Top Items:
Philip Sherwell / Telegraph:
US prepares military blitz against Iran's nuclear sites — Strategists at the Pentagon are drawing up plans for devastating bombing raids backed by submarine-launched ballistic missile attacks against Iran's nuclear sites as a "last resort" to block Teheran's efforts to develop an atomic bomb.
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Con Coughlin / Telegraph:Iran plant 'has restarted its nuclear bomb-making equipment'
Discussion:
NewsHog
New York Times:
The Trust Gap — We can't think of a president who has gone to the American people more often than George W. Bush has to ask them to forget about things like democracy, judicial process and the balance of powers — and just trust him. We also can't think of a president who has deserved that trust less.
BBC:
Thousands join pro-Islam protest — About 5,000 UK mainstream Muslims joined a protest in London's Trafalgar Square against controversial cartoons satirising the Prophet Muhammad. — There had been fears the rally may have been disrupted by extremists, but it proved to be a trouble-free afternoon.
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Lynn Zinser / New York Times:
Michelle Kwan Pulls Out of Olympics — TURIN, Italy, Feb. 12 ˆ Michelle Kwan, the face of United States figure skating for more than a decade and one of the best known female athletes in the world, announced in a tearful news conference today that she has withdrawn from her final Olympics …
Discussion:
Althouse
Spencer S. Hsu / Washington Post:
Katrina Report Spreads Blame — Homeland Security, Chertoff Singled Out — Hurricane Katrina exposed the U.S. government's failure to learn the lessons of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, as leaders from President Bush down disregarded ample warnings of the threat to New Orleans …
Time:
First Photo of Bush and Abramoff — White House had initially said there was no record of disgraced lobbyist at 2001 meeting … Just how close was the relationship between the White House and disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff? The Bush Administration again faced questions about those ties …
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Times of London:
British imam praises London Tube bombers — A LEADING imam in the mosque where the July 7 bombers worshipped has hailed their terrorist attack on London as a "good" act in a secretly taped conversation with an undercover reporter. — Hamid Ali, spiritual leader of the mosque in West Yorkshire …
Discussion:
AMERICAN FUTURE
Matt Stoller / MyDD:
Jim Brady Acting Up Again: It's the Accountability, Stupid — With this nasty letter in the Washington Post, online editor Jim Brady shows just how aggressive he is willing to be to avoid accountability at his newspaper. It's quite remarkable, actually. He still does not understand what went wrong.
Deborah Howell / Washington Post:
Why Not Publish These Cartoons? — Hundreds of readers have asked why The Post hasn't reprinted the Danish cartoons of the prophet Muhammad that inflamed Muslims around the world, leading to deadly protests and the burning of embassies. Some readers questioned the Post's journalistic courage.
Mark Steyn / Chicago Sun Times:
Toon-deaf Europe is taking the wrong stand — From Europe's biggest-selling newspaper, the Sun: ''Furious Muslims have blasted adult shop [i.e., sex shop] Ann Summers for selling a blowup male doll called Mustafa Shag. Not literally "blasted" in the Danish Embassy sense, or at least not yet.
Carpetbagger / The Carpetbagger Report:
This Week in God — First up from this week's God machine is the latest in a series of twists for evangelism and religious coercion problems at the Air Force Academy. After a year of back-and-forth wrangling, and evidence of school-sponsored proselytizing, the Air Force released new guidelines …
Nell Henderson / Washington Post:
Cheney Says New Unit Will Prove Tax Cuts Boost Revenue — Vice President Cheney said Thursday night that the verdict is in before the Bush administration's new tax analysis shop has even opened for business: Tax cuts boost federal government revenue. — That assertion won applause …
Discussion:
Suburban Guerrilla
Michael Liedtke / Associated Press:
'Throttling' Angers Netflix Renters — SAN FRANCISCO - Manuel Villanueva realizes he has been getting a pretty good deal since he signed up for Netflix Inc.'s online DVD rental service 2 1/2 years ago, but he still feels shortchanged. That's because the $17.99 monthly fee that he pays …
Hal Bernton / Seattle Times:
Government wants to sell thousands of acres — The Bush administration on Friday proposed the largest Forest Service land sale in decades, listing 309,421 acres in more than 30 states — including nearly 7,500 acres in Washington state. — The plan, which requires congressional approval …
Abdullah Shiri / Associated Press:
Update 11: Saudi Cleric Demands Trial Over Drawings — Saudi Arabia's top cleric called on the world's Muslims to reject apologies for the "slanderous" caricatures of Islam's Prophet Mohammed and demanded the authors and publishers of the cartoons be tried and punished, Saudi newspapers reported Saturday.
Fox News:
U.N. Procurement Scandal: How Far Did the Inside Information Travel? — UNITED NATIONS — On April 27, 2005, a U.N. procurement officer named Alexander Yakovlev was working unusually late. — At 11:23 p.m. he fired off an e-mail to a food service executive named Andy Seiwert …
Greg Jefferson / mysanantonio.com:
Unions unite in attempt to oust Cuellar — Add steelworkers to the list of unions gunning for U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar. — "He is our No. 1 primary target in the United States," said Chuck Rocha, national political director of the United Steelworkers of America.
