Sisyphus Shrugged - ...and that was the dulcet tones of the Brass Monkey Castrato Choir, singing their new arrangement of Baby, It's Cold Outside for cymbals and wind. And now the news...

elections

the talking dog: organizing his Iowa Caucus blogburst, with linkbacks and saturation coverage and a good time had by all

Lieberman picks up the RNC line on Clark

re Clark - Is that clear enough? Or is there some part of "I think it's not time yet to use force against Iraq" Mr. Drudge needs to have explained to him more slowly?

Transcript of Clark's testimony to congress on Iraq

New Democrat and DLC associate endorses Dean

the RNC flashes their wad (of money, thank goodness)

Yes! Uggabugga diagrams the Kevin Phillips book on Bush

Jeanne points out that maybe we should save our anger for Bush

Quarantining dissent / How the Secret Service protects Bush from free speech

The race to place

The Redistricting Wars

Washington Goes to War (with Howard Dean)

Butching up for Victory

Can Kerry Get Real?

Gephardt steps up criticism of Dean on trade, health

Dr. King and his congregation and You, The Taxpayer pay for Bush campaign trip

Bush seeks billions for religious groups

Truly, nothing honors the spirit of Dr. King more than ordering members of a church to vacate the premises so it doesn't obstruct your plans to craft a photo-op while you're "in the area" to raise campaign funds.

Both sides of the argument gave a little. Bush will visit. The committee's tribute will go on. The twist is that no one can enter the church after 2 p.m. Guests may, however, leave the church. Some organizers were a little frustrated that attendees couldn't come and go, but said being able to continue the program during the president's visit was some consolation.

But the MLK March Committee, a group of area civil rights activists who worked with King, say they have worked for months on a program to honor the civil rights leader at Ebenezer Baptist Church, across the street. "They told us that the Secret Service wanted us out of there by 2 p.m.," said the Rev. James Orange. "We are not leaving the church."

Hundreds Protest As Bush Visits MLK Tomb

Protesters push past barricades at King's tomb

'I feel really great' - Mrs. King rises above

President Bush ran into a protest in Atlanta today as he made a political foray into the Deep South to promote a favorite social initiative, raise campaign money and shore up voter support.

Bush Seeks Funds for Religious Charities

Perhaps the most overlooked facet of George Bush's faith-based initiative is the racial aspect of it...

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national

My long-reigning favorite Bushism has now been edged out by a fresh contender I cannot resist. The old fave goes back to Oct. 4, 2001, when Bush, still trying to reassure a shaky nation, said, "We need to counter the shockwave of the evildoer by having individual rate cuts accelerated and by thinking about tax rebates."

Scalia doesn't think the handicapped should have to right to use polling places, government buildings

Bishop Shelby Spong has some thoughts about homosexuality and the Episcopalians

Going after Ashcroft on his campaign malfeasance

the WOC healthy marriage initiative

local

Bar sells mailing list of lawyers to neo-nazis in FL

Plan to refinance California's debt faces uphill battle

CA Senate Democrats Vote To Override Governor's Veto

The anti-rail group investigation in TX is not going as fast as people who are not the guy who's supposed to be investigating would like it to

Teenaged honor student in prison for a long time for child molestation for having consensual sex with teenaged girl

Katharine Harris, scaring Republicans this time

As Harris jetted last week between her Sarasota congressional district and Washington, D.C., saying that she was close to a decision, her actions fueled speculation that the White House -- loathe to relive the bitter 2000 election in a state central to the president's re-election -- was pulling out the stops to convince the GOP star of that election to sit it out until 2006.

Democratic National Committee spokesman Tony Welch has dubbed Harris one of the "best get out the vote weapons" for the Democratic Party and said: "If she gets in, she answers many Democrats’ prayers. She’s an absolute lock for the Republican nomination and an absolute lock to lose the general election."

"She's certainly given every indication that she is running," Jay Timmons, executive director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, said Wednesday after talking to Harris in the afternoon.

friendly op-ed columnist flails

U.S. Rep. Mark Foley said Wednesday he will support Mel Martinez for U.S. Senate, giving the former Housing and Urban Development secretary his first major endorsement in the race to succeed retiring Sen. Bob Graham - Penelas wants Democratic slot, counterintuitively

''He's the one Republican who gives us the best chance to win in November,'' said Foley, noting that White House strategists, including chief advisor Karl Rove, were urging Martinez to get into the race when the moderate Foley was still in the running, in part because Martinez could mobilize critical Hispanic voters.

The former secretary of state has considered entering the race to succeed retiring Democratic Sen. Bob Graham for months. President Bush's political advisers have feared her candidacy would energize angry Democrats and hurt the president's chances of carrying the state, which could be vital to his re-election prospects.

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Mr. O'Neill

While wild-eyed, really really angry, Saddam-loving, America haters are comparing George Bush to Hitler, calm, eminently sensible commentators like Cal Thomas are comparing Paul O'Neill to workplace NRA show-offs

Paul O'Neill, Odd Duck Out of Water

From the start, O'Neill rowed against the Bush team

The rest of the world

WHO is 'failing malaria patients'

Former President Bill Clinton announced yesterday that his foundation had negotiated deals with five major medical companies to steeply discount the price of two crucial diagnostic tests for H.I.V./AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean.

