If you knew where all the energy zooming into your house was being used and wasted, would you change the way you consume power? One company is banking on it. Our Power Trip heads to Redwood City, California to talk to Joe Polastre, CTO and co-founder of Sentilla. The company has invented an unassuming rectangular box that tracks —dollar by dollar, watt by watt—how much energy the appliances in your home are using. Clothes dryers and air conditioners beware: your energy guzzling ways are secrets no more.

When most people stumble across a polluted pond, they would sigh over the fate of our beloved planet and maybe quote some Thoreau. Fortunately, there are some very crafty individuals out there who see a polluted pond and devise a way to both clean up the pond and create a renewable energy source. As part of our Power Trip we go visit an algae company in Washington State where green goo in dirty water is being turned into biofuel.

Want to see the algae start-up in action? Watch the video. For more stories from our Power Trip, click here!

The Pittsburgh Steelers are heading into their seventh Super Bowl. They’ve won five of those match-ups and, if they win on Sunday, they would break the record for most Super Bowl championships in the NFL. But there’s another Steelers legacy that many sports writers are celebrating this year and that is the so-called "Rooney Rule". Gene Wojciechoski is a senior national columnist for ESPN.com and joins us to talk about the rule and why it is getting so much attention this year.

On Sunday, the powerhouse Pittsburgh Steelers face off against the Arizona Cardinals in Super Bowl 43. The Cardinals are the underdog, so if you don't have loyalties to either team you might be tempted to root for Arizona. But hold on just a second. The Takeaway is talking to Stephen Dubner, author of Freakonomics and unabashed Steelers fan, who has a list of ten reasons to root for the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Not a Steelers fan? Here are all the reasons to love the Arizona Cardinals.

If you like to root for the underdog, you may not find a better sports story this year than the rise of the Arizona Cardinals. They’ve gone from perennial Bad News Bears to the Super Bowl. On Sunday, they’ll face off against the powerhouse Pittsburgh Steelers. New York Times reporter Greg Bishop goes behind the scenes with the Cardinals.

The President will meet with Republican House and Senate members today in the hopes of selling them on his stimulus package. GOP party leaders have so far been unswayed. One of the lawmakers meeting with President Obama today is Jason Chaffetz, the Republican Representative for the 3rd Congressional district in Utah. He joins us to explain his take on the president's proposal.

Sunday marked the 250th birthday of renowned Scottish poet Robert Burns. Think you would never know some musty old poet? Oh, but you do! He wrote such classics as "Auld Lang Syne" and "A Red, Red Rose." The Takeaway is joined by David Stenhouse, a radio producer for the BBC, who tells us why Scotland is counting on Burns to bring in millions of dollars to the Scottish economy in 2009.

Here is a dramatic reenactment of Burns' poem "To a Mouse":

Hours before Barack Obama was to take the oath of office, a CD of his speeches set to techno music blared out of a boom box sitting on a pile of T-shirts. "How much for the Shepard Fairey watch?" said a customer, leaning over the sidewalk table full of Obama merchandise. The greatness and gravity of the presidency, conjured up today under the Capitol dome, will sit starkly against the moat of junk that has never been seen before for a president.

Obama's popularity and personality have inspired designers and hawkers to take his rock star status to new marketing heights. The new president's smiling face sits behind the hands of clocks. A towel features the former senator dunking a basketball in a Superman suit, with the scoreboard reading "1:20:09." Regular campaign buttons that would have satisfied collectors and politicos of past ages are now neon, handmade and outfitted with glowing backlights.

Norris Gibson knew this would be big business eighteen months ago. "Win or lose, he was going to be a legend," he says. On Monday, he was busily manning tables outside Union Station that are extension of his Web site, myobamashop.com ("The New Presidential Obama Hoodies and Long Sleeves are now available!") He's created more than 150 designs with Obama's likeness, and boasts that he was the first to celebrate the young president using rhinestones on clothing. Caps and ski caps with "OBAMA" in white plastic stones are selling for $12; T-shirts at his stand go for $26.99. The devoted throng stood two or three deep, calling out sizes and styles, while a CD switched to a Gospel-backed version of Obama's Grant Park victory speech.

Just outside the Greyhound Bus Terminal, Darin White was pushing sequined T-shirts for $45. "I think there will be enough folk here that there will be nice sales all across the city. It'll be a great Obama Day," he said, further reinforcing his brand.

It’s out with the old in with the new. Barack Obama takes power tomorrow, along with a host of new cabinet secretaries about to be confirmed and a new Congress. Documenting the transfer of power from Republicans to Democrats is The Takeaway’s Andrea Bernstein, who joins John and Adaora from Washington.

For more on the Inauguration, see your take on the Inauguration.



Here is one person's vision of things to come:

The unemployment numbers for December are out and the jobless rate hit 7.2 percent. Additionally, payroll employment dropped by 524,000 over the month. While this is pretty much what economists expected, it is still shocking in that it is one of the biggest monthly drops ever in this modern post-war economy. Here to tell us about how the losses have accelerated is Kelly Evans of the Wall Street Journal.

President Bush offered the American auto industry $13.4 billion dollars in short-term financing that will be drawn from the $700 billion dollar Wall Street rescue program. Another $4 billion dollars will be added later. The President said that the only way to avoid a collapse of the U.S. auto industry was for the executive branch to step in. However, there are some serious stipulations attached to the loan. Joining The Takeaway is Micheline Maynard, Senior Business Correspondent for The New York Times, based in Michigan, and Todd Zwillich with Capitol News Connection.

The price of gas is dropping, but statistics show Americans are clocking fewer miles on the road.

"Obama is going to form a working coalition and put people in it that give him the votes when he needs them. If you think that you're going to have all Democrats, all highly partisan people, you may be disappointed."
--Lynn Sweet on the president-elect's cabinet choices

"The controls that might have been written six weeks ago when this bill was signed would perhaps be defunct at this point because of the change in policy. That exposes the soft underbelly of the overall process."
— Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction Stuart Bowen speaking about overseeing financial bailouts

Illinois Democratic governor Rod Blagojevich must find a replacement for President-elect Barack Obama, who will resign his Senate seat Sunday. The first-term Senator was the only black in the Senate and the choice of his successor will be a huge political gift to whomever gets it (for Blagojevich as well — he's become reviled since his election in 2002). But with no choice expected soon, Democrats retain a tenuous majority in the Senate — McCain supporter Senator Joe Lieberman, ID-Conn., is a wild card — as lawmakers consider economic stimulus legislation.