In Transition: After major firings and resignations, President-elect Donald Trump denies that there’s infighting and disorganization within his transition team. “Very organized process taking place as I decide on Cabinet and many other positions,” Trump tweeted. “I am the only one who knows who the finalists are!”

The press has reported that the Trump team has had trouble pulling itself together for a move to the White House.

At the center of the power struggle appears to be Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who’s being credited with edging NY Chris Christie out of the inner circle. What few people know or remember, is that Christie was the federal prosecutor who sent Kushner’s billionaire father to prison for criminal tax evasion and witness tampering. The older Kushner actually set up his brother-in-law with a prostitute, had the encounter videotaped, and sent it to his sister.

As Trump takes phone calls from foreign leaders, the State department tells reporters that neither he nor his team have taken briefings on US relations with other countries. Trump tweeted, “The failing @nytimes story is so totally wrong on transition. It is going so smoothly. Also, I have spoken to many foreign leaders.”

That’s not the question. The question is whether he knows what he’s talking about when he talks to them. The Justice Department and the Pentagon also say they have not heard from the Trump team.

Second Place: Hillary Clinton last night delivered her first public speech since the election at an event for the Children’s Defense Fund in Washington. “There have been a few times this past week when all I wanted to do is just to curl up with a good book, or our dogs, and never leave the house again,” she said.

Nation: A Minnesota police officer who shot and killed a black motorist during a traffic stop last July has been charged with second-degree manslaughter. Off. Jeronimo Yanez of the St. Anthony Police Dept. shot and killed 32-year-old Philando Castile after Castile said he had a gun in the car, even though he was not reaching for it. Yanez fired seven bullets 62 seconds after the stop began.

The Arts: First he said nothing. Then he said maybe. Now Bob Dylan has told the Swedish Academy he has other commitments and won’t be going to Stockholm to accept the Nobel Prize for Literature. — Colson Whitehead won the National Book Award for his surrealistic novel “The Underground Railroad” about the horrors of slavery and escape to the North.

In his acceptance Whitehead said, “We’re happy in here; outside is the blasted hellhole wasteland of Trumpland,” he said, referring to President-elect Donald J. Trump. “Be kind to everybody, make art and fight the power.”

The Obit Page: Melvin Laird, the defense secretary under President Nixon who oversaw the withdrawal of US troops from Vietnam and the establishment of the all-volunteer army, has died at age 94. Laird had served on a destroyer during World War II that was hit by a Japanese kamikaze plane. He had shrapnel in his body for the rest of his life.

Glut: The US Geological Survey says it has discovered in the shale of West Texas the largest deposit of oil and natural gas ever found in the US. The USGS says the deposit holds 20 billion barrels of oil and 16 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, all recoverable by hydraulic fracking and other means. Nice to have, but there’s a glut of oil on the market right now and the business is in a slump.

Signoff: CBS News Senior White House correspondent Bill Plante is retiring after 52 years on the job. He’s covered everything from The Civil Rights movement to the Vietnam War and a string of presidential campaigns.

Gotta Have Art: A Claude Monet painting of a stack of grain  … it’s a beautiful stack of grain … sold at auction at Christie’s for $81.4 million. Monet painted 25 of his “Grainstack” series, and if he had just held onto them think how rich he could be today.

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