At a welcoming ceremony with the rank-and-file at the Department of the Interior, the new Interior Secretary, Ken Salazar, fielded questions, while sidestepping the controversial issue of whether he would support the Bush administration’s last-minute lifting of a ban on loaded, concealed weapons in national parks. But he was more forthcoming in answer to a question about basketball. Salazar, who played on a team from his attorney general’s office in Colorado, said, “I serve at the pleasure of the president. I will say this in public, that we of the Department of the Interior will challenge President Obama and his White House team to a basketball game.” No word yet on whether the Department of Defense and others will enter the fray.