“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Glenn Greenwald: What WikiLeaks revealed to the world in 2010

Throughout this year I’ve devoted substantial attention to WikiLeaks, particularly in the last four weeks as calls for its destruction intensified.  To understand why I’ve done so, and to see what motivates the increasing devotion of the U.S. Government and those influened by it to destroying that organization, it’s well worth reviewing exactly what WikiLeaks exposed to the world just in the last year:  the breadth of the corruption, deceit, brutality and criminality on the part of the world’s most powerful factions.

As revealing as the disclosures themselves are, the reactions to them have been equally revealing.  The vast bulk of the outrage has been devoted not to the crimes that have been exposed but rather to those who exposed them:  WikiLeaks and (allegedly) Bradley Manning.  A consensus quickly emerged in the political and media class that they are Evil Villains who must be severely punished, while those responsible for the acts they revealed are guilty of nothing.  That reaction has not been weakened at all even by the Pentagon’s own admission that, in stark contrast to its own actions, there is no evidence — zero — that any of WikiLeaks’ actions has caused even a single death.  Meanwhile, the American establishment media — even in the face of all these revelations — continues to insist on the contradictory, Orwellian platitudes that (a) there is Nothing NewTM in anything disclosed by WikiLeaks and (b) WikiLeaks has done Grave Harm to American National SecurityTM through its disclosures.

Gail Collins: The Tannenbaum Chronicles

This year, my favorite Christmas story involves Rachel Maddow’s mother. “A friend gave her a remote control for the Christmas tree,” said Maddow. It was the best present ever, liberation from a lifetime of crawling under the tree every morning and night to put in or pull out the plug.

And it turned Maddow’s mom into a combination Magi and missionary. She bought a slew of remotes and distributed them throughout the neighborhood like special-recipe cookies, along with instructions on exactly how to make them work.

The friend came to New York for the holidays with the Maddow family. For presents, she is giving everybody a Christmas tree in a box.

Another step forward for Christmas tree culture.

Charles M. Blow: Suffer the Little Children

As we celebrate this Christmas with the sound of tiny feet rushing toward a tree to rip open presents, let’s take a moment to consider the children less fortunate – the growing number who live in poverty in this country.

According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, 42 percent of American children live in low-income homes and about a fifth live in poverty. It gets worse. The number of children living in poverty has risen 33 percent since 2000. For perspective, the child population of the country over all increased by only about 3 percent over that time. And, according to a 2007 Unicef report on child poverty, the U.S. ranked last among 24 wealthy countries.

This is a national disgrace.

Yet the reaction to this issue in some quarters is still tangled in class and race: no more welfare to black and brown people who’ve made poor choices and haven’t got the gumption to work their way out of them. The truth is, neither the problem nor the solutions are that simple.

Yes, the percentage of blacks, Hispanics and American Indians living in low-income homes is about twice that of whites and Asians. This raises unpleasant cultural questions that must be addressed. But that’s not the whole story. Despite the imbalance, white children are still the largest group of low-income children.

Johann Hari: The under-appreciated heroes of 2010

Who did we under-appreciate in 2010? In the endless whirr of 24/7 corporate news, the people who actually make a difference are often trampled in the stampede to the next forgettable news-nugget like Lady Gaga’s meat-dress. So in the final moments of this year, let’s look at a few people who deserved more of our attention.

Bob Herbert: Thinking of Aretha

Nineteen sixty-seven was a tough year in many respects – riots, protests, an unwinnable war – but I can’t think of it without thinking of the glory of Aretha Franklin, a woman in her mid-20s, introverted and somewhat shy, who sang soul and rock ‘n’ roll with the power and beauty of a heavenly choir.

Newark and Detroit went up in flames in 1967, and neither city was ever to recover. Muhammad Ali, a perfect physical specimen in his absolute athletic prime, was convicted of dodging the draft and stripped of his world heavyweight championship. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. endured a hurricane of criticism when he came out publicly against the war in Vietnam and called the United States government “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.”

If you were lucky, you could close the door on the din, at least for a little while, and reach for the record album with the head and shoulder shot of Aretha positioned at a precarious angle on the cover. The album was called “I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You,” and if you listened closely, if you paid attention, it would just thrill you, take you to a place of exquisite human feeling. A region of laughter and tears. Of love and joyous possibilities.

David Sirota: Faces of Economic Death

If you’ve turned on the tube these last few weeks, you’ve probably been a collateral casualty of the biggest televisual war of attrition in recent memory. No, I’m not talking about the scripted skirmishes between cable channels, nor am I referring to the Battle of Zombie Talking Points that ate most of our brains during the election. I’m talking about the now never-ending throwdown between two of the most in-your-face salespeople our mediascape has ever manufactured: Geico’s unnamed gecko and Progressive Insurance’s chipper saleswoman, Flo.

No doubt, you know them both-the green lizard’s smile and cockney accent feign earnestness while the aproned Flo goes for the same effect through the saccharine enthusiasm of an “Office Space” character. It’s mildly cute, but don’t be fooled: As the best-known avatars of the insurance industry, these two are aggressively competing for our cash through re-education-camp levels of repetition, hoping to harass us into buying their product.

Certainly, there’s nothing new about hard sells from TV charlatans. But these two represent something different, something apocalyptic-and I say that not merely because their maddening ubiquity has driven me to the brink of insanity. I say it because they are peddling the kind of commodity that offers little tangible worth, waging a fight that promises no valuable innovation, and representing a larger insurance and finance sector that’s hollowing out our economy.

John Nichols: Christmas, Congress and the Times That Try Men’s Souls

It would appear that several conservative Republican senators missed the reading from the Book of Matthew that goes: “Judge not, that ye be not judged.”

After learning that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nevada, would be keeping the chamber in session in the days leading up to Christmas, with an eye toward securing passage of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), these Republican senators did not react by declaring their pride at being able to further the mission of the Prince of Peace by limiting the likelihood of nuclear war.

Instead, they grumbled that any Senate Majority Leader who messed with their Holiday shopping schedules must be a very poor Christian indeed.

