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Washington Post:
Military Says It Paid Iraq Papers for News — Possible 'Improprieties' to Be Investigated — The U.S. military command in Baghdad acknowledged for the first time yesterday that it has paid Iraqi newspapers to carry positive news about U.S. efforts in Iraq, but officials characterized …
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Captain Ed / Captain's Quarters:Just Doing Business The Iraqi Way (Updated And Bump)
Discussion:
The Heretik
MSNBC:
Top al-Qaida officer reportedly killed — Group's operational leader Rabia killed by missile in Pakistan, officials say — By By Robert Windrem and Carol Grisanti — ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - The operational commander of al-Qaida, possibly the No. 3 official in the terrorist organization …
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Brian S. Wesbury / Opinion Journal:
Pouting Pundits of Pessimism — Every bit of good economic news gives them reason for despair. — During a quarter century of analyzing and forecasting the economy, I have never seen anything like this. No matter what happens, no matter what data are released, no matter which way markets move …
Charles Babington / Washington Post:
Alito Distances Himself From 1985 Memos — Senator Says Nominee Drew a Line Between Expressed Views and Potential Rulings — Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. yesterday tried to tamp down criticisms of several past statements — including his assertion that the Constitution does …
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Adam Nossiter / New York Times:
Wearying Wait for Federal Aid in New Orleans — NEW ORLEANS, Dec. 2 - They are the faces and voices of a city's desperation. Stepping wearily up to a Federal Emergency Management Agency help center here, all have a similar story of ruin in the past, anxiety over the future and frustration in the present …
Discussion:
Just a Bump in the Beltway
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Spencer S. Hsu / Washington Post:
FEMA Pulls Out of Lower Ninth — Agency Calls for Troops, Reporting Threats of Violence — The Federal Emergency Management Agency pulled all its workers out of New Orleans's Lower Ninth Ward yesterday after threats of violence and planned to request additional police or National Guard support, a FEMA spokeswoman said.
Tom Maguire / JustOneMinute:
Sometimes Nothing Is A Real Cool Hand — Sometimes the cover-up is worse than the crime, especially when the underlying crime is not really there. Put another way, Lewis Libby is an idiot (but we knew that). — Special Counsel Fitzgerald has made a filing in response to a motion to unseal …
Discussion:
The Next Hurrah
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James Fallows / The Atlantic Online:
Why Iraq Has No Army — The Bush administration doesn't take the problem seriously—and it never has — W hen Saddam Hussein fell, the Iraqi people gained freedom. What they didn't get was public order. Looting began immediately, and by the time it abated, signs of an insurgency had appeared.
Larisa Alexandrovna / rawstory.com:
Senate Intelligence Committee stalling pre-war intelligence report — Phase II, the follow-up to the Senate Intelligence Committee's investigation into pre-war intelligence on Iraq, is still facing opposition from administration officials and has seen little action from the committee's chairman …
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Major John / Miserable Donuts:
An Army Broken? — With all the eagerness of a dog returning to something it has vomited up, the conventional media has latched onto Rep. Murtha's rambling discourse about the Army being "broken" and "has done all they can." — Unmitigated crap. And I don't say this out of defensiveness …
Jonathan Weisman / Washington Post:
Muted Support for GOP Change Grows — Amid Scandals, Some Republicans Push to Permanently Replace DeLay as Leader — Widening corruption scandals in Washington are heightening Republican sentiments for a GOP leadership shake-up early next year that would permanently replace former majority …
Ellen Goodman / Washington Post:
A Vatican Retreat on Homosexuality — BOSTON — Somewhere along the way the dividing line over gay issues picked up and moved. It's no longer between red and blue states, or left and right wings, but between nature and nurture. Or, to be more precise, between those who believe …
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Washington Post:
10 Marines Killed in Fallujah Blast — BAGHDAD, Dec. 3 — Insurgents ambushed a joint patrol of U.S. and Iraqi forces north of Baghdad Saturday morning, killing 11 Iraqi soldiers a day after the U.S. military reported the deaths of 10 Marines in a bomb attack on their foot patrol outside Fallujah.
Kevin Hayden / The American Street:
Gangrape Rewarded — I attended this trial. It was especially interesting that the prosecutor kept referring to the three men involved as 'boys', when they were fully grown men. The woman was 17. — The judge found inconsistencies in all of the stories, thus establishing reasonable doubt in every story.
Mickey Kaus / Slate:
Hillary's Chimerical 'Recalibration' — ABC's Note admires the smokescreen. — Pssst! Bolivia is about to elect a president who wants to decriminalize coca production. Won't that throw the War on Drugs into a more than mild state of disarray? Just asking. ... 2:08 A.M.
Cathy Young / The Y Files:
O'Reilly on the Christmas warpath — The "save Christmas" hysteria this year seems to be worse than ever (though that's what I thought last year, too). I mean, okay, some of the ACLU-type handwringing over creches on public grounds gets ridiculous, but John Gibson carrying on about "the plot to ban the sacred Christian holiday"?
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