memeorandum: Wave of retaliation sweeps Iraq (Solomon Moore/Los Angeles Times)

Mosques torched after worst Iraq bombing — BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Gunmen bent on revenge burned mosques and homes in a Sunni enclave of Baghdad on Friday as Iraq's leaders pleaded for calm, a day after the worst bomb attack since the U.S. invasion. — Some 30 people were killed, police said …

Discussion: Tammy Bruce, Don Surber, Firedoglake, Riehl World View, THE ASTUTE BLOGGERS and Middle Earth Journal

Edward Wong / New York Times:

Militants Attack Sunnis' Mosques in 2 Iraqi Cities — Defying a government curfew, Shiite militiamen stormed Sunni mosques in Baghdad and a nearby city on Friday, shooting guards and burning down buildings in apparent retaliation for the devastating bombings that killed more than 200 people …

Solomon Moore / Los Angeles Times:

Wave of retaliation sweeps Iraq — Shiite bloc's threatened walkout could lead to the government's collapse. — BAGHDAD — Iraq's civil war worsened Friday as Shiite and Sunni Arabs engaged in retaliatory attacks after coordinated car bombings that killed more than 200 people in a Shiite neighborhood the day before.

Discussion: PBD, Informed Comment and Hullabaloo

Reuters:
Sadr followers threaten to pull out of Iraqi govt

Discussion: The Fourth Rail

Tony Karon / Time:
Iraq's Violence Spins Beyond Anyone's Control

Discussion: Attytood, The Reaction and Hot Air

Elaine Shannon / Time:

Iran and Syria Helping Hizballah Rearm — As Lebanon's government tries to maintain its shaky grip on power, sources tell TIME that Tehran and Damascus are shipping weapons to the militant Shi'ite group — Iran is smuggling weapons through Syria to re-arm Lebanese allies Hizballah …

Discussion: Hot Air and The Belgravia Dispatch

David Ignatius / Washington Post:

The Politics of Murder — A disease is eating away at the Middle East. It afflicts the Syrians, the Iraqis, the Lebanese, even the Israelis. It is the idea that the only political determinant in the Arab world is raw force — the power of physical intimidation. It is politics as assassination.

Discussion: Blue Crab Boulevard and Viking Pundit

Caroline Glick / Jerusalem Post:
Column One: The Gemayel warning

Discussion: Gateway Pundit

Eric Lichtblau / New York Times:

Despite a Year of Ire and Angst, Little Has Changed on Wiretaps — When President Bush went on national television one Saturday morning last December to acknowledge the existence of a secret wiretapping program outside the courts, the fallout was fierce and immediate.

Discussion: The Heretik, TalkLeft, Gun Toting Liberal and Redstate

The Australian:

Islamic fears kill off children's thriller … A LEADING children's publisher has dumped a novel because of political sensitivity over Islamic issues. — Scholastic Australia pulled the plug on the Army of the Pure after booksellers and librarians said they would not stock the adventure thriller …

Discussion: Secular Blasphemy

Little Green Footballs:
Aussie Publisher Cancels Book, Fearing Religion of Peace

Discussion: Andrew Bolt

Jackie Danicki:

I am slightly miffed — Originally uploaded by dynamist. — The kid in the picture above doesn't look very harmful, right? He's reasonably well-dressed, anyway. But actually, he is quite a large fellow, and likes to assault random women with the help of an equally vile friend of his.

Discussion: Blue Crab Boulevard, Dead Guy and Alabama Liberation Front

Matt Stoller / MyDD:

Take Your Time, Speaker Pelosi — I'm getting quite irritated at the immediate reaction among white male liberal DC kewl kidz (and Maureen Dowd) to discern catty motives on the part of Nancy Pelosi. Digby's noted it before, but it's not stopping. Look at the first two paragraphs in an email …

Discussion: TalkLeft

Joe Conason / Salon:

Pelosi's compulsion — Whatever urge impels Nancy Pelosi to consider replacing Jane Harman with Alcee Hastings as chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence must be extraordinarily powerful. Some say that Speaker-elect Pelosi harbors a personal grudge against her fellow Californian …

Discussion: Talking Points Memo, Redstate and GINA COBB

Tricia Bishop / Chicago Tribune:

Stores revert to 'Merry Christmas' — Wal-Mart leads way, backing off from 'happy holidays' — Christmas is back at Wal-Mart - not that it really ever left. — After testing out a generic, yet all-inclusive, "happy holidays" theme last year, the nation's largest retailer announced …

Discussion: protein wisdom

Peggy Noonan / Opinion Journal:

What Grandma Would Say — We don't need to solve the immigration problem forever. We need to solve it now. — It is July 10, 1858, a Saturday evening, and Lincoln is speaking in Chicago. The night before his opponent in their race for the U.S. Senate, Stephen Douglas …

Discussion: JunkYardBlog, Daily Pundit, Blue Crab Boulevard and Solomonia

Big Tent Democrat / TalkLeft:

FL-13: Who Is To Blame? — This will be an unpopular post with my Democratic brethren. It is about who is to blame for frustrating the voters' intent in the House race in Florida's 13th Congressional district (Katherine Harris's old seat). While it seems absolutely clear most voters wanted …

Discussion: The Carpetbagger Report, DownWithTyranny!, JoeTrippi.com and Prairie Weather

Jane Hamsher / Firedoglake:

Dig That Crazy Beat, Daddy-O! — Clearly still smarting from the cancellation of the Mel Torme Show or something, our Red State Brethren are all atwitter after old straight people in Arizona defeated a ban on gay marriage because they wanted to protect their right of "shacking up" …

Discussion: Alabama Liberation Front