Thousands gather for fairer globalization

war/middle east

Kennedy Hits Bush On War

"I don't agree with Ted Kennedy on a lot of policy issues," [gold-star parent][ Brian Hart said following the speech. "It was difficult for us to be here today, but he's right.

I had the opportunity to hear a talk by Kanan Makiya at MIT last week. Makiya, as you may know, is the former Iraqi dissident who wrote Republic of Fear, a moving account of Saddam's atrocities, and is involved with current events there both as an advisor to the constitutional committee of the IGC, and as the organizer of the Iraq Memory Foundation, an organization dedicated to preserving the memory of Saddam Hussein's atrocities.

Define "plan" - Bush now claims that despite his earlier claims that Clinton did nothing about Saddam, the whole Iraq mess was Clinton's ongoing plan

Bad excuses to go to war even if they were true

Body and Soul: The Latest on Maher Arar

Um, yes, it is bad that soldiers are killing themselves

Powell's shrinking credibility on Iraq

Terrorism & Security

Airport insecurity

GAO Faults 'Inconsistent' Online Security Programs

Adnan Pachachi, the temporary president of Iraq's Governing Council, has appealed to the United Nations to intervene in a showdown between the US-led coalition and the country's leading Shia cleric over the mechanisms for returning Iraq to self-government.

Adnan Pachachi Statement

Iran’s Khamenei Orders Review of Electoral List

Iranian reformists insist all 3,000 disqualified from parliamentary elections be allowed to run

Sharia in Iraq?

A Theocracy in Iraq?

Iraq bus runs over anti-tank mine

The United Nations Security Council reaffirmed on Thursday to help complete Afghanistan's peace process in continuing cooperation with the Afghan transitional government.

British officials say a judicial report will be released January 28 on the apparent suicide of a British scientist believed to be the source of charges of government exaggeration of the threat of Iraqi weapons.

then reporters started getting through to the people who actually know what they're talking about -- like the experts at the International Committee of the Red Cross -- and it became clear the Pentagon hadn't really closed off any options by slapping those big white POW letters on Saddam's back.

9/11 director gave evidence to own inquiry

‘Separation wall’ protests mount

Media and the Right

CBS bans MoveOn ad from Super Bowl

Columbia Journalism Review (from the JSchool that brings you the Pulitzers) launches online ombudssite for election coverage

Josh Marshall wins an award, and someone out there thinks Friedman's not an advocacy columnist

Clinton = Hitler comparisons from the right and other links of note

Salon and Rolling Stone will be working together on political coverage

You've seen the ad, now get the t-shirt - It reads latte-drinking, sushi-eating, volvo-driving, new york times-reading body-piercing, hollywood-loving, left-wing freak show

For all their alleged contemporaneity and stoopid-freshness, right-wing bloggers still have an old-fashioned paleocon attitude toward the Liberal Media. All that distinguishes them from, say, William Safire in his Agnew speechwriting period, is style (or lack thereof), and perhaps class (ditto).

the Very Controversial Lileks is a wanker article

the road to surfdom takes on the execrable Mr. Lileks

This trooper story is so smelly even Lucianne Goldberg is backing off it

Bill O'Reilly is a bad man

Dennis Miller and the nazis

mad cow

U.S. consumer groups on Thursday demanded the federal government release the names of the grocery stores and restaurants that may have purchased meat from a Washington state cow infected with mad cow disease.

Hunt for infected cows leaves out 'slaughter auctions'

Another dairy herd in Washington state was quarantined after at least one animal was linked to a Holstein cow infected with mad cow disease, the U.S. Agriculture Department said on Wednesday.

USDA finds another herdmate of Holstein that had mad cow

'Unfair' bans on U.S. beef mirror actions taken here

Bush seeks $178 mln to update mad cow testing lab

Stuff made from cow

Labor

The Specter of Outsourcing

Mexican Opposition Denounces Bush-Fox Immigration Plan

money

Hey, Dumbledore has an army, why not Krugman?

Debating the tax cuts

US to fight EU trade sanctions threat

Mixed Economic News

to the moon, alice

U.S. space record mixed

Mission to Mars?

What's next for Mars?

Who doesn't support the Mars plan

Mel, Mel, Mel

Mel Gibson's 'Passion' film to be released on 2,000 screens

Tickets in demand as passion builds over Gibson epic

extemporanea

Manhattan man in snowball fight with parked car

More Dean eyecandy

Recipes to raise your core temperature

It's colder in New York than on Mars

Interview with the man who publishes the Kevin and Kell books (and about 85 other things, including Bev Harris' Blackbox files)

Possum seen in midtown (this happens in our yard avery night, and yes, the neighborhood kids think they're huge rats)

Marlowe in modern fiction and Johnny Depp

odd, writerly fascination with death

Braising is an art...

duck!

New Domestic Terror Group Identified: Al-gebra

Republican princess Britney says she really respects marriage, t'was Vegas made her get married to the guy she was sleeping with one night while she was drinking

Internet 'Geek' Image Shattered by New Study

Town persuades prostitutes to wear longer dresses

Uta Hagen, RIP

Ledger and Gyllenhall pair up as gay cowboys

Cool new blog

American Rears Too Wide For Brit Theater

Oak Island Mystery