memeorandum: Going to Church on Christmas: A Vanishing Tradition (Amy Sullivan/Time)

Bush Revokes Pardon Of GOP Donors' Relative — President Bush took the remarkable step yesterday of reversing a pardon that he granted the day before to a Brooklyn, N.Y., real estate developer, whose relatives contributed more than $40,000 to Republicans before his clemency petition was filed with the White House.

Discussion: Newsday, Think Progress, Spin Cycle, Firedoglake, NY Daily News, Minnesota Independent, TIME.com, Associated Press, Fox News and Los Angeles Times

P.S. Ruckman, Jr / PARDON POWER:

On the Revocation of Pardons — “Experts said they knew of no other instance in which a presidential pardon had been revoked. They said it was not clear whether Bush was legally allowed to do so.” - Chicago Tribune, December 25, 2008 — One can hardly blame the Tribune for printing this statement.

Discussion: Talking Points Memo and Open Left

New York Times:

Harold Pinter, Nobel-Winning Playwright, Dies at 78 — Harold Pinter, the British playwright whose gifts for finding the ominous in the everyday and the noise within silence made him the most influential and imitated dramatist of his generation, died on Wednesday. He was 78 and lived in London.

Discussion: Gawker, Newshoggers.com, Connecting.the.Dots and Gothamist

Associated Press:

Iraq Declares Christmas an Official Holiday for First Year — BAGHDAD — Iraq's Christians, a small minority in the overwhelmingly Muslim country, quietly celebrated Christmas on Thursday with a present from the government, which declared it an official holiday for the first time.

Discussion: The Jawa Report, Alan Colmes' Liberaland, Yahoo! News, Gateway Pundit, Scared Monkeys, The Moderate Voice, TigerHawk, Associated Press, Liberal Values and Don Surber

Paul Richter / Los Angeles Times:

Bush a catalyst in America's declining influence — The president oversaw a period of eroding economic and political power, in which the rise of China, India and others was a major factor, but assisted by an aversion to him and his policies. — Reporting from Washington …

Discussion: ATTACKERMAN and The Washington Independent

CNN:

Singer, actress Eartha Kitt dies at 81 — (CNN) — Singer and actress Eartha Kitt has died, her publicist, Patty Freedman, told CNN on Thursday. — Kitt, 81, died in New York, where she was being treated for colon cancer, Freedman said. Her daughter, Kitt Shapiro, was by her side.

Discussion: Jack & Jill Politics, skippy the bush kangaroo, Reuters, BBC, Gothamist and Scared Monkeys

Kevin Sack / New York Times:

Expansion of Clinics Shapes a Bush Legacy — NASHVILLE — Although the number of uninsured and the cost of coverage have ballooned under his watch, President Bush leaves office with a health care legacy in bricks and mortar: he has doubled federal financing for community health centers …

Heather Burke / Bloomberg:

Holiday Sales in U.S. Fell as Much as 4%, SpendingPulse Says — A A A — Dec. 25 (Bloomberg) — U.S. retail sales fell as much as 4 percent this holiday season as consumers limited purchases to necessities and cut back on clothing, electronics and jewelry, according to SpendingPulse.

Carol E. Lee / The Politico:

Joe and Jill feed the homeless — Vice President-elect Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, slipped on aprons Wednesday afternoon to serve meatloaf to a few hundred homeless people at a soup kitchen in Wilmington, Del. — Biden told a local news station that the long lines outside …

Discussion: TIME.com and Don Surber

Jerusalem Post:

8 Katyusha rockets defused in Lebanon — The Lebanese army on Thursday discovered and defused eight Katyusha rockets that had been placed near the southern town of Nakoura and were about to be fired at Israel. — The 107-millimeter projectiles were fitted with timers and were defused …

Discussion: A Blog For All and Israel Matzav

Oliver Janney / CNN:

Blog ‘miracle’ saves Christmas for hard-luck family — (CNN) — A family facing foreclosure is anything but a unique story in these troubled economic times. — But this is a happier story of one family whose financial ruin was averted by the actions of a friend, the compassion of strangers …

Discussion: Liberty Street

Selim Algar / New York Post:

BARACK NAME LOSES ‘CLASS’ ON LI — SCHOOL NIXES CHANGE TO ‘OBAMA ELEMENTARY’ — They said NO-bama. — A proposal to change the name of a Long Island public school to Barack Obama Elementary was scrapped this week after running into fierce public opposition.

Discussion: Don Surber and A Blog For All