Nicholas Jahr: Award Recognizes Uncompromising Change-Makers

As the freshly shellacked president cuts deals with a triumphant Republican Party, the annual Puffin/Nation Prize for Creative Citizenship was awarded to two uncompromising activists: environmentalist Bill McKibben and Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards.

Awarded annually for the last decade by the Nation Institute and the Puffin Foundation, this is the first time the prize has been given to two recipients.

“The times dictated that we’ve got to fight back,” says Gladys Rosenstein, who runs the Puffin Foundation with her husband Perry. Their choices of who to support this year were dictated by the causes under attack: the fight for women’s rights and against global warming. When it comes to the latter, Gladys notes, “they seem to think it’s a farce.”

Michelle Chen: Global Recession Turns Top-Tier Economies Upside Down

This year, the big list of who’s naughty and nice won’t come from Santa. The International Labour Organization has published its Global Wage Report 2010/11. It’s another reminder that workers should expect no glad tidings in the coming year as the recession continues to snowball around the globe.

It wasn’t all bad news. Wages are generally on an upward trendline. But in its analysis of national wage data sampled from 115 countries and territories, the ILO reports:

   growth in average monthly wages slowed from 2.8 per cent in 2007, on the eve of the crisis, to 1.5 per cent in 2008 and 1.6 per cent in 2009. Excluding China from the aggregate, the global average wage growth drops to 0.8 in 2008 and 0.7 in 2009….

   In particular… since the mid-1990s the proportion of people on low pay – defined as less than two-thirds of median wage – has increased in more than two-thirds of countries with available data.

(10 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

December 22, 2010

Channel 4 News

The number of drone strikes in Pakistan, believed to be led by the CIA, has doubled under the Obama administration in 2010 – leading to hundreds of deaths. Channel 4 News maps a secret war.

In the last 12 months there have been at least 113 attacks by secret US drones in Pakistan‘s mountainous Waziristan region.

It is double the number of strikes in 2009, which itself saw a dramatic spike, bringing the total number of attacks under President Obama to an estimated figure of 166. That marks an increase of nearly 300 per cent compared with the last four years of the Bush presidency.

In the sights of these unmanned spy planes (UAVs) are Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders held responsible for unrest and attacks on coalition troops in the long-running Afghanistan war.

As a result of the 2010 drone surge, there have been 500-900 known deaths. Of these, media reports suggest the majority were militant fighters.

But Channel 4 News has found that women and children – some with alleged links to militants – have also perished while the sheer number of drone flights have caused “panic and terror” among ordinary tribespeople. It is clear that a changing strategy has often put villages rather than remote hideouts in the firing line.

In a recent study by the Campaign for Innocent Victims of Conflict (CIVIC), report author Christopher Rogers said: “It’s almost certain that US drone strikes are causing more civilian casualties than the US has thus far admitted”.

December 23, 2010

For CIA drone warriors, the future is death

By Pepe Escobar

Forget the iPad; the ultimate icon of fetishized commodity is the drone. Israelis do it – and sell them like hot cakes. Mexicans do it – to patrol their side of the border. Brazilians wanna do it – to patrol the Rio favelas. Saudis wanna do it. Uzbeks wanna do it. Everybody’s singing: Let’s do it. Let’s fall in love (with the drone).

Furthermore, abandon all hope those who enter (the doors of misperception): Afghanistan is now officially just a lowly, troop-infested sideshow to the AfPak war. The real thing is an illegal drone war against Pakistan. Viva Richard Nixon. As much as Tricky Dick annexed Cambodia to the Vietnam War, the Barack Obama administration pulled a Nixon regarding Pakistan. And the great thing is that no one needs another WikiLeaks “dump” to know this. It’s out there in the open.

Tricky Dick’s tricks paved the way to Year Zero for the Khmer Rouge. Obama’s throw of the dice may be paving the way to a Year Zero for the Pashtun brotherhood. The 16-agency US intelligence establishment says the Afghan adventure is doomed. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is somewhat gloomy. But the surge-addicted White House – in a stark reminder of those George W Bush-era reports about Iraq – says it’s all swell (Taliban “momentum has been arrested in much of the country”). Pentagon supremo Robert Gates says Washington now controls more Afghan territory than a year ago; maybe in terms of Kabul shopping malls – and that’s already a stretch.

Taliban momentum, anyway, is just an afterthought. What matters for the White House is to smash (“significant progress”) al-Qaeda, allegedly holed up not in Afghanistan but in Pakistan’s tribal areas. Take them Pakistani Talibs out from the air, with the CIA playing Ride of the Valkyries, just like in an orgiastic Facebook-friendly remix of Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now, with all those US Marine tanks rolling along in Helmand province offering a cute counterpart. I love the smell of a burning Talib in the morning. Makes me think of … re-election.

But what about collateral damage? Tough guys of the “real men go to Tehran” type say this is for sissies (the New America Foundation says around a third of drone deaths are civilians, but that’s hugely underestimated, according to Pakistani sources.) Blowback, anyway, is guaranteed to last until the 22nd century.

[snip]

The TAPI inter-government agreement was finally signed in mid-December. Make no mistake; this is Washington in overdrive. The Washington-backed Asian Development Bank is to come up with the bulk of the $7.6 billion (and counting) financial package. The 2,000 kilometer-long TAPI – to be built by an international consortium – should snake through a very dodgy 735 kilometers of Afghanistan and 800 kilometers of Pakistan.

[snip]

And here’s where The Year of the Drone merges with what the late, great deconstructionist Jacques Lacan would qualify as “the unsayable”: the invisible, dangerous liaisons between the “war on terror” and the energy war, as in the topography of the war on terror matching all the key 21st-century sources of energy from the Middle East to Central Asia.



[snip]

TAPI theoretically should be finished by 2014. Surprise! That’s exactly the deadline year (for now …) for American troops to exit Afghanistan. No one will be exiting anything. Finally, the whole AfPak imbroglio will be revealed for what it is; a Pipelineistan gambit.

