[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/POLITICS/01/01/illinois.senate.seat/art.blag.burris.wgn.jpg caption="Senate Democrats will not allow Burris on the Senate Floor if he shows up next week."](CNN) - Senate Democratic leaders think Roland Burris, Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich's pick to fill President-elect Barack Obama's vacant Senate seat, will likely show up on Capitol Hill Tuesday for the opening day of Congress, according to a Democratic aide familiar with Senate Democratic leaders' plans.
They have prepared a contingency plan in case he does, the aide added.
Burris will not be allowed on the Senate floor, according to this aide and a Senate Democratic leadership aide.
Watch: What if Burris shows up?
The aide familiar with Senate Democratic leaders' plans said if Burris tries to enter the Senate chamber, the Senate doorkeeper will stop Burris. If Burris were to persist, either trying to force his way onto the Senate floor or refusing to leave and causing a scene, U.S. Capitol Police would stop him, said the aide.
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/12/17/art.kennedy.gi.jpg caption="A powerful New York Democrat now says he will support Kennedy if she is named Senator."](CNN) - Caroline Kennedy appears to have cleared a big hurdle in her quest to replace outgoing New York Sen. Hillary Clinton.
New York Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a powerful Democrat who has questioned whether Kennedy is the best choice to fill the likely vacant seat, said Wednesday he will support Kennedy should she ultimately be appointed to the post.
"I have determined there's a good possibility she will be the appointee of the governor," Silver told the New York Post. "If she is the appointee of the governor, I will certainly be supportive of her. I will work for her and will work strenuously for her election."
Silver's comments differ markedly from his statements last week, when he suggested Kennedy is too closely allied with Michael Bloomberg, the Republican-turned-Independent New York City Mayor.
"If I were the governor, I would look and question whether this is the appointment I would want to make: whether her first obligation might be to the mayor of the City of New York, rather than to the governor who would be appointing her," Silver told an Albany radio station then.
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/images/01/01/art.clintonsec.gi.jpg caption="Likely the next Secretary of State, Clinton will be confronted with a host of World issues."](CNN) - The Gaza crisis is an alarm bell and flashing light for incoming Secretary of State Hillary Clinton - buckle up, it's going to be a bumpy ride.
As she prepares to become the top U.S. diplomat and the symbol for U.S. policy around the globe, Clinton inherits from the Bush administration a dangerous and unpredictable world in which the violence in Gaza and southern Israel is just one reminder.
Outgoing Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is winding down her diplomatic responsibilities and has briefed both Clinton and President-elect Barack Obama about what is playing out in the Middle East. Those talks are private and Team Obama is scrupulously sticking to its "only one president at a time" mantra when it comes to international policy.
But the ground keeps shifting. And events in and around Gaza will force the new secretary of state to deal with questions about the Mideast sooner than she and her advisers might have hoped.
"We'll have to see what the landscape is like by January 20," said David Makovsky of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "We'll have to see what this administration is inheriting."
(CNN) - Vice President-elect Joe Biden issued a statement Thursday responding to the death of former Sen. Claiborne Pell.
"Our thoughts and prayers are with the entire Pell family as they mourn the loss of one of our country's greatest public servants. Claiborne Pell was a man of extraordinary integrity, grace and decency. Chairman Pell was a mentor to me and one of our nation's most important voices in foreign policy for over 30 years," Biden said in the statement.
"He was a leader in the effort to reduce the size of the world's nuclear arsenal and to stop the spread of nuclear weapons. Few Senators have done more to expand opportunity in America. Because of Senator Pell and the Pell Grant, the doors of college have been opened to millions of Americans - and will continue to be opened to millions more. That is a legacy that will live on for generations to come."
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/images/01/01/art.pell.gi.jpg caption="Claiborne Pell, Rhode Island's senator from 1961 to 1997, has died."](CNN) - Former Sen. Claiborne Pell, who was largely responsible for the Pell Grants for U.S. college students, died early Thursday morning at his home in Newport, Rhode Island, his family announced.
Pell, 90, "died peacefully in the presence of his wife Nuala and family members," the family statement said. He had suffered from Parkinson's disease for a number of years.
Born in New York City, Pell graduated from Princeton in 1940 and Columbia University in 1946, serving in the U.S. Coast Guard in between and later in the Coast Guard Reserve. Pell also worked for the State Department and as a foreign service officer from 1945 to 1952 in Czechoslovakia, Italy and Washington.
He was first elected to the Senate from Rhode Island in 1960, and served from January 3, 1961, to January 3, 1997, when he retired. He was the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 1987 to 1994, and was named U.S. delegate to the United Nations in 1997.
But Pell's great passion lay in education and the arts and humanities, believing that the country's people were its greatest asset. Largely through his efforts, Congress created the Pell Grants in 1973. He was the main sponsor of the bill creating the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
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[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/12/30/art.palin30.gi.jpg caption="Bristol Palin with Levi Johnston, mother Sarah Palin and brother Trig at the GOP convention."] Alaska Governor Sarah Palin hasn't yet said anything publicly about her 4-day-old grandson, Tripp, but she does want people to know that Tripp's parents – her eldest daughter Bristol and her fiancé Levi Johnston – are hard at work and keeping up with school.
"You need to know that both Levi and Bristol are working their butts off to parent and going to school and working at the same time," Palin told PEOPLE in a phone message Wednesday. "They are certainly not high school dropouts."
The former vice presidential candidate said she wanted to be clear about their continuing work toward high school degrees because any suggestion otherwise "harms Bristol's reputation and Levi's reputation and their chances for good work opportunities."
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