GOP hits Pelosi's 'hypocrisy' on wage bill  —  House Republicans yesterday declared "something fishy" about the major tuna company in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's San Francisco district being exempted from the minimum-wage increase that Democrats approved this week.

BOXER'S LOW BLOW  —  Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, an appalling scold from California, wasted no time yesterday in dragging the debate over Iraq about as low as it can go - attacking Secre tary of State Condoleezza Rice for being a childless woman.  —  Boxer was wholly in character for her party …

Bush Speaks and Base Is Subdued  —  President Bush came to this Georgia military base looking for a friendly audience to sell his new Iraq strategy.  But his lunchtime talk received a restrained response from soldiers who clapped politely but showed little of the wild enthusiasm that they ordinarily shower on the commander in chief.

Unveiled Threats  —  A Bush appointee's crude gambit on detainees' legal rights  —  MOST AMERICANS understand that legal representation for the accused is one of the core principles of the American way.  Not, it seems, Cully Stimson, deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs.

Lam is asked to step down  —  Job performance said to be behind White House firing  —  The Bush administration has quietly asked San Diego U.S. Attorney Carol Lam, best known for her high-profile prosecutions of politicians and corporate executives, to resign her post, a law enforcement official said.

Read more about the CBS News poll '08 Contenders Weigh In  —  Bush, visiting with troops at Fort Benning, Ga., cautioned that the troop increase "is not going to yield immediate results.  It's going to take a while."  —  The president's plan, outlined in a prime-time address to the nation on Wednesday …

White House Press Secretary Tony Snow following up the President's speech last night.  —  The Hugh Hewitt Show  —  HH: Pleased to welcome back to the Hugh Hewitt Show now, White House Press Secretary Tony Snow.  Happy New Year, Tony.  —  TS: Happy New Year, Hugh.

In Baghdad, Bush Policy Is Met With Resentment  —  Iraq's Shiite-led government offered only a grudging endorsement on Thursday of President Bush's proposal to deploy more than 20,000 additional troops in an effort to curb sectarian violence and regain control of Baghdad.

The Question of the Day  —  Jim Webb is really one of the most exciting things to happen to our politics recently; the personification of potentially worthy electoral trends who's managed to pull it off not by embracing militarism but by showing that good sense in national security policy …

Getting Iraq to Work  —  New York City's successes have lessons for Baghdad.  —  The American mission in Iraq must succeed.  Our goal—promoting a stable, accountable democracy in the heart of the Middle East—cannot be achieved by purely military means.  —  Iraqis need to establish a civil society.

Convicted lawmakers to lose pensions  —  WASHINGTON - Members of Congress convicted of serious crimes would lose their taxpayer-paid pensions, sometimes totaling more than $100,000 a year, under a measure unanimously approved by the Senate Friday.  —  The 87- vote to deprive lawbreaking lawmakers …

Agents Say Fast Audits Hurt I.R.S.  —  Top officials at the Internal Revenue Service are pushing agents to prematurely close audits of big companies with agreements to have them pay only a fraction of the additional taxes that could be collected, according to dozens of I.R.S. employees …

The Two Vacuums  —  Neither Iraqis nor Democrats seem ready to do what's required of them.  —  I had the odd and wholly unexpected experience of feeling supportive of a troop increase until I saw the president's speech arguing for it.  What a jarring, furtive-seeming thing it was.