Meanwhile, enjoy the Year of the Drone. And while we’re at it, here’s some breaking news. The 2011 Pentagon/NATO strategy for AfPak is already established: wait for the Taliban spring/summer offensive to see where they’re at. And then drone them to death. Call it Drone Eye for the Bad Guy.

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This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

December 25 is the 359th day of the year (360th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are six days remaining until the end of the year. This day is commonly known as Christmas Day.

On this day in 1818, the first performance of “Silent Night” takes place in the church of St. Nikolaus in Oberndorf, Austria.

The original lyrics of the song Stille Nacht were written in Austria by the priest Father Joseph Mohr and the melody was composed by the Austrian headmaster Franz Xaver Gruber. In 1859, John Freeman Young (second Bishop, Episcopal Diocese of Florida) published the English translation that is most frequently sung today. The version of the melody that is generally sung today differs slightly (particularly in the final strain) from Gruber’s original, which was a sprightly, dance-like tune in 6/8, as opposed to the slow, meditative lullaby version generally sung today. Today, the lyrics and melody are in the public domain.

 800 – Coronation of Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor, in Rome.

1000 – The foundation of the Kingdom of Hungary: Hungary is established as a Christian kingdom by Stephen I of Hungary.

1066 – William the Conqueror is crowned king of England, at Westminster Abbey, London.

1100 – Baldwin of Boulogne is crowned the first King of Jerusalem in the Church of the Nativity.

1130 – Count Roger II of Sicily is crowned the first King of Sicily.

1261 – John IV Lascaris of the restored Eastern Roman Empire is deposed and blinded by orders of his co-ruler Michael VIII Palaeologus.

1553 – Battle of Tucapel: Mapuche rebels under Lautaro defeats the Spanish conquistadors and executes the governor of Chile, Pedro de Valdivia.

1599 – The city of Natal, Brazil is founded.

1643 – Christmas Island found and named by Captain William Mynors of the East India Company vessel, the Royal Mary.

1776 – George Washington and his army cross the Delaware River to attack the Kingdom of Great Britain’s Hessian mercenaries in Trenton, New Jersey.

1818 – The first performance of “Silent Night” takes place in the church of St. Nikolaus in Oberndorf, Austria.

1826 – The Eggnog Riot at the United States Military Academy concludes after beginning the previous evening.

1837 – Battle of Lake Okeechobee: United States forces defeat Seminole Native Americans.

1868 – U.S. President Andrew Johnson grants unconditional pardon to all Civil War Confederate soldiers.

1914 – World War I: Known as the Christmas truce, German and British troops on the Western Front temporarily cease fire.

1926 – Emperor Taisho of Japan dies. His son, Prince Hirohito succeeds him as Emperor Showa.

1927 – The Vietnamese Nationalist Party is founded.

1932 – A magnitude 7.6 earthquake in Gansu, China kills 275 people.

1941 – Admiral Chester W Nimitz arrives at Pearl Harbor to assume command of the U.S. Pacific Fleet.

1941 – World War II: Battle of Hong Kong ends, beginning the Japanese Occupation of Hong Kong.

1946 – The first in Europe artificial, self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction was initiated within Soviet nuclear reactor F-1.

1947 – The Constitution of the Republic of China goes into effect.

1950 – The Stone of Scone, traditional coronation stone of British monarchs, is taken from Westminster Abbey by Scottish nationalist students. It later turns up in Scotland on April 11, 1951.

1963 – Turkish Cypriot Bayrak Radio begins transmitting in Cyprus after Turkish Cypriots are forcibly excluded from Cyprus Broadcasting Corporation.

1965 – The Yemeni Nasserite Unionist People’s Organisation is founded in Taiz

1968 – Apollo program: Apollo 8 performs the very first successful Trans Earth Injection (TEI) maneouver, sending the crew and spacecraft on a trajectory back to Earth from Lunar orbit.

1968 – 42 Dalits are burned alive in Kilavenmani village, Tamil Nadu, India, a retaliation for a campaign for higher wages by Dalit labourers.

1974 – Cyclone Tracy devastates Darwin, Northern Territory Australia.

1974 – Marshall Fields drives a vehicle through the gates of the White House, resulting in a four-hour standoff.

1977 – Prime Minister of Israel Menachem Begin meets in Egypt with President of Egypt, Anwar Sadat.

1989 – Nicolae Ceausescu, former communist dictator of Romania and his wife Elena are condemned to death and executed under a wide range of charges.

1990 – The first successful trial run of the system which would become the World Wide Web.

1991 – Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as president of the Soviet Union (the union itself is dissolved the next day). Ukraine’s referendum is finalized and Ukraine officially leaves the Soviet Union.

2000 – Russian President Vladimir Putin signs a bill into law that officially establishes a new National Anthem of Russia, with music adopted from the anthem of the Soviet Union that was composed by Alexander Vasilyevich Alexandrov.

2003 – The ill-fated Beagle 2 probe, released from the Mars Express Spacecraft on December 19, disappears shortly before its scheduled landing.

2004 – Cassini orbiter releases Huygens probe which successfully landed on Saturn’s moon Titan on January 14, 2005.

2007 – A tiger at the San Francisco Zoo escapes from its enclosure and attacks three people, killing one.

2009 – Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab unsuccessfully attempts a terrorist attack against the US while on board a flight to Detroit Metro Airport Northwest Airlines Flight 253

Holidays and observances

   * Christian Feast Day:

         o Anastasia of Sirmium (Catholic Church)

         o December 25(Eastern Orthodox liturgics)

   * Christmas Day, Christian holiday commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ. (International)

   * Constitution Day (Taiwan)

   * Malkh-Festival (Nakh peoples of Chechenya and Ingushetia)

   * Quaid-e-Azam’s Day (Pakistan)

   * The first day of the Cali Fair (Cali)

I’ll Play Scrooge To Your Grinch



And Don’t For Get To Hand Over All The Damn Money

Daniel J. Langevin was 35, mentally ill and broke. He had been living in psychiatric institutions on and off since his early 20s.

