• Attorney General Eric Holder is leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration’s interrogation practices. “Newsweek” is also reporting that Holder has asked his staff for a list of 10 candidates who might serve as that prosecutor if one is named.

• After weeks of meeting senators and preparing for tough questions, Sonia Sotomayor today begins the formal hearings on her nomination to become the nation’s first Hispanic Supreme Court justice. Sotomayor, 55, received a good-luck phone call yesterday from President Obama.

• Dems on the House Ways and Means Committee on Friday proposed a graduated tax on wealthy Americans to pay for health care reform. The new tax would apply to individuals who make more than $280,000 a year and married couples who make more than $350,000 a year.

• North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has life-threatening pancreatic cancer, a news report in South Korea said today, days after new images of him looking gaunt spurred speculation that his health might be worsening following a reported stroke last year.

• Comedian John Fugelsang joins us in studio at 8:06am Pacific to hang out and talk about the news of the day.

• The results of a “stress test” on the nation’s banks show that 10 of the nation’s 19 largest banks will need to raise a total of $74.6 billion in capital. Under the most severe economic scenario, regulators estimated losses could reach $600 billion for the group, the bulk of which coming from residential mortgages and other consumer loans such as credit cards.

• President Obama asked Congress yesterday to eliminate or trim 121 federal programs for a savings of $17 billion in the upcoming budget year. The proposed cuts amount to less than one-half of 1 percent of his $3.6 trillion federal budget outline. GOPers denounced his proposed reductions as too small.

• GOPer-turned-Dem Sen. Arlen Specter gained a Judiciary subcommittee chairmanship yesterday when Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) said he would give up his chairmanship of the Judiciary Crime and Drugs subcommittee so that Specter could have it.

• The Obama administration will not release terrorists from Guantanamo Bay into neighborhoods in the U.S., Attorney General Eric Holder told Congress yesterday as he sought to reassure worried lawmakers.

• Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) said yesterday that an independent commission is needed to determine who authorized the use of abusive interrogation techniques against suspected terrorists. “I want to know who was it who made CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

• The Obama administration announced late last week that the Pentagon would turn over to the ACLU 44 photographs showing detainee abuse of prisoners in Afghanistan and Iraq during the Bush administration. The pictures are a part of the ACLU’s Freedom of Information Act request.

• Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made a surprise trip to Baghdad over the weekend, where she deplored the recent bombings in Iraq that left over 160 people dead, but said the “terrible and tragic events” haven’t stopped the nation from making strides in its security.

• The U.S. is “relatively close” to making decisions on what to do with an initial group of Guantanamo Bay detainees, Attorney General Eric Holder said yesterday. Holder said the first step is to decide how many total detainees will be set free, and he announced that it will be done “on a rolling basis.”

• Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) calls in at 6:05am Pacific to talk about the torture memo debate.

• Comedian Michael McDonald calls in at 8:30am Pacific to talk about his upcoming gig at The Improv in Hollywood, CA.

• Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned yesterday that Pakistan is in danger of falling into terrorists’ hands because of failed government policies and called on Pakistani citizens and expatriates to voice more concern. Pakistan is a nuclear-armed state.

• Ramping up his campaign to crack down on credit cards, President Obama will meet today with executives of 14 leading companies to press his case for new consumer protections. Meanwhile, the House moved forward on a bill Tuesday to ban “arbitrary” interest rate increases, prohibit excessive fees, and order more disclosure.

• Condi Rice, John Ashcroft, and other top Bush administration officials approved as early as the summer of 2002 the CIA’s use at secret prisons of harsh interrogation menthods, including waterboarding, a technique that Attorney General Eric Holder has described as illegal torture.

• Brushing aside the president’s suggestions, congressional Dems pushed ahead firmly yesterday toward investigations into the Bush administration’s harsh interrogation of terrorism suspects including hundreds of instances of waterboarding and other abusive practices.

• Jennifer Palmieri, Senior Vice President of Communications for the Center for American Progress, calls in at 7:30am Pacific to talk about Obama and the Bush torture memos.

• Actor Jason Alexander joins us in studio at 8:30am Pacific to promote his production of “The Fantasticks” at U.C.L.A. and to talk about the politics of the day.

• President Obama left open the possibility of criminal prosecution yesterday for former Bush administration officials who drew up the legal basis for aggressive interrogation techniques many view as torture. Obama said it will be up to Attorney General Eric Holder to decide whether or not to prosecute the former officials.

• President Obama’s national intelligence director Dennis Blair said in a memo to staff last night that Bush-era interrogation methods may have yielded important information about terrorists and may have provided a deeper understanding of Al Qaida, but he said that we do not need these techniques to keep America safe.

• Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner testified before Congress yesterday, defending President Obama’s bank bailout, answering questions about TARP’s transparency and Obama’s plan to encourage private investors to help banks get rid of troubled assets.

• Rep. Eliot Engel (D-NY) calls in at 6:30am Pacific to discuss President Obama’s stimulus plan.

• Richard Greene, host of “Clout,” calls in at 8:05am Pacific to discuss the progressive celebrity focus of his radio show.

• The U.S. Senate confirmed Eric Holder as attorney general yesterday, voting 75-21 to place him in charge of the Department of Justice. His confirmation makes him the first African-American confirmed to the post, though he held the job on an acting basis in 2001.

• Republican Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire has accepted President Obama’s offer to be commerce secretary and the announcement is scheduled for today. In a move that will leave the balance of the Senate unchanged, NH’s Dem governor will name a GOPer to replace Gregg.

• Dem senators stood behind Heath and Human Services Secretary-designate Tom Daschle yesterday after a closed-door session of the Senate Finance Committee on the former SD senator’s tax troubles. The committee is expected to hold a hearing on Daschle’s nomination next week.

• A group of GOP senators have drafted an alternative stimulus measure that narrows government spending to infrastructure programs and helping unemployed Americans, address the housing crisis, and relies mostly on tax cuts. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has dismissed the idea that the GOP is trying to block passage of the Dems’ stimulus plan.

• The House last night passed an $819 billion economic stimulus package on a party-line vote, despite President Obama’s efforts to achieve bipartisan support for the bill. The Senate is likely to take up the bill next week.

• President Obama visited the Pentagon yesterday for a dose of “unvarnished” give-and-take on how to move forward in America’s two wars. Obama sat down with Defense Secretary Robert Gates and the Joint Chiefs of Staff to get a “comprehensive view of the situation in Iraq and Afghanistan and the impact on our forces.” Obama first expressed his thanks for the men and women fighting abroad.

• The Senate confirmed by unanimous consent retired Adm. Dennis Blair as director of national intelligence yesterday. The confirmation followed the resignation of former director Michael McConnell, who left the post Tuesday after nearly 2 years on the job.

• Senate GOPers, who acted like lions in challenging Eric Holder, turned into lambs yesterday as they joined Dems in recommending President Obama’s choice for attorney general. The Judiciary Committee voted 17-2 to endorse Holder, and the full Senate could vote as soon as today.

• Embattled Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has announced he wants to speak at his impeachment hearing before the state Senate today if lawmakers allow him to do so.