Check out Mini-memeorandum for simple mobiles or memeorandum Mobile for modern smartphones.
6:25 PM ET, December 31, 2008

memeorandum

 Top Items: 
Alan M. Dershowitz / Christian Science Monitor:
Israel, Hamas, and moral idiocy  —  Much of the world's response is a false moral equivalence that simply encourages the terrorists.  —  Israel's decision to take military action against Hamas rocket attacks targeting its civilian population has been long in coming.
RELATED:
William Sieghart / Times of London:
We must adjust our distorted image of Hamas  —  Gaza is a secular society where people listen to pop music, watch TV and many women walk the streets unveiled  —  Last week I was in Gaza.  While I was there I met a group of 20 or so police officers who were undergoing a course in conflict management.
Megan McArdle:
The problem with Israel-Palestine blogging  —  Everyone engaged in it is interested in proving that one side is righter than the other.  Since no action in the region has occurred without plausible provocation for 4,000 years or so, this requires constantly shifting the metrics by which you measure whichever side you happen to favor.
Discussion: Israel Matzav and Random Thoughts
Ynetnews:
IDF bombs ‘terror mosque’
Discussion: Yourish.com
Roni Sofer / Ynetnews:
Gaza: Hamas gunmen hide in hospitals
Discussion: Yourish.com and Seraphic Secret
Deb Riechmann / Associated Press:
White House: Cease-fire depends on Hamas
Ta-Nehisi Coates:
Bobby Rush on CNN  —  Here's Rush arguing for the importance of a black senator.  To which I respond—Nigga, please!!  —  I don't know if I've shifted politically or what.  But after watching a black man named Barack Obama—who couldn't get into the Democratic convention eight years ago …
Discussion: Ben Smith's Blogs and MoJoBlog
RELATED:
Chicago Sun Times:
Another bad choice by ethically bankrupt gov  —  The people of Illinois didn't need another reason to throw Gov. Blagojevich out of office.  —  They had plenty already.  —  But on Tuesday, the governor gave the state one more excellent reason, this time by going back on his word and appointing …
Chicago Breaking News:
Bobby Rush warns Democratic senators
Evan Perez / Wall Street Journal:
Gonzales Defends Role in Antiterror Policies  —  WASHINGTON — Alberto Gonzales, who has kept a low profile since resigning as attorney general nearly 16 months ago, said he is writing a book to set the record straight about his controversial tenure as a senior official in the Bush administration.
RELATED:
Jonathan Stein / MoJoBlog:   Alberto Gonzales Is Going to Write an Awfully Short Tell-All
Sam Youngman / The Hill:
Obama dismisses Bush Pentagon appointees  —  Despite keeping Defense Secretary Robert Gates in the Pentagon, President-elect Obama's transition team informed 90 Bush appointees their services will not be needed after Inauguration Day.  —  Scott Gration, a senior official on Obama's transition team …
Discussion: TPMMuckraker
Barak Ravid / Haaretz:
Arab youths open fire on Israelis working at mall in Denmark  —  A group of Arab youths opened fire Wednesday evening on a number of Israelis working at a mall in the Danish city of Odenza, some 200 kilometers north of Copenhagen.  —  The Israelis, who were operating a stall in the shopping center, were lightly wounded in their legs.
Discussion: Mere Rhetoric and Hot Air
RELATED:
Hana Levi Julian / Arutz Sheva:
PA Arab Terrorists Attack Israelis in Denmark, Two Wounded
Discussion: Israel Matzav and Atlas Shrugs
Peter Nicholas / Los Angeles Times:
Obama plans to campaign for economic stimulus package  —  His administration ‘wants the American people involved’ in talks — but Republican lawmakers say they're still waiting to be consulted themselves.  —  Reporting from Washington — President-elect Barack Obama is preparing to lead …
Discussion: TIME.com and The Swamp
RELATED:
Paul Steinhauser / CNN:
Poll: Obama viewed as a strong leader  —  CNN Deputy Political Director  —  WASHINGTON (CNN) — A national poll suggests that three-quarters of the public thinks President-elect Barack Obama is a strong and decisive leader, the highest marks for a president-elect on that characteristic in nearly three decades.
Discussion: The Swamp
Stephanie Clifford / New York Times:
Village Voice Lays Off Nat Hentoff and 2 Others  —  The troubled Village Voice laid off three employees Tuesday, including Nat Hentoff, the prominent columnist who has worked for the paper since 1958, contributing opinionated columns about jazz, civil liberties and politics.
Glenn Greenwald / Salon:
Torture prosecutions finally begin in the U.S.  —  (updated below - Update II)  —  While fiercely loyal establishment spokespeople such as The Washington Post's Ruth Marcus continue to insist that prosecutions are only appropriate for common criminals ("someone breaking into your house") …
Seth Borenstein / Associated Press:
NASA chief's wife to Obama: Don't fire my husband  —  WASHINGTON - Late on Christmas Eve, one last wish was sent, by e-mail: Please let NASA Administrator Michael Griffin keep his job.  It was from his wife.  —  Rebecca Griffin, who works in marketing, sent her message with the subject line “Campaign for Mike” to friends and family.
Ben Smith / Ben Smith's Blogs:
No end in sight  —  More evidence?  A weak case?  Behind-the-scenes negotiations?  —  Anyway, it goes on:
James Joyner / Outside The Beltway:
Katharine Webb Joyner  —  My wife Kimberly woke me a little before 2 yesterday morning to inform me that her water had broken and that it was time to drive her to the hospital.  After 12 hours of trying naturally, another 14 of trying with the aid of an inducing drug, and two hours of hard labor …
Joe / Power Line:
HAMAS H.Q. BOMBED; POWER LINE, TOO  —  Talk about disproportionate response.  Just an hour or so after Power Line posted a series of videos from the Israeli Defense Forces—videos that, as Scott discovered, YouTube had pulled—we experienced a Denial-of-Service attack from a cabal …
Discussion: JTA, TBogg and PoliGazette
 