A friend who visited him at the Rochester Psychiatric Center in February 1995 remembered that Mr. Langevin had pain in his jaw, eye and face that was not getting much attention from the staff. A week later, he was discovered unconscious, with a near-fatal infection spreading to his brain and other organs.

Mr. Langevin sued New York State, which operates the hospital, and probably would have won a sizable award.

Dissent Is Allowed as Long As You Don’t Offer Any Dissent



Keep Quite Or It’s Off To Prison  

CARACAS, Venezuela – The National Assembly has approved a sweeping set of laws that impose penalties for spreading political dissent on the Internet, grant decree powers to President Hugo Chávez for 18 months and prevent legislators from breaking with his political movement.Despite an outcry here by critics, pro-Chávez lawmakers rapidly approved the measures in the closing weeks of the year, before a less pliant legislature convenes next month with a bigger opposition presence.

I Really Really Really Am President

The West African regional bloc Ecowas has told incumbent Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo to stand down or expect to face “legitimate force”.

If You Don’t Believe Me I’ll Stomp My Feet and Hold My Breath

The statement came at the end of emergency talks on the crisis sparked by a disputed election last month.

The 15-member bloc and other international bodies have recognised his rival Alassane Ouattara as winner.

The Ivory Coast’s Constitutional Council says Mr Gbagbo was elected, citing vote-rigging in some areas.

The election was meant to unite the country after a civil war in 2002 split the world’s largest cocoa producer in two.

On Thursday state television, one of the key elements keeping Mr Gbagbo in power, was taken off the air in areas outside Abidjan.

With Elbows Swinging And Credit Cards Flying



Shoppers Race Into Christmas    

On the last day day of shopping before Christmas, Cornell Lewis had an armful of bags packed with leather boots, watches and a remote-controlled helicopter set – mostly gifts for his nieces and nephews.

But Lewis, 44, didn’t get these gifts at a mall, like many shoppers on Christmas Eve. Indeed, he went to a place without sprawling malls – downtown Los Angeles. There, he joined throngs of lively gift-givers going shop to shop in Chinatown and the toy district.

“You can get the same items here for half the price,” said Lewis, a retail manager who lives in Hollywood.

Jesus Doesn’t Want Me On The Radio

 

But, The Pope Doesn’t Mind

Pope Benedict’s Christmas message for the UK was broadcast as the Thought for the Day on Radio 4’s Today programme.

He said he prayed for the sick and elderly and “those who are going through any form of hardship”.

In his message, he recalled his recent UK visit with “great fondness” and said he was glad to greet listeners again.

Emerging Superpower Can’t Produce Weapons  



So, Others Do It For Them. Isn’t That Wonderful

MOSCOW – The Moscow Machine-Building Enterprise Salyut on the east side of town has put up a massive Soviet-style poster advertising its need for skilled workers. The New Year’s party at the Chernyshev plant in a northwest suburb featured ballet dancers twirling on the stage of its Soviet-era Palace of Culture.

The reason for the economic and seasonal cheer is that these factories produce fighter-jet engines for a wealthy and voracious customer: China. After years of trying, Chinese engineers still can’t make a reliable engine for a military plane.

Ho, ho, ho.

The box may seem empty but the message is clear-

Play Santa again and I’ll kill you next year

New Tools.  Previous entries.  Instant gratification-

Zap2it TV Listings, Yahoo TV Listings

This edition good until 6 pm.  Now until 11 pm.  See you tomorrow at 6 am!  Merry ek’s mas.

6 am

• Animal Planet– Puppy Bowl IV
• ESPN– Sports Center marathon until Noon (the last 2 hours are live)
• MSNBC– 24 Hours of Prison Porn
• Nick– Full House Holiday Special
• TBS– Did I mention 25 hours of A Christmas Story? (until 8 pm)
• Turner Classic– Little Women

6:30 am

• Nick– Full House Holiday Special (a different one)

7 am

• ABC Family– Flintstone Christmas
• FX– Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who! x 6 until 7 pm
• History– Challenger Tank
• Travel– Man v. Food marathon until 4 am (thank goodness)

7:30 am

• Nick– Fairly OddParents
• Toon– Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends Christmas Special: A Lost Claus

8 am

• ABC Family– Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town
• History– Da Vinci
• Turner Classic– The Shop Around the Corner

8:30 am

• Bravo– Real Housewives marathon until 5:30 pm
• Nick– Spongebob until 10 am

9 am

• ABC Family– The Year Without a Santa Claus
• Disney– Phineas and Ferb Christmas Vacation
• Discovery– Dirty Jobs Reindeer Farmer
• History– Bible Conspiracy Theory marathon until 4 am
• National Geographic– Fishing.  No.  Seriously.  Until 3 am.
• Sci Fi– Sea Snakes
• Spike– Star Wars (Triple Feature x 2)
• TLC– Lights! marathon until 1 pm

10 am

• ABC Family– Miracle on 34th Street
• AMC– Scrooged marathon until 6 am (this will be all TheMomCat will be watching)
• Disney– The Ultimate Christmas Present
• Discovery– Mythbusters marathon until 3 am (actually my favorite holiday programming)
• Turner Classic– Susan Slept Here

10:30 am

• Comedy– Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure
• E!– The Soup

11 am

• Animal Planet– Cats and Dogs and Pets 101 until 8 pm
• Lifetime– 12 Men of Christmas
• Sci Fi– Frankenfish
• Toon– Olive, the Other Reindeer
• USA– National Treasure (Double Feature)

11:30 am

• Disney– Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas
• Nick– Fairly OddParents
• Turner Classic– A Christmas Carol

Noon

• ABC– Christmas Day Parade
• ESPN– Hoopies, Bulls @ Knicks
• ESPN2– Timbersports! marathon until 2 pm
• Spike– The Empire Strikes Back
• Style– When A Man Loves A Woman
• TNT– King Kong (not the good 1933 version or even the less good 1976 version)

12:30 pm

• ABC Family– Santa Buddies
• Comedy– Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle
• Oxygen– Rumor Has It

