memeorandum: The Helen Mirren Effect: With Notes on the Diane Keaton Scandal (Alexandra Zacharios-Haight/The Huffington …)

1:30 PM ET, April 8, 2007

Top Items:

al-Sadr calls for attacks on U.S. troops — BAGHDAD - The renegade cleric Muqtada al-Sadr urged Iraqi forces to stop cooperating with the United States and told his guerrilla fighters to concentrate their attacks on American troops rather than Iraqis, according to a statement issued Sunday.

Discussion: NewsHog, New Pairodimes, The Moderate Voice and Brilliant at Breakfast

John McCain / Washington Post:

The War You're Not Reading About — I just returned from my fifth visit to Iraq since 2003 — and my first since Gen. David Petraeus's new strategy has started taking effect. For the first time, our delegation was able to drive, not use helicopters, from the airport to downtown Baghdad.

Discussion: All Spin Zone, TPMCafe blogs, Cliff Schecter, The Democratic Daily and Rising Hegemon

Ed Morrissey / Captain's Quarters:

Sadr: It's On — Moqtada al-Sadr has decided to finally acknowledge that the surge strategy in Baghdad will undermine the basis of his power in Iraq, and has ordered the Mahdi Army to resist American and Iraqi forces trying to put him out of business. In a missive to his forces today …

Steven R. Hurst / Associated Press:
U.S., Iraqi troops fight Shiite militia

Discussion: Hot Air and All Spin Zone

Dr. Steven Taylor / PoliBlog (TM): Sadr Orders Attacks on US Forces

Telegraph:

Buoyant Teheran warns of further kidnappings — Hardliners in the Iranian regime have warned that the seizure of British naval personnel demonstrates that they can make trouble for the West whenever they want to and do so with impunity. — The bullish reaction from Teheran will reinforce …

Discussion: Captain's Quarters, Washington Times, NewsHog, The Arab American News, Belfast Telegraph, Tehran Times, The Corner, The Strata-Sphere and Blue Crab Boulevard

Kathleen Parker / Washington Post:
Mother Of All Blunders

Discussion: View from Iran, Pandagon, The Sideshow and If I Ran the Zoo

Joe Gandelman / The Moderate Voice:
Iran British Sailors' Confession Crisis Will Have Multiple Impacts (UPDATED)

Discussion: Washington Post, BBC, Outside The Beltway and skippy the bush kangaroo

Dahlia Lithwick / Washington Post:

Justice's Holy Hires — Monica Goodling had a problem. As senior counsel to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and Justice Department liaison to the White House, she no longer seemed to know what the truth was. She also must have been increasingly unclear about who her superiors were.

Discussion: Firedoglake, The Moderate Voice, Economist's View, All Spin Zone, Rising Hegemon and Booman Tribune

Dahlia Lithwick / Slate:
Who's the Boss? — HOW PAT ROBERTSON'S LAW SCHOOL IS CHANGING AMERICA.

Discussion: The Impolitic and skippy the bush kangaroo

Michael J.W. Stickings / The Reaction:
Jesus Camp for law students

Discussion: The Moderate Voice

Jamie Holly / Crooks and Liars:

Guess Which One Was Defending Pelosi's Trip?: Hint: It wasn't Lieberman — If you picked w/o the help—Arlen Specter then you are correct. Specter was accurately defending Pelosi's trip to Syria as being her constitutional right and duty, while Joe Lieberman played his usual good role as the Bush mouthpiece condemning her.

Nico / Think Progress:

Lieberman Says Pelosi Syria Visit Was 'Bad For America,' Suggests Syria Was Behind 9/11 — Today on CNN, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) said he "strongly disagrees" with Speaker Nancy Pelosi's (D-CA) bipartisan delegation to Syria, calling it a "mistake" and "bad for the United States of America."

Detroit News:

Plug it in, fire it up, Mr. President — Credit Ford Motor Co. CEO Alan Mulally with saving the leader of the free world from self-immolation. — Mulally told journalists at the New York auto show that he intervened to prevent President Bush from plugging an electrical cord into the hydrogen tank …

Discussion: Bark Bark Woof Woof and CorrenteWire

Mark Steyn / Chicago Sun Times:

Iran's bluff humbles Britain — Watching Tottenham Hotspur fans taking on the Spanish constabulary at a European soccer match the other night, I found myself idly speculating on what might have happened had those Iranian kidnappers made the mistake of seizing 15 hard-boiled football yobs …

Times of London:
Fury as the hostages sell stories

Discussion: EU Referendum, Michael P.F. van der Galiën, On Deadline and Riehl World View

Associated Press:

Pope: 'How much suffering' in the world … VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI decried suffering in much of the world in his Easter Sunday message, lamenting that "nothing positive" is happening in Iraq and voicing worry over unrest and instability in Afghanistan and bloodshed in parts of Africa and Asia.

Alexandra Zacharios-Haight / The Huffington Post:

The Helen Mirren Effect: With Notes on the Diane Keaton Scandal — I knew it! I felt it coming. I could feel it in my bones. — Ideas about about beauty (aesthetics), politics and power are changing. That Helen Mirren won every major acting award this year is not just poetic justice …

Discussion: TalkLeft

Popular Mechanics:

BMW Hydrogen-Powered 7-Series Hybrid: New York Auto Show Test Drive — Traffic outside the Javits Center, site of the New York International Auto Show, is heavy—even by Big Apple standards. That means that you probably could walk across 11th Avenue from the roof of one taxicab to another without seeing asphalt.

Thomas E. Ricks / Washington Post:

Politics Collide With Iraq Realities — There are two Iraq wars being waged, according to military officers on the ground and defense experts: the one fought in the streets of Baghdad, and the war as it is perceived in Washington. — Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, who took over as the top U.S. commander …

Discussion: Matthew Yglesias, The Heretik, The Strata-Sphere and The Democratic Daily

Washington Post:

White House Looked Past Alarms on Kerik — Giuliani, Gonzales Pushed DHS Bid Forward — When former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani urged President Bush to make Bernard B. Kerik the next secretary of homeland security, White House aides knew Kerik as the take-charge top cop from Sept. 11, 2001.

Discussion: Oliver Willis, The Volokh Conspiracy, Think Progress, TalkLeft, The Heretik and Amygdala

George F. Will / Washington Post:

Fred Thompson's Idea of 'Reform' — A man walking along the edge of a cliff slips and plummets toward jagged rocks and crashing surf, barely saving himself by clinging to the cliff's face. But the cliff is too steep to climb, so he shouts, "Is anyone up there?"

Discussion: Bob Krumm, The RBC, Hot Air and Don Surber

Angela K. Brown / Associated Press:

Crawford Peace House hit by strife — CRAWFORD, Texas - With allegations of money mismanagement, threats of court action and some members leaving, a group that has sponsored war protests in President Bush's adopted hometown has been anything but peaceful. — The Crawford Peace House recently lost …