memeorandum: Huckacide — Editor's note: This column is available exclusively … (Rich Lowry/National Review)

6:15 PM ET, December 14, 2007

Top Items:

Election 2008: Florida Republican Primary — Florida: Huckabee 27% Romney 23% Giuliani 19% — Mitt Romney's strategy for winning the Republican nomination was to win the early states and build momentum. Rudy Giuliani's plan was to accept defeats in the early states and come back strong …

Discussion: Weekly Standard, American Spectator, Riehl World View, Los Angeles Times, HorseRaceBlog, Talking Points Memo, Associated Press, Hot Air, Donklephant, RealClearPolitics, TPM Election Central, The Corner, Below The Beltway, eyeon08.com, The Caucus Cooler, Pollster.com, PoliGazette and Taegan Goddard's …

Ed Tibbetts / Quad City Times:

Obama, Huckabee lead new Iowa poll — Presidential candidates Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee hold 9-point leads in Iowa with less than three weeks to go before the Jan. 3 caucuses, according to a new poll conducted for the Quad-City Times and other Lee Enterprises newspapers.

Discussion: The Swamp, Eunomia, Riehl World View, Pollster.com and TPM Election Central

Gordon Trowbridge / Detroit News:

New polls in the Michigan primary campaign — Two new independent polls of Michigan primary voters out today add to the evidence for a surge for Mike Huckabee in Michigan, a decline for Rudy Giuliani and the possibility of a John McCain surge if the GOP contest draws lots of independents and Democrats.

Discussion: The Corner, The Campaign Spot, eyeon08.com, race42008.com and RIGHTWINGSPARKLE

Ross Douthat:

Huckenfreude (n): Pleasure derived from the outrage of prominent conservative pundits over the rising poll numbers of Mike Huckabee. Particularly sharp when the pundits in question are partisans of Rudy Giuliani, but extends to supporters of Mitt Romney as well.

Discussion: Townhall.com, Washington Post and Eunomia

Bryan / Hot Air:
Video: No Monkey Business; Update: Fred scores again on AP …

Discussion: Associated Press, Macsmind and JunkYardBlog

Sarah Liebowitz / Concord Monitor:
Obama edges Clinton in poll

Discussion: Captain's Quarters, Wall Street Journal, MyDD, USA Today, CNN Political Ticker, Obama HQ, TIME: Swampland, Washington Post, MSNBC, TIME, TPM Election Central, Pollster.com, Raising Kaine, Blue Hampshire and Taegan Goddard's …

CNN Political Ticker:
S.C. poll: Huckabee bolts to top of GOP; Obama cuts into Clinton lead

Discussion: yourconcord.com, Balloon Juice, Outside The Beltway, Comments from Left Field, Open Left, The Carpetbagger Report, TPM Election Central, The Swamp, Captain's Quarters, Reason Magazine, Below The Beltway, Ben Smith's Blogs, Riehl World View, PoliBlog (TM) and Marc Ambinder

Liz Sidoti / Associated Press:
Rivals try class warfare against Romney

Discussion: The New Republic

Dan Eggen / Washington Post:

Mukasey Rejects Call for CIA Tape Details — Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey today sharply rebuffed congressional demands for details about the Justice Department's inquiry into the destruction of CIA interrogation tapes, saying that providing such information would make it appear that the department was …

Discussion: TPMmuckraker, The Carpetbagger Report and Greatscat!

CNN:

FISA Bill With Telco Immunity To Be Debated Monday — WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Friday that debate on the legislation underpinning the government's warrantless wiretapping program will begin Monday. — Speaking in the Senate, Reid said he would bring forward …

Discussion: TPM Election Central, Firedoglake, Salon, Corrente and TalkLeft

Paul Kane / Washington Post:
Rove, Bolten Found in Contempt of Congress

Discussion: Norwegianity, Daily Kos, Comments from Left Field, Buck Naked Politics, The Newshoggers, The Democratic Daily, Crooks and Liars and Shakespeare's Sister

Al Kamen / Washington Post:
Instead of Plum Appointments, Maybe a Lump of Coal

Discussion: AMERICAblog, New York Times and The Democratic Daily

Rich Lowry / National Review:

Huckacide — Editor's note: This column is available exclusively through King Features Syndicate. For permission to reprint or excerpt this copyrighted material, please contact: kfsreprint@hearstsc.com, or phone 800-708-7311, ext 246). — The ghost of Howard Dean haunts the pundit class.