 
 Archived Page Info: 
This is a snapshot of memeorandum at 6:25 PM ET, December 31, 2008.

View the current page or another snapshot:


 
 See Also: 
memeorandum: site main
memeorandum River: reverse chronological memeorandum
memeorandum Mobile: for phones
memeorandum Leaderboard: memeorandum's top sources
 
 Subscribe: 
memeorandum RSS feed
memeorandum on Mastodon
 
 
 More Items: 
John Hawkins / Right Wing News:
Death To All Juice!  —  I'm not sure whether to be more appalled …
Discussion: Hot Air and QandO
Andrew E. Kramer / New York Times:
Gazprom Set to Halt Gas Shipments to Ukraine
Discussion: On Deadline
Adam Horowitz / The Huffington Post:
Jews are Soul-Searching About Madoff — What About Gaza?
Larry Oakes / Minneapolis Star Tribune:
Election judge is dumbfounded her ballot was rejected
Discussion: TPM Election Central
 Earlier Items: 
Agence France Presse:
Iran shuts down leading reformist newspaper
Discussion: Daimnation! and Gateway Pundit
José M. Guardia / Barcepundit:
MORE ON Spain's property bust, in The Economist:
Discussion: PoliGazette and The Moderate Voice
Andy McCarthy / The Corner:
Re: The Sense of Proportion
Discussion: TigerHawk and Daled Amos
Myglesias / Matthew Yglesias:
Nobody Goes There Anymore, It's Too Crowded
Wall Street Journal:
Let Detroit Build Profitable Cars
Discussion: Lean Left and EconLog
 

 
From Techmeme:

Stephanie Palazzolo / The Information:
An undisclosed 2023 agreement between Microsoft and OpenAI defines achieving AGI as the point when OpenAI develops AI systems that generate $100B+ in profits

Noah Smith / Noahpinion:
How H-1B workers from India and other countries help the US remain dominant in tech, as some on the new “Tech Right” discover MAGA's racial-nationalist bigotry

Shubham Sharma / VentureBeat:
DeepSeek releases DeepSeek-V3, an open-source MoE model of 671B total parameters, with 37B activated per token, claiming it outperforms top models like GPT-4o

 
Sister Sites:

Techmeme
 Top news and commentary for technology's leaders, from all around the web
Mediagazer
 Top news and commentary for media professionals from all around the web
WeSmirch
 The top celebrity news from all around the web on a single page