Top Items:
Walter Pincus / Washington Post:
Pentagon Expanding Its Domestic Surveillance Activity — Fears of Post-9/11 Terrorism Spur Proposals for New Powers — The Defense Department has expanded its programs aimed at gathering and analyzing intelligence within the United States, creating new agencies, adding personnel …
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Jo Fish / Democratic Veteran:
WELCOME TO GERMANY, 1933 — Holy Crap. This is some serious s**t, and it's not being talked about much...or I've been sleeping waaaay too long. … Alarmist? No, I don't think so...read on... (and the emphasis in the quotes is mine) … OK, wait a f**king minute here...this is the US of A, right?
Discussion:
Jesus' General
Captain Ed / Captain's Quarters:
Biden, Democrats Ask The Wrong Question — Senator Joe Biden writes an op-ed for today's Washington Post that gets the entire war on terror fundamentally wrong — and demonstrates why the Democrats have entirely failed to provide any leadership on Iraq and the wider war.
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Aziz / No End But Victory:
The flesh is willing, but is the spirit weak? — This may be a colossal understatement, but there is a narrative here at NEBV that takes as axiomatic that the sole threat to victory in Iraq is the Perfidious, Anti-American Left (PAAL). — There are indeed progressivists out there at the left end …
Discussion:
The Mahablog
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Adam Liptak / New York Times:
In Terror Cases, Administration Sets Own Rules — When Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales announced last week that Jose Padilla would be transferred to the federal justice system from military detention, he said almost nothing about the standards the administration used in deciding whether …
Peter Beaumont / Observer:
Abuse worse than under Saddam, says Iraqi leader — · Allawi in damning indictment of new regime — · Bush prepares way for US troop pull-out — Human rights abuses in Iraq are now as bad as they were under Saddam Hussein and are even in danger of eclipsing his record …
Daniel Cooney / Associated Press:
Troops Who Burned Taliban Face Discipline — KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Four U.S. soldiers face disciplinary action for burning the bodies of two Taliban rebels — a videotaped incident that sparked outrage in Afghanistan — but they will not be prosecuted because they their actions were motivated …
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Reuters:
US military admits it burned bodies — KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - The U.S. military admitted on Saturday that its soldiers in Afghanistan had burned the bodies of two dead Taliban guerrillas and taunted insurgents about it, but had not meant it as a desecration.
Discussion:
NewsHog
David D. Kirkpatrick / New York Times:
From Alito's Past, a Window on Conservatives at Princeton — WASHINGTON, Nov. 26 - In the fall of 1985, Concerned Alumni of Princeton was entering a crisis. — The group's members at the time included Samuel A. Alito Jr., now President Bush's nominee to the Supreme Court …
Sarah Baxter / Times of London:
Rumsfeld's Al-Jazeera outburst — THE Middle Eastern news network Al-Jazeera was accused by Donald Rumsfeld, the American defence secretary, of broadcasting "vicious, inaccurate and inexcusable" reports about the war in Iraq the day before President George W Bush met Tony Blair at the White House …
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Jeff Jarvis / BuzzMachine:
My content, my readers, my numbers, damnit — Hey, My Yahoo, Google Reader, Pluck, Newsgator Enterprise and other RSS readers: Hand over my numbers. You are taking my RSS feed and caching it to serve more efficiently, which would be fine if only you told me how many times you are doing that.
Bruce Kesler / Democracy Project:
Thankgiving for Midge Decter: Thanks Mom — Unbeknownst to Midge Decter, until last year, although having children of her own to raise, she has been my spiritual mother since I was 20. Midge Decter's writings, on the nexus of culture and politics, the guide of the values we have at home …
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Andrew Jacobs / New York Times:
Just Try to Sleep Tight. The Bedbugs Are Back. — They're the scourge of hobo encampments and hot-sheet motels. To impressionable children everywhere, they're a snippet of nursery rhyme, an abstract foe lurking beneath the covers that emerges when mommy shuts the door at night.
New York Times:
Pension Officers Putting Billions Into Hedge Funds — Faced with growing numbers of retirees, pension plans are pouring billions into hedge funds, the secretive and lightly regulated investment partnerships that once managed money only for wealthy investors.
Barb Howe / Lucky White Girl:
Medium rare electronics — Sometimes life is like the movies: just when you think the world is going end, deus ex machina steps in and magically everything is okay. — Today I come rushing home because it's the end of the semester and I have finals coming up and I need to write …
Discussion:
Philobiblon
Associated Press:
Students: Teacher Gave Anti-Bush Vocab Quiz — BENNINGTON, Vt. — A high school teacher is facing questions from administrators after giving a vocabulary quiz that included digs at President Bush and the extreme right. — Bret Chenkin, a social studies and English teacher …
Discussion:
Pyjamas Media
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Angus McDowall / Independent:
Iran's President digs in as leadership crisis deepens — A power struggle of titanic proportions has broken out between Iran's newly elected President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the country's parliament. — Now the President's domestic political agenda is in danger of collapse …
Peter Slevin / Washington Post:
Ohio Scandals May Give Democrats a Lift — Republicans' Standing In Key State Endangered — COLUMBUS, Ohio — The scandal began as a curiosity. Tom Noe, a gregarious businessman and Republican Party leader in northwest Ohio, had been entrusted with $50 million in state money to invest in rare coins …
Discussion:
The American Street
Charles Burress / San Francisco Chronicle:
Governor agrees to Williams hearing Convicted killer gets closer to possible clemency — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has decided to hold a clemency hearing Dec. 8 for Stanley Tookie Williams, the condemned killer who has attracted a number of high-profile backers calling for his life to be spared.
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Juliet Williams / Associated Press:
Believers Flock to 'Crying' Virgin Mary — SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Carrying rosary beads and cameras, the faithful have been coming in a steady stream to a church on the outskirts of Sacramento for a glimpse of what some are calling a miracle: A statue of the Virgin Mary they say has begun crying a substance that looks like blood.
Discussion:
PunditGuy
