Cabinet

The reign of the trophy kitchen is officially over. The dream kitchens of today aren't about the sexiest six-burner range or the most exotic countertop material. As cooking has returned to center stage and remodeling budgets have sobered, the kitchen island is nurturing family togetherness and reviving casual entertaining. In kitchens with a small footprint, glass tiles, quartz counters and dish drawers are adding sparkle and practicality. The kitchen of 2013 has soul. "That industrial, commercial style was looking a little cold," says...

THE WAIT: Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's plans for getting Japan's growth back on track after two decades of stagnation, endorsed by his Cabinet on Friday, depend on convincing businessmen to invest in that recovery. SO FAR, SO GOOD: Abe has claimed early progress in countering the stagnation that has hobbled growth for more than 20 years through an onslaught of monetary and fiscal stimulus, after the economy grew 4.1 percent in January-March. But economists say deeper, more far-reaching changes are needed to...

ISLAMABAD — Pakistan's new prime minister unveiled a 25-member Cabinet on Friday, a group that many here hope will waste no time in tackling major economic, energy and security challenges facing the country. Key posts were handed out to longtime aides of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, some of whom held Cabinet positions in previous governments. But the key positions of foreign minister and defense minister were left unfilled. Pakistani media have reported that Sharif will keep those portfolios himself with aid from...

For some people, summertime means the beach or maybe the mountains, a time to kick back in the shade to catch up on reading or just hang out. But for a few of President Obama 's Cabinet nominees, it may mean twisting slowly in those summer breezes, waiting for the Senate to act on their nominations. Two nominees, Penny Pritzker for Commerce and Anthony Foxx for Transportation, have a reasonable chance of celebrating the Fourth of July as Cabinet members. Both were voted out of committee unanimously earlier this week — a very...

Look for a relatively slow, rolling transition of President Obama 's Cabinet over the next year or so. There are lots of movable chairs. Here's what we've been hearing: ●Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says she's leaving as soon as she can — if not on Inauguration Day, then not long after. Possible replacements: The Democrats' larger majority in the Senate probably enhanced the chances of Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.)

For a few more days, until Thursday, the Smithsonian's newest and perhaps most stunning earthly treasure hides behind a thick metal door, like that of a bank vault, deep in the heart of the National Museum of Natural History, behind the galleries, beyond the cabinets stuffed with chunks of minerals, deep inside the "blue room," whose shelves groan under heavy crystals of a thousand sparkling hues. The museum's longtime curator of gems and minerals , Jeffrey Post, handles an unmarked...

Charles M. Maguire, 79, a business and public policy consultant who served as a White House speechwriter during the Johnson administration, died April 25 of pneumonia at Georgetown Hospital. He was a resident of the District. In 1965, Mr. Maguire was a member of the first class of White House Fellows, a leadership and public service program that allowed the 15 who were selected to "spend the next academic year moving as free spirits around some of the most important men in government," the New York Times said in 1966.

I want to thank "In the Loop" writer Al Kamen for pointing out in his April 20 column that President Obama's turning to former members of the Clinton administration for top jobs at Cabinet agencies is "the norm" as compared to the administration of George W. Bush. This is a good example of how this administration amounts to politics as usual and not the change that I was supposed to believe in. BETH CROOKER Herndon

Born : Dec. 13, 1976, in Dakar, Senegal Education : Paris Institute of Political Sciences, 2000 Political affiliation : Union for a Popular Movement Current post : Junior minister for youth and sports

With the nation facing unprecedented economic challenges, reality is likely accelerating a rite of passage familiar to virtually every former Cabinet member, that moment when unanticipated circumstances beg the timeless question posed by Robert Redford in the 1972 film classic The Candidate: 'What do we do now?' At a time when all Americans, regardless of politics, should want to see the Obama administration succeed, let me offer some practical lessons of experience to his newly formed Cabinet, gleaned from past successes and ample helpings of humble...

The two photos serve as powerful visual bookends for any discussion of gender and the Obama White House. The first was worth its thousand words, and sparked even more: the president sitting in the Oval Office with 10 men arrayed in front of him, and Valerie Jarrett's leg barely visible. The second, less than six months later, was equally striking, if less noticed: the president, Susan Rice, his new national security adviser, and Samantha Power, his nominee for United Nations ambassador, striding down the...

ISLAMABAD — Pakistan's new prime minister unveiled a 25-member Cabinet on Friday, a group that many here hope will waste no time in tackling major economic, energy and security challenges facing the country. Key posts were handed out to longtime aides of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, some of whom held Cabinet positions in previous governments. But the key positions of foreign minister and defense minister were left unfilled. Pakistani media have reported that Sharif will keep those portfolios himself with...

Commerce Department General Counsel Cameron Kerry — brother of Secretary of State John Kerry — will become acting secretary of commerce when the outgoing acting secretary, Rebecca Blank , leaves at the end of this month. This may be the first time — we're checking — that two brothers served in the Cabinet at the same time. Of course, President John F. Kennedy had brother Robert Kennedy as attorney general, but that's not quite the same. (And it won't happen again, because that move...

IT'S NO SURPRISE that Senate Republicans grouse about Obama administration policies on enforcing civil rights laws or limiting greenhouse-gas emissions. They are entitled to their policy views. It's a different matter for Republican leaders to manifest their views by blocking confirmation to Cabinet positions of the officials in charge of those policies. By doing so, on absurdly flimsy pretexts, Republicans not only impede the president's nominations for labor secretary and chief of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)

Important segments of President Obama 's base have been hammering him for not appointing enough Latinos and African Americans — and no gays — to his second-term Cabinet. Thirty-two years ago, when Ronald Reagan 's first-term team was coming together, the Cabinet included one woman, U.N. Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick , and one African American, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Samuel Pierce . But the number of women and minorities increased later in Reagan's term, and he named the first...

And then there was one. Now that President Obama has announced Penny Pritzker as his pick for commerce secretary and Michael Froman for U.S. trade representative, there's only a single, lonely vacant slot left in the second-term Cabinet — the Cabinet-rank job of administrator of the Small Business Administration . So, with the band nearly all together, how did Obama do on maintaining diversity in the exclusive club?...

It's become fashionable among Washington's secretarial class (that is, the Cabinet kind) to give up a portion of their salaries to show solidarity with the hard-working folks under them whose pay is being pinched by the sequester. It's worth noting, however, that some of President Obama 's Cabinet secretaries can more easily afford to participate in the phenomenon we've dubbed "sacrifice solidarity" than others. For most, giving up a chunk of their nearly $200,000 annual pay amounts to little more than lost latte money.

JOHANNESBURG, Sept. 23 -- The office of ousted South African President Thabo Mbeki announced Tuesday that his deputy president, 10 cabinet ministers and three deputy ministers were resigning, an exodus that sent tremors through the markets of Africa's biggest economy and stoked fears of a political crisis. Most worries were mitigated by afternoon, when the ruling African National Congress announced that several of those who had quit -- including Finance Minister Trevor Manuel, who is viewed as a rudder of South Africa's ...

Virginia Gov. Robert F. McDonnell (R) announced Wednesday that he will create a "Teacher Cabinet" of advisers to influence high-level decisions that affect public schools . The teachers who will comprise most of the cabinet will be charged with developing recommendations for new ways to engage parents and close achievement gaps, and they will work on methods for improving the collaboration between public schools, colleges and workplaces....