stratfor email and saw Stratfor VP Fred Burton claiming that a billionaire Obama fundraiser had accused the President of “weakness and wispiness” in 2009, and that they would probably sit out the 2012 election.

The Initial Unemployment Claims report for last week is out and guess what? The Economists are surprised. And water is wet and the sky is blue.

Hotel housekeepers around the country have had enough. Yesterday, more than 350 housekeepers and their supporters launched a seven-city nationwide “Hope for Housekeepers” tour.

They kicked it off in Long Beach, Calif., carrying a seven-foot by 60-foot “Hope Quilt” on a mile-long pilgrimage from the Hilton Long Beach to the Hyatt Regency Long Beach to symbolize their struggle for decent working conditions.

“Hope for Housekeepers” is a national movement of women, founded by Hyatt housekeepers across the country, to stop the abuse of women in the hotel industry and bring a message of hope to Hyatt housekeepers and women working as housekeepers across the globe. The tour will travel to San Francisco, Santa Clara, San Antonio, Boston, Indianapolis and Chicago.

As Jane has pointed out, Penny Pritzker, of the massively wealthy Pritzker family who chairs four major corporations, including Hyatt, is a vocal opponent of workers’ freedom to form unions, strongly opposing the Employee Free Choice Act.

Earlier this year, Pritzker joined with other billionaires to fight the Employee Free Choice Act. She told President Obama she is opposed to majority verification (card-check), which would give workers another choice—a labor board election is the other option—when deciding whether to join a union.