Top Items:
Economist:
The brainbox and the blowhards — Samuel Alito, George Bush's latest pick for the Supreme Court, faces a tough and dirty battle for confirmation. But he looks as though he'll win — Getty Images — TED KENNEDY is deeply troubled by the ethics of the Supreme Court nominee.
Discussion:
AMERICAN DIGEST, Campaign for the Supreme Court, Concurring Opinions, Cold Fury, blackprof.com and SCOTUSblog
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Dahlia Lithwick / Slate:
Please Don't Feed the Federalists — A Democrat's field guide to the conservative jurist. — Ladies and gentlemen, Democrats of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, welcome to this introductory tour of the North American federalist in his natural habitat.
Michael O'Hare / The Reality-Based Community:
A piece missing — I have been dipping into the Alito hearings, not following them completely, but enough to form a distinct and I think a fair impression. I read the nominee as a competent, careful, capable legal craftsman, unprejudiced as regards religion or race, and a decent guy.
Jaketapper / DownAndDirty:
CAP smear? — WASHINGTON DC — For Alito, it's all over but the votin'....It does not appear that the Democrats inflicted any real damage on the Supreme Court nominee, excepting of course his wife's mascara. — AP photo — Probing the debate over Alito's having said he was a member …
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Daniel Henninger / Opinion Journal:
The Battle of Princeton — Borking has lost its bite. — The grand hulk of Ted Kennedy ranted that he wanted to subpoena the papers of former National Review publisher William Rusher to get to the bottom of Samuel Alito's membership in the Concerned Alumni of Princeton.
E. J. Dionne Jr / Washington Post:
A Hearing About Nothing — A listless intellectual fog had fallen over the Senate hearing room on Tuesday, the first full day of questioning for Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr. before the Judiciary Committee. As one Democratic senator strode out to the hallway during an afternoon break, he leaned toward me and said: "We have to hit him
National Review:
The Multilateral Moment? — "Multilateralism good; preemption and unilateralism bad." — For four years we have heard these Orwellian commandments as if they were inscribed above the door of Farmer Jones's big barn. Now we will learn their real currency, since the Americans …
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daoureport.salon.com:
UNCLAIMED TERRITORY — A Nation of Jonah Goldbergs — There is a widespread, tacit assumption that no matter how apathetic and inattentive Americans become, there is still some line which they will not allow the Government to cross when it comes to exceeding or abusing the limits of government power.
Glenn Greenwald / Unclaimed Territory:
A Nation of Jonah Goldbergs — There is a widespread, tacit assumption that no matter how apathetic and inattentive Americans become, there is still some line which they will not allow the Government to cross when it comes to exceeding or abusing the limits of government power.
Discussion:
Eschaton, The Strata-Sphere, Lawyers, Guns and Money, The Heretik, The Corner on National …, Fantasy Life and Sadly, No!
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Jim VandeHei / Washington Post:
GOP Contest Guided by Lessons of Battles Past — Money Talks, but Maybe In a Whisper This Time — When the House speaker's job opened up in 1998, Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Calif.) — a telegenic policy intellectual from the nation's most populous state — seemed like a logical candidate.
Discussion:
Talking Points Memo
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Elisabeth Bumiller / New York Times:
In New Orleans, Bush Speaks With Optimism but Sees Little of Ruin — NEW ORLEANS, Jan. 12 - President Bush made his first trip here in three months on Thursday and declared that New Orleans was "a heck of a place to bring your family" and that it had "some of the greatest food in the world and some wonderful fun."
Discussion:
Think Progress, BAGnewsNotes, NewsBusters.org, The Heretik, BlondeSense and Facing South
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Michelle Malkin:
WE ARE ALL HOMELAND SECURITY AGENTS — Picture this: You're a retail store clerk. It's the busy Christmas season. A half-dozen men of Middle Eastern/South Asian descent walk into the store. They want to buy between 60-150 disposable cell phones—you know, the kind that can't be traced.
Discussion:
The Strata-Sphere, junkyardblog.net, Chris Christner's Blog, Macsmind, Power Line, Clayton Cramer's BLOG and Sister Toldjah
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Sen. Harry Reid / Houston Chronicle:
If we can beat mob, we can fight DeLay-style politics — Experience in Las Vegas similar to D.C. corruption — In 1977, I was appointed chairman of the Nevada Gaming Commission. It was a difficult time for the gaming industry and Las Vegas, which were being overrun by organized crime.
Michael Barbaro / New York Times:
Maryland Sets a Health Cost for Wal-Mart — ANNAPOLIS, Md., Jan. 12 - The Maryland legislature passed a law Thursday that would require Wal-Mart Stores to increase spending on employee health insurance, a measure that is expected to be a model for other states.
Discussion:
Washington Post, Soccer Dad, Ezra Klein, TAPPED, TigerHawk, The Conspiracy to Keep …, ACSBlog, EconLog, UNCoRRELATED, Fantasy Life, Sisyphus Shrugged and Preemptive Karma
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John Wagner / Washington Post:Md. Senate Overrides Veto on 'Wal-Mart Bill'
Discussion:
Suitably Flip, thoughtsonline.blogspot.com, Michelle Malkin, Below The Beltway and Malkin(s)Watch
The Truth Laid Bear:
An Appeal from Center-Right Bloggers — I'm pleased to present the following statement on behalf of the undersigned bloggers. —N.Z. — An Appeal from Center-Right Bloggers — We are bloggers with boatloads of opinions, and none of us come close to agreeing with any other one of us all of the time.
Discussion:
QandO
Edmund L. Andrews / New York Times:
Deficit Will Climb in 2006, White House Says — WASHINGTON, Jan. 12 - The White House acknowledged on Thursday that the budget deficit would climb back above $400 billion this year, erasing the brief improvement last year and complicating President Bush's vow to cut the deficit in half by 2009.
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Jonathan Weisman / Washington Post:Deficit Could Top $400 Billion
Discussion:
The Blogging of the President, The Carpetbagger Report, Angry Bear, AMERICAblog, Donklephant and Calculated Risk
NY Daily News:
Steamed about Rice, Russian pol unleashes rant — Condoleezza Rice might want to see if there's room in one of those "black site" terror-suspect prisons for Russian politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky. — The wacko leader of Russia's Liberal and Democratic Party has surpassed his earlier screeds …
Jason Leopold / truthout.org:
Bush Authorized Domestic Spying Before 9/11 — The National Security Agency advised President Bush in early 2001 that it had been eavesdropping on Americans during the course of its work monitoring suspected terrorists and foreigners believed to have ties to terrorist groups, according to a declassified document.
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Opinion Journal:
Saddam's Documents — What they tell us could save American lives today. — It is almost an article of religious faith among opponents of the Iraq War that Iraq became a terrorist destination only after the U.S. toppled Saddam Hussein. But what if that's false, and documents …
