Top Items:
Washington Post:
Obama Is Under Fire Over Panetta Selection — Current, Ex-CIA Officials Criticize ‘Opaque’ Process — President-elect Barack Obama said yesterday that he has selected a “top-notch intelligence team” that would provide the “unvarnished” information his administration needs, rather than “what they think the president wants to hear.”
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The Hill:
'I don't work for Obama' — Democrats must be “very, very careful” to avoid overreaching and will not rubber-stamp President-elect Obama's policies, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said Tuesday. — In an interview with The Hill, Reid said it is essential for Obama …
CNN:
Obama to tap new position, meet with predecessors — (CNN) — President-elect Barack Obama on Wednesday will announce his pick for “chief performance officer,” a newly created position that will work on the federal budget and to reform government, a Democratic official told CNN.
John Bresnahan / The Politico:
Reid vows to lead till at least 2015 — Harry Reid vowed Tuesday that he'll lead the Senate until 2015 and beyond, taunting Republicans who'd like to unseat him and dashing the hopes of Democrats who'd like to succeed him. — The Nevada Democrat, who is up for reelection in 2010 …
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New York Times:
Obama Warns Trillion-Dollar Deficit Potential — WASHINGTON — President-elect Barack Obama on Tuesday braced Americans for the unparalleled prospect of “trillion-dollar deficits for years to come,” a stark assessment of the budgetary outlook that he said would force his administration …
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Associated Press:
Hill aides: CBO to project $1.2T deficit for 2009 — WASHINGTON - The federal budget deficit will hit an unparalleled $1.2 trillion for the 2009 budget year, according to a Capitol Hill aide briefed on new Congressional Budget office figures. — The aide says the CBO also sees a $703 billion deficit for 2010.
Discussion:
TIME.com
Washington Post:
Blair House Mystery Solved: It's John Howard — The veil is lifted. We now know who is booked at Blair House, kicking President-elect Barack Obama and his family to the waiting list and across Lafayette Park to the Hay-Adams Hotel. — The only overnight visitor at the presidential guest manse …
Daily Mail:
Synagogue set ablaze and anti-Semitic assaults soar in UK following Israel's invasion of Gaza … The number of anti-Semitic attacks in London has risen sharply following Israel's land assault on Gaza, Jewish community groups said today. — Their leaders have compiled a dossier of attacks …
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John Leicester / Associated Press:
Gaza conflict spreads to Europe with Jews attacked
Gaza conflict spreads to Europe with Jews attacked
Discussion:
Vox Popoli
Thomas L. Friedman / New York Times:
The Mideast's Ground Zero — The fighting, death and destruction in Gaza is painful to watch. But it's all too familiar. It's the latest version of the longest-running play in the modern Middle East, which, if I were to give it a title, would be called: “Who owns this hotel? Can the Jews have a room?
Discussion:
Commentary, Jules Crittenden, Wall Street Journal, Mondoweiss, The Agonist and Soccer Dad
Avi Shlaim / Guardian:
How Israel brought Gaza to the brink of humanitarian catastrophe — The only way to make sense of Israel's senseless war in Gaza is through understanding the historical context. Establishing the state of Israel in May 1948 involved a monumental injustice to the Palestinians.
Hal Varian / Wall Street Journal:
Boost Private Investment to Boost the Economy — Excessive spending is what got us into this mess in the first place. — These days it seems like it is our patriotic duty to consume more. And if we don't choose to spend more money ourselves, the government will do it for us. — But wait a minute.
Associated Press:
Sarkozy says Israel, Palestinians OK Gaza plan — PARIS (AP) — French President Nicolas Sarkozy says Israel and the Palestinian Authority have accepted an Egyptian-French plan for Gaza. — Sarkozy says he “strongly welcomes the acceptance by Israel and the Palestinian Authority …
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Eric Lichtblau / New York Times:
Specter Attacks Choice for Attorney General — WASHINGTON — A leading Republican senator issued a broad attack on Tuesday on President-elect Barack Obama's pick as attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., questioning his political independence. — The senator, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania …
Discussion:
CBS News, Washington Monthly, Think Progress, Law Blog, The BLT, TPMMuckraker, PointOfLaw Forum and AmSpecBlog
William Booth / Washington Post:
Many Cubans Expect Obama to End Bilateral Hostilities — Many Islanders Expect Better Relationship With U.S. Under New President — HAVANA — Vicente González says that although Barack Obama is no Karl Marx — “he is a capitalist and likely an imperialist” — he has high hopes …
Walter Dellinger / New York Times:
City of Cold Shoulders — THE scene of Roland W. Burris being escorted from the Senate by the Capitol police on Tuesday could be only the first act of an unpleasant and distracting drama. But in the days since Mr. Burris's appointment to Illinois's junior Senate seat was announced …
The Atlantic Online:
The End of White America? — ANOTHER MOMENT FROM The Great Gatsby: as Fitzgerald's narrator and Gatsby drive across the Queensboro Bridge into Manhattan, a car passes them, and Nick Carraway notices that it is a limousine “driven by a white chauffeur, in which sat three modish negroes, two bucks and a girl.”
Discussion:
Matthew Yglesias
Jeff Stein / SpyTalk:
CIA Man: Spies' Reaction to Panetta ‘Overwhelmingly Negative’ — A retired senior CIA operations officer who quit last summer after 20 years tracking terrorists says the rank-and-file reaction to President-elect Obama's choice of Leon E.Panetta to run the spy agency has been “overwhelmingly negative.”
Discussion:
Firedoglake, The Daily Dish, ATTACKERMAN, The Washington Independent and Wall Street Journal
Glenn Greenwald / Salon:
The DOJ pursues the “real criminal” in the NSA spying scandal — There are few viewpoints, if there are any, which trigger more fervent agreement across the political and media establishment than the view that George Bush, Dick Cheney and other top officials should not be criminally investigated …
Discussion:
theheretik.us
Benjamin Netanyahu / Wall Street Journal:
Militant Islam Threatens Us All — Hamas rockets have the same terror goal as Hitler's blitz. — Imagine a siren that gives you 30 seconds to find shelter before a Kassam rocket falls from the sky and explodes, spraying its lethal shrapnel in all directions.
Catherine Clifford / CNNMoney.com:
Job weakness continues, reports show — ADP says the private sector shed 693,000 jobs in December, while Challenger shows employers unveiled 166,348 job cuts. — NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Separate employment reports released Wednesday showed the labor market continued to get battered in December.
Discussion:
TIME.com
Nick Perry / Seattle Times:
11 gay bars get letters threatening ricin attacks — Eleven gay bars in Seattle were sent letters Tuesday threatening ricin attacks — in what some are describing as a hate crime. The Seattle Police Department said it takes the threat seriously. The department has seized the letters …
Discussion:
Towleroad
Brad Stone / New York Times:
Want to Copy iTunes Music? Go Ahead, Apple Says — SAN FRANCISCO — In moves that will help shape the online future of the music business, Apple said Tuesday that it would remove anticopying restrictions on all of the songs in its popular iTunes Store and allow record companies to set a range of prices for them.
Scott / Power Line:
OVERTIME IN THE MINNESOTA SENATE ELECTION — The media coverage of the events related to Minnesota's Senate election and subsequent recount has been so poor that it is difficult to determine what happened. The erosion of Senator Coleman's approximately 700 vote lead over Al Franken …