Top Items:
Washington Post:
Pushing the Limits Of Wartime Powers — In his four-year campaign against al Qaeda, President Bush has turned the U.S. national security apparatus inward to secretly collect information on American citizens on a scale unmatched since the intelligence reforms of the 1970s.
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New York Times:
This Call May Be Monitored ... On Oct. 17, 2002, the head of the National Security Agency, Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden, made an eloquent plea to a joint House-Senate inquiry on intelligence for a sober national discussion about whether the line between liberty and security should be shifted …
Charles Babington / Washington Post:Domestic Spying Issue Inflames Debate Over Patriot Act Renewal
Discussion:
The Sideshow
Michelle Malkin:
TIME'S LAME CHOICES — Okay. I don't question that the rock star and the world's biggest philanthropists are doing good for the world. (Interesting, isn't it, that Bill Gates didn't deserve the honor when he was actually creating something, but only earns Time magazine's highest praise when he's giving his money away.
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CNN:
Time names Bono, Bill and Melinda Gates Persons of Year — (CNN) — The good deeds of an activist rock legend and one of the world's richest men and his wife carried the day in 2005, as Time magazine on Sunday named U2 frontman Bono and philanthropic couple Bill and Melinda Gates as its "Persons of the Year."
Glenn Greenwald / Unclaimed Territory:
Purposely misquoting FISA to defend the Bush Administration — Defenders of the Bush Administration are resorting to outright distortions and deliberate falsehoods about the Foreign Intelligence Security Act (FISA) in order to argue that the Administration's warrantless eavesdropping …
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Judd / Think Progress:
January 2005: Gonzales Said Bush Did Not "Authorize Actions...In Contravention of Our Criminal Statutes" — According to President Bush's radio address today, as White House counsel, Alberto Gonzales personally approved Bush's program for warrantless domestic wiretaps.
BBC:
Powell raps Europe on CIA flights — Ex-US Secretary of State Colin Powell has indicated that Europeans are being disingenuous when they deny knowledge of the rendition of terror suspects. — Mr Powell said the recently highlighted practice of moving people to places where they are not covered …
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Haaretz:
Sharon rushed to Jerusalem hospital after minor stroke — Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was rushed to hospital in Jerusalem on Sunday evening after suffering a minor stroke, the Israeli media reported. — According to Channel 2 television, 77-year-old Sharon was taken to Hadassah University Hospital …
Reuters:
Iran tells West to be tolerant of Holocaust views — TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's denial of the Holocaust is a matter for academic discussion and the West should be more tolerant of his views, Iran's foreign ministry spokesman said on Sunday.
Patricia Sullivan / Washington Post:
Investigative Journalist Jack Anderson, 83, Dies — Pulitzer-Prize Winner Exposed Corruption in Washington in His Decades-Long Column — Jack N. Anderson, 83, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter who for years was America's most widely read newspaper columnist, died Dec. 17 at his Bethesda home.
Discussion:
Running Scared
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Mark Steyn / Chicago Sun Times:
Iraq vote leaves Dems looking like the losers — Well, that old Iraqi quagmire just keeps getting worse and worse, if only for the Democratic Party. What was the straw they were clutching at back in January? Oh, yeah, sure, gazillions of Kurds and Shiites might have gone to the polls, but where were the Sunni?
Nick Beaudrot / Ezra Klein:
Censure and Move On? — Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot of Electoral Math — Like Hilzoy, I think that the Clinton impeachment has raised the bar for what ought to be an impeachable offense. Politically, if the opposition party calls for every President's head, we will have turned what ought …
Los Angeles Times:
Planted PR Stories Not News to Military — U.S. officials in Iraq knew that a contractor was paying local papers. Discretion was the key. — WASHINGTON — U.S. military officials in Iraq were fully aware that a Pentagon contractor regularly paid Iraqi newspapers to publish positive stories …
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:
Editorial: Big Brother Bush / The president took a step toward a police state — The Bush administration is continuing its assault on Americans' privacy and freedom in the name of the war on terrorism. — First, in 2002, according to extensive reporting in The New York Times on Friday …
Discussion:
Politics in the Zeros
Manohla Dargis / New York Times:
Masculinity and Its Discontents in Marlboro Country — LESS than two weeks after its release, "Brokeback Mountain" is already on the verge of being embalmed in importance. A lightning rod for attention even before it opened, the film has earned plaudits from critics' groups along with predictable sneers …
Discussion:
Althouse