1 pm

• Lifetime– The Christmas Hope
• Sci Fi– Eye of the Beast
• Turner Classic– Ben-Hur
• TLC– Cakes marathon until 8 pm

1:30 pm

• USA– National Treasure: Book of Secrets

2 pm

• Nick– Merry Christmas, Drake & Josh

2:30 pm

• ABC– Hoopies, Celtics @ Magic
• ABC Family– The Santa Clause
• Comedy– Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey
• Oxygen– Beaches
• TNT– The Librarian: Quest for the Spear (Triple Feature)

3 pm

• Lifetime– The Christmas Blessing
• Sci Fi– Lake Placid 2
• Spike– Return of the Jedi

3:30 pm

• Disney– Phineas and Ferb with Micky’s Once and Twice Upon a Christmas until 7 pm

4 pm

• NBC– Skating
• E!– Knocked Up
• MTV– That ’70s Show marathon until 8 pm
• USA– Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins

4:30 pm

• ABC Familty– Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
• Comedy– Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure
• Nick– Curious George
• TNT– The Librarian: Return to King Solomon’s Mines

5 pm

• ABC– Hoopies, Heat @ Lakers
• Lifetime– Comfort and Joy
• Oxygen– Something’s Gotta Give
• Sci Fi– Malibu Shark Attack
• Turner Classic– King of Kings
• TV Land– Independence Day
• VH1– Grease

6 pm

• Bravo– House marathon until 2 am
• TNT– The Librarian: Curse of the Judas Chalice
• USA– The Pacifier
• Vs.– Rocky II

6:30 pm

• Spike– Star Wars (Triple Feature)

7 pm

• ABC Family– Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas x 2
• Comedy– Employee of the Month
• FX– Kung Fu Panda
• Lifetime– Undercover Christmas
• Sci Fi– Shark Swarm (4 hours)

7:30 pm

• ESPN2– College Hoopies, Hawaiian Airlines Diamond Head Classic, Consolation Game
• VH1– Pretty In Pink

8 pm

• ABC– Transformers
• E!– Pride & Prejudice
• ESPN– Nuggets @ Thunder
• Food– Basically a Chopped marathon with some Iron Chef Americas until 4 am
• Oxygen– Titanic
• TBS– The Wizard of Oz
• Turner Classic– The Lion in Winter
• TLC– Cake Boss marathon until 2 am
• TNT– The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
• USA– Elf x 2 until 11 pm

8:30 pm

• Disney– Phineas and Ferb Christmas Vacation
• Vs.– Rocky III

9 pm

• Lifetime– A Diva’s Christmas Carol

9:30 pm

• Comedy– The Girl Next Door
• ESPN2– College Hoopies, Hawaiian Airlines Diamond Head Classic, Finals
• Spike– The Empire Strikes Back

10 pm

• Animal Planet– Bad Dog! (Series Premier repeat)
• TBS– Surviving Christmas

10:30 pm

• ESPN– Hoopies, Blazers @ Warriors
• Turner Classic– Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
• Vs.– Rocky IV

11 pm

• E!– The Soup
• FX– Archer marathon until 4 am mostly with some Two and a Half Men
• Oxygen– Ocean’s Twelve
• Sci Fi– Sea Beast
• USA– Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins (again)

11:30 pm

• NBC– SNL 10/23
• TNT– The Mummy Returns

Midnight

• ABC Family– Ernest Saves Christmas
• Animal Planet– Bad Dog! (Series Premier repeat)
• Comedy– American Virgin
• Style– When A Man Loves A Woman

12:30 am

• Disney– Phineas and Ferb Christmas Vacation and marathon until 2:30 am
• Spike– Return of the Jedi
• Vs.– Rocky II

1 am

• Sci Fi– Snakehead Terror
• TBS– My Cousin Vinny
• Turner Classic– Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

1:30 am

• USA– [Hairspray ]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hairspray_%281988_film%29 (the good original version)

2 am

• Comedy– American Pie Presents: The Book of Love
• E!– The Soup
• ESPN2– Hoopies, Celtics @ Magic

2:30 am

• Disney– The Ultimate Christmas Present

3 am

• Sci Fi– Spring Break Shark Attack
• Turner Classic– Ordinary People
• Toon– GitS: SAC 2nd Gig, Poker Face (Episode 14)

3:30 am

• ESPN– Hoopies, Bulls @ Knicks
• TBS– Surviving Christmas
• Toon– GitS: SAC 2nd Gig, Pat (Episode 15)

4 am

• ESPN2– Hoopies, Heat @ Lakers

5 am

• Turner Classic– Indiscretion of an American Wife

From all of us at The Stars Hollow Gazette, to you and yours.

Open Thread

I was going to write on a completely different topic, but decided that some Christmas music would be appropriate, since I often write about music here.  Most of the songs are either from my childhood or from comparatively long ago.  I have no “new” favorite Christmas songs.

What I intend to impart is just this:  Christmas is a legal holiday in the United States, but is also a time for people of any, or no, faith to come together and celebrate family and friends.  I care not a whit if you are Jewish, Wiccan, Muslim, Sikh, Christian, Shinto, Taoist, Buddhist, a believer in Confucius, or any other religion, or none at all.

In the United States, Christmas is recognized officially, for good or ill.  If all of the great religious can agree about anything, it is good will towards everyone.  With this in mind, please enjoy with me a bit of music that sort of makes the season for me.

Most of these are either of Christian tradition or more modern.  Once again, I have no prejudice towards any other faiths, but was raised in the Christian tradition, so that forms a large amount of my frame of reference.  I do believe that the words of Jesus that involve generosity, love for others, and forgiveness are universal if we, as decent people, desire to be better.  He was just one of many who advocated that message.

Of course, I have to lead with The Who.  This little gem is embedded in Tommy, and must might be one of the bestest (I spelt that intentionally) Christmas songs ever.  Here is a little personal history.

For many years we would go back to our parents’ houses to celebrate Christmas.  Many times I would write the words on my mum’s refrigerator board, and she always thought that it was appropriate.  Listen very closely because not only is the music, but the lyrics are quite brilliant.

