memeorandum: PELOSI ELECTED SPEAKER, FIRST WOMAN TO LEAD HOUSE (Fox News)

11:30 PM ET, January 5, 2007

Top Items:

Congressional Leaders Call on President to Reject Flawed Iraq Troop Surge — Washington, DC—Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Speaker Nancy Pelosi today sent the following letter to President Bush urging him to reject his reported plan to escalate the war in Iraq by increasing troop levels …

Discussion: Macsmind, Outside The Beltway, Wake up America, The Carpetbagger Report, BobGeiger.com, Taylor Marsh and AMERICAblog

Tom Curry / MSNBC:

McCain calls for substantial, sustained surge — Cites Lieberman's re-election as proof Americans don't want Iraq exit — WASHINGTON - The 2006 election has not changed Sen. John McCain's support for victory in Iraq one iota. — While some Democrats have interpreted their party's triumphs …

Discussion: Hullabaloo and Brilliant at Breakfast

David Stout / New York Times:

Top Democrats Oppose More Troops in Iraq — As President Bush prepares to present his new strategy on Iraq to the American people, Democratic Congressional leaders said today they will fight any approach that calls for deploying more United States troops there.

Discussion: TalkLeft and On Deadline

President George W. Bush / Huffington Post:
DEM LETTER TO BUSH: "WE STRONGLY ENCOURAGE YOU TO REJECT ANY PLANS …

Discussion: NewsMax.com, Hot Air, jules crittenden and Wonkette

Bill Brubaker / Washington Post:
Democrats Urge Bush Not to Increase Troops in Iraq

Discussion: PrairiePundit and Daily Kos

AJStrata / The Strata-Sphere:
Democrats Complete First Item On Their Contract With Al Qaeda - Surrender Iraq

Discussion: Don Surber and Wizbang

Bryan / Hot Air:

The Lonely Senator, Update — Via InstaPundit, the intrepid reporter whose site insinuated that the photo of John Kerry sitting alone in a chow hall in Iraq was itself bogus, has now verified that the photo is real, but the absence of troops in it is misleading: … And he backs it up by talking to the reporters involved.

Discussion: Captain's Quarters, Riehl World View, The Horse's Mouth, Little Green Footballs, The American Mind and The Democratic Daily

Glenn Reynolds / Instapundit.com:

ARE TODAY'S ELECTRONIC GADGETS WORTH THE MONEY? USA Today says that some are and some aren't: … I'm going to be attending the Consumer Electronics Show myself, as part of the Popular Mechanics contingent — and yes, it was awfully nice of the PM folks to invite me along.

Discussion: USA Today

Ann Althouse / Althouse:

In which I annoy you once again with the asssertion that I'm a moderate. — I took this test — recommended by Andrew Sullivan — and scored a 21 on a political scale that ran from 0 (100% liberal) to 40 (100% conservative). Sullivan scored 26, by the way. — UPDATE: Glenn Reynolds takes the test and, like me, gets a 21.

Discussion: TalkLeft, The Reaction, Transterrestrial Musings and Mick LaSalle

Eugene Volokh / The Volokh Conspiracy:

TRUST TEST: Andrew Sullivan, InstaPundit, and Ann Althouse link to this quiz that purports to measure where you stand on the liberal-conservative spectrum. I tend to agree with InstaPundit: "it was a pretty dumb test." — "Which do you trust more: The Pentagon or The U.S. Postal Service?," the test asks.

Discussion: StephenBainbridge.com and Daily Pundit

Nico / Think Progress:

CBS: Military Tells Bush It Has Only 9,000 Troops Available For 'Surge' — A State Department official leaked word this week that President Bush is considering sending "no more than 15,000 to 20,000 U.S. troops" to Iraq. "Instead of a surge, it is a bump," the official said.

Discussion: The Moderate Voice, Booman Tribune, Eschaton, rubber hose, KnoxViews and Daily Kos

Oliver North / Human Events:

More Troops = More Targets — For months, advisers to President George W. Bush have been trying to convince the commander in chief that more U.S. troops in Iraq will improve prospects for victory. Senators John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), both recently returned from Iraq …

Discussion: The Moderate Voice, PoliPundit.com, Reason Magazine and Stop The ACLU

Hindrocket / Power Line:
SURGE LITE?

