Top Items:
Mike Allen / The Politico:
Cheney: Obama ‘trying to pretend’ — Former Vice President Dick Cheney accused President Barack Obama on Tuesday of “trying to pretend we are not at war” with terrorists, pointing to the White House response to the attempted sky bombing as reflecting a pattern that includes banishing the term …
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Josh Gerstein / The Politico:
Obama takes the heat Bush did not — Eight years ago, a terrorist bomber's attempt to blow up a transatlantic airliner was thwarted by a group of passengers, an incident that revealed some gaping holes in airline security just a few months after the attacks of Sept. 11.
Maureen Dowd / New York Times:
As the Nation's Pulse Races, Obama Can't Seem to Find His — I was walking through a deserted downtown on Christmas Eve with a friend, past the lonely, gray Treasury Building, past the snowy White House with no president inside. — “I hope the terrorists don't think this is a good time to attack …
Susan Crabtree / The Hill:
Feinstein: Halt transfers to Yemen — The senior Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee wants no more Guantanamo Bay detainees released to Yemen in the wake of a Christmas day terrorist attack hatched in that country. — “Guantanamo detainees should not be released to Yemen at this time …
Peter Baker / New York Times:
Obama Cites ‘Systemic Failure’ in U.S. Security — HONOLULU - President Obama on Tuesday blamed a “systemic failure” in the nation's security apparatus for the attempted bombing of a passenger jet on Christmas Day and vowed to identify the problems and “deal with them immediately.”
Discussion:
Online NewsHour, New York Times, White House.gov Blog Feed, The Caucus, QandO, Mediaite, Guardian, Michelle Malkin, Suburban Guerrilla, Washington Times, The Page, The BLT, USA Today, The Moderate Voice, Political Byline, Hot Air, The Atlantic Politics Channel, American Power and Weasel Zippers
Spencer Ackerman / The Washington Independent:Obama Aide: Failed Underpants Bomber Won't Stop Us From Closing Gitmo
Discussion:
The Huffington Post
Armen Keteyian / CBS News:
U.S. Intel Lapses Helped Abdulmutallab — CBS News Exclusive: CIA Had Info on Person of Interest Dubbed “The Nigerian” in August But Officials Failed to Connect Dots — (CBS) CBS News has learned that as early as August of 2009 the Central Intelligence Agency was picking up information …
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Times of London:
Al-Qaeda ‘groomed Abdulmutallab in London’ — Sean O'Neill, Crime and Security Editor and Giles Whittell in Washington — The Christmas Day airline bomb plot suspect organised a conference under the banner “War on Terror Week” as he immersed himself in radical politics while a student in London, The Times has learnt.
Chuck Bennett / New York Post:Ex-Gitmo goons did it! — Freed Qaeda creeps hatched undie-cover plan …
The Huffington Post:
Ayatollah Khamenei's Jet Checked, Iran Supreme Leader May Flee To Russia If Necessary — WHAT'S YOUR REACTION? — Iran Supreme Leader Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Khamenei could flee to Russia should the situation in his country continue to spiral out of control, according to Radio Netherlands.
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Susan Page / USA Today:
Poll: Americans most admire Obama, Clinton, Palin — WASHINGTON — President Obama is the man Americans admired most in 2009, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds, while Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and former Alaska governor Sarah Palin are virtually tied as the most-admired woman.
Steve Benen / Washington Monthly:
EVERYTHING IS ALWAYS GOOD NEWS FOR REPUBLICANS.... If facts, history, evidence, and reality have no meaning whatsoever — and they may not — then this makes sense. … By all appearances, it doesn't matter if the Republican attacks are baseless and ridiculous. It doesn't matter if Republican national security policies failed.
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Philip Rucker / Washington Post:Republicans see political opportunity in Obama response to failed airplane bomb
Discussion:
AMERICAblog News
Anne E. Kornblut / Washington Post:
Administration sees ‘some linkage’ between Detroit suspect, al-Qaeda — The official said the president and his top advisers are “increasingly confident” that Al Qaeda was involved in the attempted attacker's plans. — Obama, in his remarks to reporters earlier in the day …
Discussion:
Commentary
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Laura Saunders / Wall Street Journal:
Rich Cling to Life to Beat Tax Man — Nothing's certain except death and taxes — but a temporary lapse in the estate tax is causing a few wealthy Americans to try to bend those rules. — Starting Jan. 1, the estate tax — which can erase nearly half of a wealthy person's estate — goes away for a year.
BBC:
UK hostage released alive in Iraq — British hostage Peter Moore has been released alive from captivity in Iraq, Foreign Secretary David Miliband said. — He said Mr Moore, an IT consultant from Lincoln who was seized in Baghdad in May 2007, was in good health and “absolutely delighted at his release”.
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Arianna Huffington / The Huffington Post:
Move Your Money: A New Year's Resolution — Last week, over a pre-Christmas dinner, the two of us, along with political strategist Alexis McGill, filmmaker/author Eugene Jarecki, and Nick Penniman of the HuffPost Investigative Fund, began talking about the huge, growing chasm between …
Discussion:
The Baseline Scenario, Gawker, Outside The Beltway, Felix Salmon, New Deal 2.0 and Seeing the Forest
Susananne / susananne's Diary:
Yes, Byron, The GOP Deserves Blame, But You Need to Go Further — Byron York's article in the Washington Examiner highlights Republican shortcomings in recent years causing the shift to a Democrat-controlled Congress. While I agree with some of his points, I think York needs to go further with a few critical elements.
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Brady Dennis / Washington Post:
E-mails inside AIG reveal executives struggling with growing crisis — The probing e-mails came from every direction inside insurance giant American International Group during the summer and fall of 2007, all with the same underlying question: — Could Joe Cassano back up his assurances …
John Schwartz / New York Times:
Debate Over Full-Body Scans vs. Invasion of Privacy Flares Anew After Incident — The technology exists to reveal objects hidden under clothes at airport checkpoints, and many experts say it would have detected the explosive packet carried aboard the Detroit-bound flight last week.
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