Discussion: The Daily Dish, Taylor Marsh, The Anonymous Liberal, Blogometer, Swords Crossed, Eunomia, Balloon Juice, Riehl World View, Hugh Hewitt's TownHall Blog, Cold Fury, The New Republic and Sadly, No!

Redstate:
F-you Country Boy. Jesus Freaks Need Not Apply.

Discussion: The Corner and Eunomia

Michael Crowley / The New Republic:

Hillary's New Pitch: "No Surprises" — Johnston, Iowa— Hillary just held an extraordinary press conference here after taping an interview with Iowa public television in which she introduced a provocative new theme to her candidacy: "[T]here are no surprises."

Discussion: Althouse, Ben Smith's Blogs, The Swamp, Matthew Yglesias, The Debatable Land, The Carpetbagger Report, Hot Air, The RBC and Spin Cycle

Greg Sargent / TPM Election Central:
Hillary And The Drug Flap: Does Her Campaign Want Issue To Go Away?

Discussion: New York Times, Spin Cycle and Horses Mouth

BBC:

Iraqi oil exceeds pre-war output — Iraqi oil production is above the levels seen before the US-led invasion of the country in 2003, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). — The IEA said Iraqi crude production is now running at 2.3 million barrels per day, compared with 1.9 million barrels at the start of this year.

Discussion: Gateway Pundit, Hot Air, Dean's World, QandO and macsmind.com/wordpress

Blue Texan / Firedoglake:

Peggy Noonan: Ronald Reagan Wouldn't Make It In Today's Fundie GOP — This again. … I'm not sure either. It's funny, though, Nooner. Were you worried about this in 1998, when you wrote, … Amen! Why wouldn't God love putting SRBMs in West Germany, invading Grenada …

Peggy Noonan / Opinion Journal:
The Pulpit and the Potemkin Village

Discussion: Real Clear Politics, The Anchoress, No More Mister Nice Blog, Liberal Values, PoliGazette, Eunomia, Political Machine, The Moderate Voice, The American Scene, Stop The ACLU, Publius Endures, QandO and Below The Beltway

Kenneth P. Vogel / The Politico:

Huck's gift-givers ended up in state posts — Mike Huckabee accepted more than 90 gifts from 21 Arkansans he appointed to state posts during his decade as governor, a Politico analysis of state public records found. — Since setting his sights on the White House, those supporters …

Discussion: Guardian and Hot Air

Deacon / Power Line:

HE'S NOT A DOCTOR OF THEOLOGY, HE JUST PLAYS ONE ON TV — In a post-debate interview with CBN News last month, Mike Huckabee claimed that he is uniquely qualified to lead the war on terror because he has a theology degree. Huckabee said: … The notion that a theology degree constitutes …

Discussion: The Carpetbagger Report, The Corner, MSNBC and First State Politics

Gateway Pundit:

MULLAHS PUNKED— So Much For That Modesty Campaign — Sadly, someone played a video switcheroo on the Iranian hardliners. — This probably didn't sit too well with the mullahs and their battle against immodesty and women. — The billboard video display was certainly not cleric approved …

Discussion: The Jawa Report and Say Anything

Dan Froomkin / Washington Post:

Bush Demands Freedom to Torture — President Bush's repeated insistence that "we don't torture" appeared even more transparently bogus yesterday as the White House threatened to veto a House bill that would explicitly ban a variety of abhorrent practices. — The bill would require U.S …

Discussion: The Daily Dish, West Virginia Blue, Washington Wire, Political Machine, normblog and AMERICAblog

Little Green Footballs:

Video: Hamas MP Says 'Jews Are Creating Artificial Earthquakes' — Here's another disturbingly insane clip from Hamas' Al Aqsa TV, in which Hamas [goon] Member of Parliament Ahmad Abu Halabiya explains that the Jews are using artificial earthquakes to destroy the Al Aqsa Mosque. It's not impossible, right?