In our new transition blog, Powering Up, Richard Wolffe offers this nugget from Obama's transition co-chair, John Podesta: “He wants to see not just Democrats in office, but he’s made a pledge to ensure that we reach out and have Republicans and independents, not just at a token level,” Podesta says. “There’s sort of been a tradition of having at least one person from the other party at the beginning of an administration in the cabinet. His commitment is to deepen that and to look even just beyond the cabinet, to try to bring people who agree with the direction that he wants to take the country and, regardless of party, to serve in the government.”

Judging from the early comments, bipartisanship has been—surprisingly—met with some skepticism. "Well, just because our national government has been screwed up for so many decades, it doesn't mean that somebody might come in and straighten it out one day," writes commenter Olderwiser. "I'm going to give them some time and see what happens. I remember how pleased I was when Bush came into office and it was said that he was a person who united factions adverse to each other. We looked up one day and had probably as divided a bunch of factions as the country has ever had." Others agreed that it seemed strange to pull people from the other side, especially after such a confrontational campaign. "It would seem that a bipartisan stance could be maintained without offering positions to people who would do most anything against you while you are campaigning for office," adds one commenter who encouraged that we "widen the base of involved people" and stray away from "retreads." In other words, let's get more people involved! (Though, I guess it is only fair to point you here so you can get a taste for the application process. Good luck.)

Now, back to issues of bipartisanship. While at the Harvard Law Review, Obama disappointed some of his fiercest supporters after he appointed more conservatives than liberals to the review once he was elected. As commenter jkellerman writes: "He thought it important to appoint the most qualified people even if they didn't agree with his ideological perspective to bring a balanced well-rounded view. Sure, Obama will be the man in charge, but I believe the skeptics may be pleasantly surprised at how different this presidency will actually be run."

A differently-run presidency? That's something both sides can get behind.