Top Items:
New York Times:
Clintons Move to Tamp Down Criticism From Blacks About Recent Comments — WASHINGTON — The Clinton campaign moved Friday to try to quell a potentially damaging reaction to recent comments by Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton that have drawn criticism from African-Americans …
Discussion:
Ben Smith's Blogs, The Swamp, Wake up America, The Politico, TIME: Swampland, American Street, TalkLeft, Political Machine, Outside The Beltway, News Hounds, ScrappleFace, Jules Crittenden, Connecting.the.Dots, Macsmind, TPM Election Central, The Gun Toting Liberal™, Bookworm Room, Althouse and Irish Trojan in Tennessee
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Kenneth P. Vogel / The Politico:
Newt: Hillary shows courage, integrity — Newt Gingrich's on-again, off-again adulation of Hillary Rodham Clinton appears to be back on. — The leader of the 1994 Republican revolution — who as House speaker in the mid 1990s clashed fiercely with then-first lady Clinton and her husband …
Ryan Lizza / New Yorker:
MINORITY REPORTS — After New Hampshire, a hint of racial politics. … The brief interregnum between the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary may be remembered as a time when it appeared that the magical qualities ascribed to Barack Obama included an ability to suspend all the ordinary rules of politics.
Sam Roberts / New York Times:
Obama Giving Clinton a Race in Her Backyard — With Senator Barack Obama vowing to challenge Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton on her home turf, the Democratic presidential primary in New York on Feb. 5 is shaping up as the state's most competitive since 1992, when Bill Clinton took up a rival's mantra …
Discussion:
Weekly Standard, The Moderate Voice, New York Daily News Blogs, Captain's Quarters, Stumper and Prairie Weather
Dan Balz / Washington Post:
Edwards Will Face a Moment of Truth After South Carolina Primary
Edwards Will Face a Moment of Truth After South Carolina Primary
Discussion:
Firedoglake, The Caucus, The Sideshow, Blue Crab Boulevard, Prairie Weather and The Huffington Post
Wayne Washington / The State:
Clinton camp hits Obama | Attacks ‘painful’ for black voters
Clinton camp hits Obama | Attacks ‘painful’ for black voters
Discussion:
QandO
George W. Bush / Newsweek:
Sorry, Barack, You've lost Iraq. — Bush's efforts to negotiate a long-term U.S-Iraq pact may remove troops as an '08 election issue for Obama, Clinton. — Camp Arifjan in the desert kingdom of Kuwait, America's depot to the Iraq war, feels about as far away as you can get from South Carolina …
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Gateway Pundit:
VICTORY!... In Kuwait Bush Claims Surge a Huge Success! (Video) — “History will say, it was when you were called upon, you served, and the service you rendered was absolutely necessary to defeat an enemy overseas so we do not have to face them here at home...”
Big Tent Democrat / TalkLeft:
Ben Nelson To Endorse Obama — Now this is a predictable development as Ben Nelson is the king of bipartisanship, voting with Republicans more than any other Democrat: … Again, the national implications for me are not positive for Obama, they are negative.
Discussion:
KETV Omaha's Channel 7
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Steve Friess / New York Times:
Teachers Sue to Block Hotel Workers' Union Vote in Nevada Caucus — LAS VEGAS — Nevada's state teachers union and six Las Vegas area residents filed a lawsuit late Friday that could make it harder for many members of the state's huge hotel workers union to vote in the hotly contested Jan. 19 Democratic caucus in Nevada.
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Qassim Abdul-Zahra / Associated Press:
Iraq to reinstate Saddam party followers — BAGHDAD - Iraq's parliament passed a benchmark law Saturday allowing lower-ranking former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath party to reclaim government jobs, the first major piece of U.S.-backed legislation it has adopted.
Discussion:
The Strata-Sphere, The Reaction, Liberty Street, Balloon Juice, QandO and State of the Day
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Ed Morrissey / Captain's Quarters:
De-Baathification Reform Law Passes In Iraqi Parliament — Note: I'm leaving this post on top for the morning; newer posts are below. — Those who claim that the surge strategy in Iraq has paid no dividends because it hasn't met Congressional benchmarks may wish to skip to the next post.
Discussion:
Jules Crittenden, Redstate, Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, Wake up America and Cadillac Tight
Paul Vitello / New York Times:
A Combative Thompson Sways Voters — MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. — John and Ann Berenberk dutifully watched the umpteenth Republican presidential debate on television on Thursday night and had an epiphany. It was about the candidate they had previously referred to as the tall, silent one. Fred D. Thompson.
Discussion:
protein wisdom, Fausta's blog, Hot Air, Riehl World View, Wake up America, QandO, Fred File, Daily Pundit and PoliGazette
Rudyg / Stumper:
Blumenthal On the Boil — Sidney Blumenthal plays hardball. A longtime confidante and adviser to the Clintons, he has zealously defended them through any number of scandal investigations. Along the way, Blumenthal has shown an affinity for the sharp counterattack.
John Amato / Crooks and Liars:
Chris Matthews stands behind his words — Chris Matthews has been taking a lot of heat over his vitriolic analysis of Hillary Clinton's political career during MSNBC's coverage of the NH primary. Is it possible that Hillary might have won her Senate seat without the scandal that Bill was involved in?
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Navy Times:
‘Filipino Monkey’ may be behind radio threats, ship drivers say — The threatening radio transmission heard at the end of a video showing harassing maneuvers by Iranian patrol boats in the Strait of Hormuz may have come from a locally famous heckler known among ship drivers as the “Filipino Monkey.”
Washington Post:
Objects From Iranian Boats Posed No Threat, Navy Says — The small, boxlike objects dropped in the water by Iranian boats as they approached U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf on Sunday posed no threat to the American vessels, U.S. officials said yesterday, even as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs …
Discussion:
AMERICAblog
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