Discussion: Associated Press, Riehl World View and Daily Pundit

Editor and Publisher:

AP's Iraqi Source Is Real: Now What Do Conservative Bloggers Say? — NEW YORK As reported elsewhere on this late this afternoon, Iraq's Interior Ministry acknowledged Thursday that an Iraqi police officer whose existence had been denied by the Iraqis and the U.S. military …

Discussion: Democracy Project, The Carpetbagger Report, Villainous Company, Patterico's Pontifications, BizzyBlog, skippy the bush kangaroo and Confederate Yankee

Joe Strupp / Editor and Publisher:
AP's Editor Criticizes Those Who Questioned Iraq Source

Discussion: Confederate Yankee, BobGeiger.com, AlterNet.org, Booman Tribune, Right Wing Nut House, JunkYardBlog, This Modern World, All Spin Zone, Unclaimed Territory, Daily Kos, Bill's Bites and Little Green Footballs

Reuters:

Cleric gunned down in Gaza after plea for calm — GAZA (Reuters) - Unidentified gunmen shot dead a Muslim cleric after he delivered a sermon in the Gaza Strip on Friday calling for an end to fierce factional fighting between Hamas and Fatah, hospital officials and local residents said.

Associated Press:
Critic of Hamas gunned down near mosque

Discussion: Secular Blasphemy

Fox News:

PELOSI ELECTED SPEAKER, FIRST WOMAN TO LEAD HOUSE — WASHINGTON — In an historic vote lawmakers on Thursday formally named California Rep. Nancy Pelosi as the first female speaker of the House, making her next in the presidential line of succession after the vice president.

Discussion: unfutz

Dana Milbank / Washington Post:
Reid Takes Center Stage, but He's Hardly the Star of the Show

Discussion: The Impolitic, The Caucus, Power Line, CNN Political Ticker and NewsBusters.org

Alexis Debat Reports / The Blotter:

American Passports Found on Bodies of Al Qaeda Fighters in Somalia — Alexis Debat Reports: — A senior official in the Somali government's new Ministry of the Interior told ABC News government forces had recovered "dozens of foreign passports," including several American passports …

Discussion: The Jawa Report, THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS, PrairiePundit and Blue Crab Boulevard

Pete Yost / Associated Press:

White House visitor records closed — WASHINGTON - The White House and the Secret Service quietly signed an agreement last spring in the midst of the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal declaring that records identifying visitors to the White House are not open to the public.

Discussion: The RBC, The Carpetbagger Report, TPMmuckraker, Prairie Weather and Shakespeare's Sister

Bryan / Hot Air:

Barney Frank accuses Bush of genocide "ethnic cleansing" Major Update — There's no other way around it: When you accuse someone of perpetrating "ethnic cleansing" in any way, shape or form, you are accusing them of genocide. — Genocide. Let that word work its way around your mind for an moment.

Discussion: SevenStripes.com, JunkYardBlog, WILLisms.com, Wizbang, The Jawa Report, The Moderate Voice, Townhall.com Blog's …, Gateway Pundit, Dr. Sanity, Cold Fury, Sister Toldjah, Ace of Spades HQ, jules crittenden and Redstate

Think Progress:

William J. Fallon: Wrong Man For The Job — At a time when the United States is engaged in protracted ground wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, one of the worst moves the Bush administration could make is to appoint someone with no background in land warfare to oversee these operations.

Discussion: Early Warning, Pen and Sword, Hullabaloo, The Next Hurrah and pacom.mil

E. J. Dionne Jr / Washington Post:

Short-Circuiting the Surge — The shift in power heralded by the Democrats' assumption of control in the House and Senate yesterday could lead quickly to a direct confrontation with President Bush if he chooses, as many expect, to "surge" additional troops into Iraq.

Discussion: Redstate and Needlenose

Hassan M. Fattah / New York Times:

Images of Hanging Make Hussein a Martyr to Many — In the week since Saddam Hussein was hanged in an execution steeped in sectarian overtones, his public image in the Arab world, formerly that of a convicted dictator, has undergone a resurgence of admiration and awe.