This is interesting because it overlays the music from the original album from 1969 to the motion picture from 1975.  Please do not pay much attention to the sparkling movie things.  The original music is the better.

You know that I, as the most dedicated fan of The Who, keep that as my favorite Christmas song.

It might bowl everyone here over to know that one of my other favorite performers is Maurice Chevalier.  He was a great actor, and not a bad singer.  I love this song, Joly old St-Nicholas.

You might also be surprised to know that I actually like at least one country artist.  Yes, the great Willie Nelson is on my list of favorites.  I really like Pretty Paper.  Please enjoy it with me.  It has become more poignant to me lately.

Whether or not you like him, Andy Williams could SING!  His rendition of O Holy Night is actually quite good, even if lip synced.  Here is is.

Williams and his wife at the time, Claudine Longet, pretty much were the big stars of the Christmas season on TeeVee in the 1960s.  They drifted apart and she fell in with what turned out to be a rough crowd.  She was accused of homicide years later.  Here they are in better days.  This is not really one of my favorite songs, but is representative of that era on TeeVee at Christmas.

Now, these are more uplifting.  The Beach Boys were good!  In the early 1960s, they were Keith Moon’s favorite band.

This one is even more close to my heart.

How about a very young David Bowie and a very old Bing Crosby?  I have seen this one for years, and still can not figure out why they made it.  Regardless, it is pretty good.

Even the Star Trek folks got into it, well not really, but this is a very nice fantasy of it, with multiple cuts from the Voyager series.

One of the best has to be John and Yoko, and I present it here with not any comment.  It stands for itself.  The embed code is blocked, but http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XNQd… is the link.

UPDATE:  How could I have forgotten this one?  Chuck Berry with Run, Rudolph, Run!

There are many, many more, but I would like to hear some of yours, so please be liberal with comments.  I was going to include some songs that I particularly dislike, but on reflection that would just ruin the spirit of the evening and might be offensive to someone, so I shall keep that counsel to myself.

Happy Christmas to all, and to all more than a better tomorrow.  Sunday Pique the Geek will address either Winter Solstice holidays from antiquity to the present or the extremely useful group of elements, the Rare Earth metals.  I have not decided which just yet, and it depends on what Muse tells me tomorrow.

Warmest regards,

Doc

Crossposted at Docudharma.com and at Dailykos.com

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 NW Pakistan gun battle leaves 35 dead

AFP

Fri Dec 24, 8:58 am ET

2 Xmas joy mixed with threats for Mideast Christians

by W.G. Dunlop, AFP

2 hrs 19 mins ago

3 Christmas cheer abounds in sunny Bethlehem

by Sara Hussein, AFP

Fri Dec 24, 11:25 am ET

4 West African leaders threaten force if Gbagbo does not quit

by Susan Njanji, AFP

33 mins ago

5 UN demands halt to Ivory Coast killings

by Dave Clark, AFP

Thu Dec 23, 6:21 pm ET

6 Russian parliament backs US nuclear treaty

by Dmitry Zaks, AFP

Fri Dec 24, 10:42 am ET

7 Japan approves record 1.1 trillion dollar budget

by Hiroshi Hiyama, AFP

Fri Dec 24, 1:28 pm ET

8 Christmas cheer, Afghan-style, for US troops

by Claire Truscott, AFP

Fri Dec 24, 1:14 am ET

9 Bomb blasts hit Swiss, Chilean embassies in Rome

by Dario Thuburn, AFP

Thu Dec 23, 8:31 pm ET

10 Rome on alert after embassy bomb blasts

by Dario Thuburn, AFP

Fri Dec 24, 7:49 am ET

11 St. Petersburg icicle patrol fights winter hazards

by Marina Koreneva, AFP

Fri Dec 24, 5:46 am ET

12 Russia to discuss initial approval of US nuclear treaty

by Dmitry Zaks, AFP

Fri Dec 24, 2:59 am ET

13 Medvedev says more time needed for reforms

By Alissa de Carbonnel and Steve Gutterman, Reuters

Fri Dec 24, 12:23 pm ET

14 Karzai warms to idea of talking to Taliban in Turkey

By Simon Cameron-Moore, Reuters

1 hr 48 mins ago

15 Italy on alert after Rome embassy attacks

By James Mackenzie, Reuters

Fri Dec 24, 12:30 pm ET

16 Anarchists claim responsibility for Rome bombs

By Roberto Landucci and Daniele Mari, Reuters

Thu Dec 23, 5:41 pm ET

17 "Christmas of misery" for many in calamity-hit Haiti

By Joseph Guyler Delva, Reuters

Fri Dec 24, 1:14 pm ET

18 Toyota settles suit over California crash for $10 million

By Steve Gorman, Reuters

Thu Dec 23, 10:23 pm ET

19 Jailed Russian tycoon Khodorkovsky faces verdict in test case

By Steve Gutterman, Reuters

Fri Dec 24, 7:55 am ET

20 Obama to renominate Diamond to Fed: official

By David Lawder, Reuters

Thu Dec 23, 4:51 pm ET

21 Russian parliament tentatively approves arms pact

By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 12:49 pm ET

22 EPA moving unilaterally to limit greenhouse gases

By MERRILL HARTSON, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 9:24 am ET

23 UN: Ivory Coast gunmen block possible mass grave

By MARCO CHOWN OVED, Associated Press

53 mins ago

24 Beer heir is in the headlines after model dies

By JIM SALTER, Associated Press

1 hr 17 mins ago

25 Pilgrims, clergy come to Bethlehem for Christmas

By TIA GOLDENBERG and DALIA NAMMARI, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 1:37 pm ET

26 NORAD Santa team has welcome news for parents, too

By DAN ELLIOTT, Associated Press

17 mins ago

27 Paralympian’s recovery: Legs regained, dreams lost

By RAF CASERT, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 1:17 pm ET

28 New tax law packed with obscure business tax cuts

By STEPHEN OHLEMACHER, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 11:41 am ET

29 Iraqi dad says killed daughter linked to al-Qaida

By REBECCA SANTANA, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 2:47 pm ET

