Fire in Cheney's Office Causes Leftists to Rant Uncontrollably  —  There was a fire in Dick Cheney's office this morning, and as usual the leftist blogosphere is brimming over with lunatic ranting.  —  At Think Progress, the Morlocks who inhabit their comments are sure this is a ploy to cover up the destroying of documents.

UPDATE: NATIONAL ENQUIRER WORLD EXCLUSIVE: JOHN EDWARDS LOVE CHILD SCANDAL!  —  Presidential candidate John Edwards is caught up in a love child scandal, a blockbuster ENQUIRER investigation has discovered.  —  The ENQUIRER has learned exclusively that Rielle Hunter, a woman linked to Edwards …

A Real Edwards Surge  —  Is John Edwards's surge a media-created phenomenon, a collective reaction formation to the media's desire to see a three-person race, or guilt for building up Barack Obama?  Does the media really have that power?  —  Or are we seeing something more organic?

Hard-liners for Jesus  —  As Christians across the world prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus, it's a fitting moment to contemplate the mountain of moral, and mortal, hypocrisy that is our Christianized Republican Party.  —  There's nothing new, of course, about the Christianization of the GOP.

For Clinton, A Matter of Fair Media  —  Senator's Camp Insists That the Press Holds Her To a Tougher Standard  —  After weeks of bad news, Hillary Clinton and her strategists hoped that winning the endorsement of Iowa's largest newspaper last weekend might produce a modest bump in their media coverage.

Person of the Year: Vladimir Putin  —  A Tsar Is Born  —  No one is born with a stare like Vladimir Putin's.  The Russian President's pale blue eyes are so cool, so devoid of emotion that the stare must have begun as an affect, the gesture of someone who understood that power might be achieved …

All Iraqi Groups Blame U.S. Invasion for Discord, Study Shows  —  Iraqis of all sectarian and ethnic groups believe that the U.S. military invasion is the primary root of the violent differences among them, and see the departure of “occupying forces” as the key to national reconciliation …

Tancredo to get out?  —  Tom Tancredo has scheduled a press conference in Des Moines tomorrow afternoon to make a “major announcement regarding the campaign,” according to a media advisory his campaign sent out today.  —  Asked whether Tancredo intended to drop out of the race …

Torture Tapes are the Watergate of Our Times  —  As I write these words on the morning of Wednesday, Dec. 19, high- and low-level officials of the Bush administration involved in torture, and the destruction of the torture tapes, are consulting their criminal lawyers as The New York Times reports …

Fred Thompson: Lazy as charged  —  WAVERLY, Iowa — When is retail politics not retail politics?  When candidates refuse to get off their big buses and go do it.  —  Fred Thompson rolled into this small town on the Cedar River in north-central Iowa on a giant brown bus Tuesday.

“Mitt Romney...Helped Save My Daughter”  —  At first blush, this seems like a genuinely great campaign ad — the story of how Mitt Romney basically closed down his business, Bain Capital, in 1996 when the daughter of one of his partners went missing in New York City and Romney sent dozens …