Former foes on Obama's radar

Today for President-elect Barack Obama is all about his former rivals.

For the first time since his historic victory, Obama met with his Republican opponent John McCain.

Reporters and photographers were let in for a few minutes before the meeting began around noon EST in Obama's Chicago transition headquarters.

"We’re going to have a good conversation about how we can do some work together to fix up the country, and also to offer thanks to Sen. McCain for the outstanding service he’s already rendered,” Obama said, according to a pool report.

When McCain was asked whether he would help Obama with his administration, he responded, “Obviously.”

Obama's designated White House chief of staff, Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, and one of McCain's closest confidants, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina were also in attendance.

UPDATE: Obama's office released a brief statement in the name of both Obama and McCain after the meeting: “At this defining moment in history, we believe that Americans of all parties want and need their leaders to come together and change the bad habits of Washington so that we can solve the common and urgent challenges of our time. It is in this spirit that we had a productive conversation today about the need to launch a new era of reform where we take on government waste and bitter partisanship in Washington in order to restore trust in government, and bring back prosperity and opportunity for every hardworking American family. We hope to work together in the days and months ahead on critical challenges like solving our financial crisis, creating a new energy economy, and protecting our nation’s security.”

There have also been rumors that Obama might even tap McCain for a Cabinet post, though that seems highly unlikely.

On the other hand, Senator Hillary Clinton, who battled Obama for the Democratic nomination for more than a year, might actually become his secretary of state.

Speculation has been swirling since their private meeting last week that Clinton could leave the Senate for a job as Obama's point person to -- as they both vowed during the campaign -- restore America's standing in the world.

But with the economy in a nose-dive, a new poll out this morning found that the selection of secretary of state is far less important to Americans than the next treasury secretary.

The CNN/Opinion Research Corp. survey asked which position would matter most to the country's future: the secretary of state, who oversees foreign policy; secretary of defense, who oversees military policy; secretary of the treasury, who oversees economic policy; or attorney general, who oversees law enforcement.

The reply: 41 percent picked treasury secretary, 25 percent secretary of state, 24 percent said defense secretary, and 8 percent said attorney general. Also, 77 percent of respondents said they were very confident or somewhat confident that Obama would make the right decisions in selecting his cabinet.