30 Spider-Man returns – and lands smoothly this time

By JOCELYN NOVECK, AP National Writer

Fri Dec 24, 5:48 am ET

31 Fed board: Keep companies from oil spill evidence

By HARRY R. WEBER, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 3:16 am ET

32 Federation: Taurasi tests positive for modafinil

By DOUG FEINBERG, AP Basketball Writer

36 mins ago

33 Rome embassy blasts wound 2; anarchists suspected

By FRANCES D’EMILIO, Associated Press

Thu Dec 23, 9:31 pm ET

34 Election board: Emanuel can run for Chicago mayor

By TAMMY WEBBER, Associated Press

Thu Dec 23, 9:32 pm ET

35 In Christmas tradition, Gulf Coast birds counted

By CAIN BURDEAU, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 6:01 am ET

36 Midwest farmland prices soar due to strong prices

By MICHAEL J. CRUMB, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 3:38 am ET

37 Accountants, Texas board still at odds over Enron

By DANNY ROBBINS, Associated Press

Fri Dec 24, 3:31 am ET

38 Ground zero workers celebrate political victory

By SAMANTHA GROSS, Associated Press

Thu Dec 23, 7:23 pm ET

39 Wilderness rules restored for public lands

By KRISTEN WYATT, Associated Press

Thu Dec 23, 6:13 pm ET

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

Pail Krugman: The Humbug Express

Hey, has anyone noticed that “A Christmas Carol” is a dangerous leftist tract?

I mean, consider the scene, early in the book, where Ebenezer Scrooge rightly refuses to contribute to a poverty relief fund. “I’m opposed to giving people money for doing nothing,” he declares. Oh, wait. That wasn’t Scrooge. That was Newt Gingrich – last week. What Scrooge actually says is, “Are there no prisons?” But it’s pretty much the same thing.

Anyway, instead of praising Scrooge for his principled stand against the welfare state, Charles Dickens makes him out to be some kind of bad guy. How leftist is that?

As you can see, the fundamental issues of public policy haven’t changed since Victorian times. Still, some things are different. In particular, the production of humbug – which was still a somewhat amateurish craft when Dickens wrote – has now become a systematic, even industrial, process.

Jim Hightower: Obama to the Corporate Powers: I Feel Your Pain

Guess who’s whining the loudest these days, wailing that they’re getting a raw deal from Barack Obama.

Good grief! Friendlier than Obama’s Wall Street reform that coddled the big banksters, or his health care reform that further entrenches profiteering insurance giants inside the system? Or the tax bill cave-in that needlessly awards billions of dollars in special breaks for corporations and rich CEOs?

Yes. So friendly that Obama is now holding an ongoing series of closed-door policy meetings with assorted CEOs. So friendly that he’s already delayed regulations to strengthen anti-pollution rules. So friendly that his deficit-reduction panel proposes cutting the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 26 percent. So friendly that he’s planning to put a high-powered CEO right inside the White House with him, as demanded by the whining corporate powers who say they’re not getting enough love from the president.

Why do they get a special presidential slot? Why not one for labor, small farmers, consumers, the unemployed? Remind me again — is this guy a Democrat?

Bill Quigley and Vince Warren: Obama’s Liberty Problem: Why Indefinite Detention by Executive Order Should Scare the Hell Out of People

The right to liberty is one of the foundation rights of a free people.  The idea that any US President can bypass Congress and bypass the Courts by issuing an Executive Order setting up a new legal system for indefinite detention of people should rightfully scare the hell out of the American people.  

Advisors in the Obama administration have floated the idea of creating a special new legal system to indefinitely detain people by Executive Order.  Why?  To do something with the people wrongfully imprisoned in Guantanamo.  Why not follow the law and try them?  The government knows it will not be able to win prosecutions against them because they were tortured by the US.  

Guantanamo is coming up on its ninth anniversary – a horrifying stain on the character of the US commitment to justice.  President Obama knows well that Guantanamo is the most powerful recruitment tool for those challenging the US.  Unfortunately, this proposal for indefinite detention will prolong the corrosive effects of the illegal and immoral detentions at Guantanamo rightly condemned world-wide.

The practical, logical, constitutional and human rights problems with the proposal are uncountable.

Jonathan Battaglia and Robert Weiner: Social Security’s Future at Risk With New Tax Deal

Under the radar screen, the new tax deal is threatening the livelihood of America’s present and future seniors – to line the pockets of millionaires.

If made permanent, a new Social Security “payroll tax holiday,” reducing the “match” employers pay from 6 percent to 4 percent of salary, will drop the solvency of the program 14 years, from 2037 to 2023, according to the Congressional Budget Office. At the same time, Congress agreed to increase high-end loopholes in the estate tax, exempting 39,000 estates worth as much as $5 million.

This bill puts in motion two devastating policies: lowering taxes for the rich and destabilizing the financing of Social Security. Without sufficient worker and employer matching money, which has kept Social Security solvent for 75 years and helped millions of Americans live out their senior years in comfort, the program could be doomed. Congress and the White House say they want to “protect Social Security’s solvency,” but this action does just the opposite.

Eric Boehlert: Jon Stewart Did What Pundits and Reporters Should Have Done

By dedicating even a few minutes of his show to the bill and by interviewing key players in the saga, Stewart instantly lapped most of the Beltway press corps.

There’s lots of media chatter about Comedy Central host Jon Stewart in the wake of yesterday’s Senate vote to pass the 9/11 first responders bill. The chatter surrounds what appears to be the central media role Stewart played in shining a spotlight on how Republicans were blocking the legislation and, just as importantly, how the Beltway press was, inexcusably, ignoring the unfolding story.

Joe Conason: Sept. 11 Heroes Disdained on the Right

To understand the depths of shame and cynicism in the partisan stalling of health legislation for 9/11 first responders, it is only necessary to recall how eagerly Republican politicians once rushed to identify themselves with New York City’s finest and bravest.

