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Bryan Woods / StormTrack:
The Boxing Day Tsunami of 2004 — *** Warning: Contains graphic content *** — It was exactly on year ago today, December 26, 2004, that the devastating Boxing Day tsunami slammed into the Indian Ocean basin. The tsunami was triggered by a massive earthquake of a magnitude of about 9.2.
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Tomi Soetjipto / Reuters:Asia remembers tsunami disaster with prayer, silence
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PunditGuy
Kenneth Anderson's Law of War and Just War Theory Blog:
Shame on Robert Kuttner for using Lincoln for cheap shots at Bush — Robert Kuttner engages in that most dangerous of all ideological games in American politics - "What would Lincoln have done?" - as a means of baiting George W. Bush. Here, in the Boston Globe.
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The Big Trunk / Power Line:
WHAT KUTTNER COULD LEARN FROM LINCOLN — On Saturday in "Thinking about the Great Liberator" I wrote a little on Lincoln's exercise of the commander-in-chief's war powers during the Civil War. Wielding Lincoln as his club, left-winger Robert Kuttner coincidentally attacked President Bush …
Robert Novak / Chicago Sun Times:
Control of Senate may hinge on Lott — Trent Lott within the next week plans to decide between seeking a fourth term in the U.S. Senate from Mississippi or retiring from public life. That could determine whether Republicans keep control of the Senate in next year's elections.
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Richard A. Oppel Jr / New York Times:
Iraq Vote Shows Sunnis Are Few in New Military — BAGHDAD, Iraq, Dec. 26 - An analysis of preliminary voting results released Monday from the Dec. 15 parliamentary election suggests that in contrast to the remarkable surge in Sunni Arab participation in the political process …
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Informed Comment
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Robert Steinback / Miami Herald:
Fear destroys what bin Laden could not — One wonders if Osama bin Laden didn't win after all. He ruined the America that existed on 9/11. But he had help. — If, back in 2001, anyone had told me that four years after bin Laden's attack our president would admit that he broke U.S. law …
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MyDD
Sebastian Mallaby / Washington Post:
My Son and I, Game to Learn — This year my knowing 11-year-old was told to write to Santa Claus, partly to keep the fun going for his younger siblings and partly because it forced him to write. He seized the opportunity to ask, naturally, for a computer game: more stuff to distract him from writing and books.
Shakespeare's Sister:
Powell the Disappointer — Continuing his slide into disgrace and eventual irrelevance by chipping away at his own backbone out both sides of his mouth, Colin Powell has decided to come out as both sort of for and sort of against the administration's secret spy program.
Discussion:
The Heretik, The Carpetbagger Report, Left I on the News, Loaded Mouth, Prometheus 6, AMERICAblog and Associated Press
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Herbert London / Baltimore Sun:
Thwarting terrorists is top priority — Partisanship of an extreme variety has reared its ugly head in Washington. Several lawmakers now object to President Bush's decision to engage in domestic spying in order to foil terrorist activity, which, it is claimed, exceeds his constitutional authority.
Bill Frist / Los Angeles Times:
Reining in Iran — IRAN'S RULING mullahs have waged a 26-year campaign to suppress dissent, support terror and pursue a nuclear weapons program. In recent weeks, it has become clear that international efforts to stop Iran's atomic program have failed to bear fruit.
Discussion:
The American Thinker
Michael Yon / Online Magazine:
Montage Or Mirage — The election photo-montage I posted last week has a certain propagandistic feel to it. It has all the usual suspects: the waving flag, the iconic soundtrack (Fanfare for the Common Man, hardly on the Iraqi Top 40) and the sequence of photos selected to tell a story ALL IN BOLD CAPITALS.
James Q. Wilson / Opinion Journal:
Faith in Theory — Why "intelligent design" simply isn't science. — When a federal judge in Pennsylvania struck down the efforts of a local school board to teach "intelligent design," he rightly criticized the wholly unscientific nature of that enterprise.
Discussion:
Balloon Juice
Jeanne / Body and Soul:
Thank you, Bedford Falls — I've always been a sucker for sappy movies. It's one of my more embarrassing traits. I think I'm reasonably intelligent, and I'm certainly aware that the world doesn't operate with the simple sweetness of a Frank Capra movie, but save a puppy …
Discussion:
Watermark
Ann Scott Tyson / Washington Post:
U.S. Seeks To Escape Brutal Cycle In Iraqi City — SAMARRA, Iraq — On one of his last days in Iraq, Sgt. Dale Evans looked out over the turbulent city from a rooftop tower piled high with sandbags, manning a machine gun. Below him, rows of Bradley Fighting Vehicles stood at the ready.
Discussion:
Needlenose
Thomas Bray / realclearpolitics.com:
And You Think America Is Repressive? — Spying on e-mail and cell phone traffic without a warrant. Searching offices and residences without a court order. Locking citizens away for weeks or months without filing charges. — Sound like your worst nightmare about the supposedly lawless Bush administration?
Charles Lane / Washington Post:
No Date Is Set for Troop Withdrawal From Iraq — General Says Insurgency Affects Timing; Powell Calls Current Levels Unsustainable — As American troops marked their third Christmas in Iraq since the war began in March 2003, the highest-ranking U.S. military officer said their number …
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