Top Items:
Mark Silva / The Swamp:
Blagojevich ‘corrupt’ cloud over Ill: Reid — Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich is “corrupt,” the way Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid sees it, explaining why the Senate cannot seat his appointee, Roland Burris, to the vacant seat of President-elect Barack Obama. — Blagojevich is about to be indicted, says Reid (D.-Nev.)
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Associated Press:
Hoyer: Stimulus unlikely before inauguration — Featured Topics: - Barack Obama - Presidential Transition — WASHINGTON - Don't expect Congress to have an economic recovery plan ready for Barack Obama when he takes office on Jan. 20. — That's the word from House's No. 2 Democrat, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer of Maryland.
The Politico:
Burris puts Senate Dems in tough spot — The defiant move by Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich to name a Senate successor to Barack Obama has triggered a political and legal mess that could drag on for months and is already prompting uncomfortable racial questions for Democrats.
John Harlow / Times of London:
Charity homes built by Hollywood start to crumble — RESIDENTS of a model housing estate bankrolled by Hollywood celebrities and hand-built by Jimmy Carter, the former US president, are complaining that it is falling apart. — Fairway Oaks was built on northern Florida wasteland by 10,000 volunteers …
Discussion:
The Strata-Sphere, Balloon Juice, Althouse, Right Wing News, RedState, Macsmind and Don Surber
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Michelle Malkin:
Jimmy Carter & Habitat for Humanity: Celebrity slum lords? — The road to hell is paved with good intentions — and, apparently, the homes in the neighborhoods along that hellish path are built by Jimmy Carter and Habitat for Humanity. The Times of London reports on one of the celebrity …
Discussion:
Don Surber
Jerusalem Post:
Two senior Hamas terrorists killed in IAF strike — Senior Hamas terrorist Hussam Hamdan, who was in charge of Grad-type rocket launches into Beersheba and Ofakim, was killed in an IAF strike on Khan Yunis on Sunday afternoon. — Another senior Hamas terrorist, Muhammad Hilo, was also killed in the same airstrike.
Discussion:
Wake up America, The Other McCain, A Blog For All, Washington Post, Israpundit, Israel Matzav and Random Thoughts
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Associated Press:Israeli forces bisect Gaza, surround biggest city
Discussion:
Sic Semper Tyrannis, Scared Monkeys, Yourish.com, Reuters, NY Daily News, BLACKFIVE and Haaretz
New York Times:
The End of the Financial World as We Know It — AMERICANS enter the New Year in a strange new role: financial lunatics. We've been viewed by the wider world with mistrust and suspicion on other matters, but on the subject of money even our harshest critics have been inclined to believe that we knew what we were doing.
Glenn Greenwald / Salon:
Orwell, blinding tribalism, selective Terrorism, and Israel/Gaza — (updated below) — Former McCain-Palin campaign spokesman and current Weekly Standard editor Michael Goldfarb notes that Israel, a couple of days ago, dropped a 2,000-pound bomb on a Gazan home which killed a top Hamas leader …
Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
SURVEILLANCE STATE RUN AMOK.... In July, the Washington Post reported on undercover Maryland State Police officers conducting surveillance on war protesters and death penalty opponents. Today, we learn that the monitoring was worse, and more pervasive, than first believed.
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Aaron David Miller / Newsweek:
He should get tough with Israel. — In Search of the High Ground: In July, Obama got a bird's-eye view of the Holy Land with Livni (right) and Defense Minister Ehud Barak — From the magazine issue dated Jan 12, 2009 — Jews worry for a living; their tragic history compels them to do so.
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Times of London:
Fears over earthquake ‘swarm’ at Yellowstone National Park — Hundreds of earthquakes have hit Yellowstone National Park, raising fears of a more powerful volcanic eruption. — The earthquake swarm, the biggest in more than 20 years, is being closely monitored by scientists and emergency authorities.
Frank Rich / New York Times:
A President Forgotten but Not Gone — WE like our failed presidents to be Shakespearean, or at least large enough to inspire Oscar-worthy performances from magnificent tragedians like Frank Langella. So here, too, George W. Bush has let us down. Even the banality of evil is too grandiose a concept for 43.
Discussion:
The Sideshow, No More Mister Nice Blog, Washington Monthly, Bark Bark Woof Woof, DownWithTyranny! and Macsmind
Michael R. Crittenden / Wall Street Journal:
The Bailout Bowl: Big-Game Sponsors Scored Billions — Financial Firms That Got Government Aid Draw Fire for Spending Millions on Marketing; ‘A Fantastic Investment’ — Football fans watching this year's college bowl games may have noticed that some of the biggest sponsors were also recipients …
Discussion:
Right Wing News
Peterr / Firedoglake:
Violence is the Tool of the Incompetent — The apartheid wall in East Jerusalem, Nov 2006 — My denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), has long-standing ties with Lutherans in the Middle East that have focused mainly on education (building schools) and both short-term …
Discussion:
QandO
Noah Pollak / Commentary:
Correcting Christiane Amanpour — On CNN a few moments ago, Christiane Amanpour, in the midst of an otherwise completely warped report on the Gaza war, said that over the past year only two Israelis were killed by Hamas rocket fire. Her point in the segment was to insinuate that Israel …
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