Nothing was easier, during the months and years that followed the terror attacks of September 2001, than to cloak oneself in the nobility of the police officers, firefighters and construction workers who rushed to the smoking ruins-and the leaders of the Republican Party never hesitated to use them and the city as symbols, culminating in the party’s 2004 national convention in Manhattan.

Unfortunately for those heroes, they are no longer so fashionable in right-wing circles and neither is their hometown. Even as they suffer from the cancers and pulmonary illnesses that have beset them as a result of their service, they seem to be scorned among conservatives in Congress as just another “special interest” seeking a new “entitlement.”

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

December 24 is the 358th day of the year (359th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are seven days remaining until the end of the year. This day is commonly known as Christmas Eve.

On this day in 1955, NORAD begins tracking Santa in what will become an annual Christmas Eve tradition.

According to NORAD’s official web page on the NORAD Tracks Santa program, the service began on December 24, 1955. A Sears department store placed an advertisement in a Colorado Springs newspaper. The advertisement told children that they could telephone Santa Claus and included a number for them to call. However, the telephone number printed was incorrect and calls instead came through to Colorado Spring’s Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) Center. Colonel Shoup, who was on duty that night, told his staff to give all children that called in a “current location” for Santa Claus. A tradition began which continued when the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) replaced CONAD in 1958.

On Christmas Eve, the NORAD Tracks Santa website videos page is generally updated each hour, when it is midnight in a different time zone. The “Santa Cam” videos show CGI images of Santa Claus flying over famous landmarks. Each video is accompanied by a voice-over, typically done by NORAD personnel, giving a few facts about the city or country depicted. Celebrity voice-overs have also been used over the years. For the London “Santa Cam” video, English television personality and celebrity Jonathan Ross did the voice-over for 2005 to 2007 and the former Beatles drummer Ringo Starr narrated the same video in 2003 and 2004. In 2002, Aaron Carter provided the voice-over for three videos.

The locations and landmarks depicted in some of the “Santa Cam” videos have changed over the years. In 2009, twenty-nine “Santa Cam” videos were posted on the website. In previous years, twenty-four to twenty-six videos had been posted.

NORAD relies on volunteers to make the program possible. Many volunteers are employees at Cheyenne Mountain and Peterson Air Force Base. Each volunteer handles about forty telephone calls per hour, and the team typically handles more than 12,000 e-mails and more than 70,000 telephone calls from more than two hundred countries and territories. Most of these contacts happen during the twenty-five hours from 2 a.m. on December 24 until 3 a.m. MST on December 25.Google Analytics has been in use since December 2007 to analyze traffic at the NORAD Tracks Santa website. As a result of this analysis information, the program can project and scale volunteer staffing, telephone equipment, and computer equipment needs for Christmas Eve.

By December 25, 2009, the NORAD Tracks Santa program had 27,440 twitter followers and the Facebook page had more than 410,700 fans.

 563 – The Byzantine church Hagia Sophia in Constantinople is dedicated for the second time after being destroyed by earthquakes.

1294 – Pope Boniface VIII is elected Pope, replacing St. Celestine V, who had resigned.

1777 – Kiritimati, also called Christmas Island, is discovered by James Cook.

1814 – The Treaty of Ghent is signed ending the War of 1812.

1826 – The Eggnog Riot at the United States Military Academy begins that night, wrapping up the following morning.

1851 – Library of Congress burns.

1865 – Several U.S. Civil War Confederate veterans form the Ku Klux Klan.

1906 – Radio: Reginald Fessenden transmits the first radio broadcast; consisting of a poetry reading, a violin solo, and a speech.

1914 – World War I: The “Christmas truce” begins.

1924 – Albania becomes a republic.

1929 – Assassination attempt on Argentine President Hipolito Yrigoyen.

1939 – World War II: Pope Pius XII makes a Christmas Eve appeal for peace.

1941 – World War II: Kuching is conquered by Japanese forces.

1942 – World War II: French monarchist, Fernand Bonnier de La Chapelle, assassinates Vichy French Admiral Francois Darlan in Algiers.

1943 – World War II: U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower becomes the Supreme Allied Commander.

1951 – Libya becomes independent from Italy. Idris I is proclaimed King of Libya.

1953 – Tangiwai disaster: A railway bridge is destroyed by a lahar at Tangiwai, in the Central North Island of New Zealand, sending a fully loaded passenger train into the Whangaehu River, and killing 153 people.

1955 – NORAD Tracks Santa for the first time in what will become an annual Christmas Eve tradition.

1966 – A Canadair CL-44 chartered by the United States military crashes into a small village in South Vietnam, killing 129.

1968 – The crew of the USS Pueblo is released by North Korea after being held for 11 months on suspicion of spying.

1968 – Apollo Program: The crew of Apollo 8 enters into orbit around the Moon, becoming the first humans to do so. They performed 10 lunar orbits and broadcast live TV pictures that became the famous Christmas Eve Broadcast, one of the most watched programs in history.

1973 – District of Columbia Home Rule Act is passed, allowing residents of Washington, D.C. to elect their own local government.

1974 – Cyclone Tracy devastates Darwin, Australia.

1979 – The first European Ariane rocket is launched.

1997 – The Sid El-Antri massacre (or Sidi Lamri) in Algeria kills 50-100 people.

2003 – The Spanish police thwart an attempt by ETA to detonate 50 kg of explosives at 3:55 p.m. inside Madrid’s busy Chamartin Station.

Holidays and observances

   * Christian Feast Day:

         o Adela and Irmina

   * Christmas Eve (Christianity) and its related observances:

         o Aofangadagskvold, the day when the 13th and the last Yule Lad arrives to towns. (Iceland)

         o Feast of the Seven Fishes (Italy)

         o Jul (Denmark)

         o Nochebuena (Spain and Spanish-speaking countries)

         o The day when presents are exchanged and opened. Presents are delivered to children by Santa Claus, personified by an adult dressed up as Santa who comes knocking on the door. (Austria, Colombia Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Lithuania, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Sweden, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, and the Dominican Republic)

         o The Declaration of Christmas Peace (Old Great Square of Turku, Finland’s official Christmas City)