TRANSITION WATCH

OUTBOUND: Sources expect most Bush Cabinet members to wind up joining corporate boards, legal firms, communications companies or universities--high-profile posts from which they can write memoirs, play golf or even run for President. “Corporations are looking for prominent people to assist them in gaining notoriety,” said an executive headhunter. . . . Defense Secretary Dick Cheney is sizing up college presidencies and corporate posts. . . . All-purpose Bushite James A. Baker III appears headed for a Washington law firm. . . . Former White House Chief of Staff Samuel K. Skinner wants to run a company. . . . Several businesses are looking to hire presidential Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater as a communications wizard. . . . Pentagon spokesman Pete Williams, a former TV newsman, is being pursued by ABC and NBC. . . . Ex-State Department spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler, now a White House aide, is said to be scouting public relations jobs but may have to allow time for congressional testimony on possible involvement in the passport-search scandal.

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FURTHERMORE . . . : Treasury Secretary Nicholas F. Brady and Budget Director Richard G. Darman may return to Wall Street, but their wealth opens other options. . . . Michael J. Boskin, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, is mulling an offer to join the faculty at UC Berkeley instead of returning to Stanford. . . . And Solicitor General Kenneth W. Starr is a seven-figure prospect to return to his old law firm, Los Angeles’ Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher--or to accept reported offers from other prominent firms.

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TO OMB OR NOT TO OMB? Democratic Rep. Leon E. Panetta of Carmel Valley knows what it’s like to work in an Administration: Richard M. Nixon’s. As a Republican. After being fired for taking a strong civil rights stand at Nixon’s Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Panetta wrote an interesting book about it--and turned Democrat. Now he may have to choose between being President-elect Bill Clinton’s budget director or continuing as chairman of the House Budget Committee. . . . Clinton recently spoke on the phone with Panetta before having his economic adviser, Robert B. Reich, pay a visit. The contacts have continued. . . . But Panetta, who says he likes it where he is, is unsure whether he would move to the Office of Management and Budget, if asked. . . . Upside: He’d be in the best position to deal with his two big concerns, the deficit and budget priorities. Downside: He might slide off Clinton’s wavelength and wind up with no power post at all.

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BORE WAR: House Republicans are launching guerrilla warfare even before the new Congress takes office. . . . GOP leaders are urging their 47 new members to skip a December briefing given for the last 20 years to newcomers of both parties at Harvard University. They are asked to attend instead a first-ever briefing sponsored by the Heritage Foundation and two other conservative groups in Annapolis, Md. . . . “The Harvard program has been criticized for one-sided policy presentations,” said Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands). A Harvard spokesman denies it: “We struggle mightily to be bipartisan or nonpartisan.” . . . Most if not all of the 63 new Democrats are expected to choose the Harvard bore-a-thon. A Republican aide vows that the Annapolis event will not be a one-sided GOP brainwashing. “Just a light rinse,” he quipped.