Welcome to the OND, Magnifico's series…it was his idea, he started it, so it’s all his fault. I accept no responsibility for the contents of this edition, but I will gladly accept tips.
Top Stories
World
The US military has appointed Army Colonel Stephen R. Henley to preside over the war crimes trial of Khalid Sheik Mohammed, in a move that the ACLU protests as being an attempt to ram cases through the system before Obama the opportunity to dismantle it.
Henley has been a military judge for 10 years and has a law degree from George Washington University. As an Army judge, he presided at the courts martial of Maryland soldiers accused of abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib, Iraq. As a commissions judge, he is the only officer so far to exclude a confession on grounds it was derived from torture.
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At issue is what, if anything, a future Obama administration would use in place of military commissions, the special post-9/11 war court the Bush administration created to prosecute accused terrorists as war criminals.
Obama has said that he wants terror suspects tried in criminal courts or, in some instances, by traditional military courts martial.
A report released by the NIC predicts that the US will find its global power and influence diminished over the next several years.
The report argues that the "international system -- as constructed following the second World War -- will be almost unrecognizable by 2025 owing to the rise of emerging powers, a globalizing economy, an historic transfer of relative wealth and economic power from West to East, and the growing influence of nonstate actors."
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And yet, while American power and influence are projected to decline, America's burdens are not.
"Despite the recent rise in anti-Americanism, the U.S. probably will continue to be seen as a much-needed regional balancer in the Middle East and Asia," the report notes.
World leaders in APEC met in Lima, Peru to try to solve the global economic crisis.
Australia and Peru took specific action, announcing they were joining a core group of countries seeking to create a free trade area out of the 21 economies of the APEC group.
"There are now seven countries prepared to enter negotiations to try and sign a Trans-Pacific basis for moving forward on trade liberalization," said Australian Trade Minister Simon Crean.
The move came two months after the United States joined the group, previously confined to Singapore, New Zealand, Chile and Brunei.
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Bush's successor [That's President Elect Barack Obama!] backs free trade but has criticized US deals with some APEC members as harmful to US workers.
Yeah, that's free trade in a nutshell..."harmful to US workers".
Somali pirates who hijacked a Saudi oil tanker loaded with two million barrels of oil are demanding $25 million ransom for the return of the vessel.
As global frustration built and a major shipping company ordered some of its vessels to avoid the Gulf of Aden, the pirates set a 10-day deadline for the ransom payment for the ship they easily seized in 16 minutes.
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"The Saudis have 10 days to comply, otherwise we will take action that could be disastrous," Said told AFP from the ship now anchored at the Somali pirate lair of Harardhere, without elaborating.
They should just float it to China and sell it there...they'd make a lot more than $25 mil...
USA
Attorney General Michael Mukasey collapsed and lost consciousness while speaking at a dinner in Washington. His condition is unknown.
Mukasey was 15 to 20 minutes into his speech about the Bush administration's successes in combatting terrorism when he began slurring his words. He collapsed and lost consciousness, said O'Conner, the department's No. 3 official.
Mukasey's was noticeably shaking during his speech before he collapsed shortly before 10:20 p.m. EST. His security detail called 911. Mukasey was on the stage for 10 minutes being attended to by his FBI detail before medics arrived, according to a Justice Department official who was there. Mukasey was still breathing at the time, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to talk to the media.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are suspending foreclosures through the holiday season, in part to allow homeowners an opportunity to take part in a newly announced program enabling them to make their mortgages more affordable, and in part to make the holidays a little merrier.
Henry Waxman (D-CA), one of this editors favorite California Congresscritters, has won control of the House Energy and Commerce Committee away from John Dingell (D-MI), who had chaired the committee for decades.
Waxman, 69, an avid environmentalist who has clashed with Dingell for three decades over issues from the Clean Air Act to climate change, saw an opening after Obama's victory last month. The committee has jurisdiction over three top elements of Obama's agenda - health care, energy and global warming - and Waxman made the case to his colleagues that Dingell would be a roadblock to enacting the new president's policies.
Lawmakers inside the Cannon Caucus room, where the Thursday's vote of the party caucus took place, said Dingell urged Democrats to remember his legislative accomplishments, while his allies urged members to respect seniority. Waxman responded by laying out his policy disagreements with Dingell over the years, casting himself as a change agent more in line with Obama.
"You could see members nodding their heads" after Waxman's speech, said Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez, who helped lead Waxman's bid for the job. "You could almost feel the votes move in the room."
At the end of voting, Waxman had prevailed, 137-122.
Alright folks. No excuses.
Shares of Citigroup stock fell to their lowest level in over 15 years.
News that the giant bank's largest individual shareholder, Saudi Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, planned to increase his stake to 5% did little to resolve questions enveloping Citi in recent days.
"Unfortunately it seems like they [sellers] are sitting on Citi here," said Todd Leaon, head trader at Cowen & Co. "It's sell first and ask questions later."
Shares of Citigroup (C, Fortune 500) cratered 26%, extending the brutal losses from Wednesday, when the stock lost nearly a quarter of its value.
So far this year, Citigroup stock is down 83%.
In an attempt to move holiday passengers along more expediently, some airports have implemented family lines, so that families can go through at their own pace without worrying about holding the line up for everyone else. I don't know about the rest of you families out there, but the only family I was ever stressed about being made late to the gate was my own.
Following reports that national claims for unemployment benefits was at a 16 year high, the Senate extended unemployment benefits through the end of the year.
The Senate's vote followed Thursday's government report that laid-off workers' new claims for jobless aid had reached a 16-year high and the number of Americans searching for work had surged past 10 million.
The White House, which had opposed broader legislation containing the benefits extension, urged passage of the new version and said President George W. Bush would quickly sign it.
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"Putting money in the hands of unemployed families means they will be able to pay their rent and utility bills, buy groceries and clothe their children," Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said after the voice vote in the Senate. "It is money that will create economic growth in America."
The House had approved the bill in October.
More than 1.2 million jobs have been lost so far this year, and the civilian jobless rate is at a 14-year high of 6.5 percent.
A report released by FEMA warns of the potential for a catastrophic earthquake in...the New Madrid fault, particularly Tennessee.
People in a vast seismic zone in the southern and midwestern United States would face catastrophic damage if a major earthquake struck there and should ensure that builders keep that risk in mind, a government report said on Thursday.
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FEMA predicted a large earthquake would cause "widespread and catastrophic physical damage" across Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri and Tennessee -- home to some 44 million people.
Tennessee is likely to be hardest hit, according to the study that sought to gauge the impact of a 7.7 magnitude earthquake in order to guide the government's response.
In Tennessee alone, it forecast hundreds of collapsed bridges, tens of thousands of severely damaged buildings and a half a million households without water.
Representative Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) is accusing the CIA of a cover-up in the downing of a missionary plane that killed a mother and her baby girl in 2001.
Rep. Pete Hoekstra on Thursday criticized "rogue" CIA employees involved in a joint CIA-Peruvian anti-narcotics program of withholding information after declassification of a CIA report identifying "routine disregard" of safety procedures that led to the plane being shot down.
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The comments come after a new internal report by the CIA's inspector general -- parts of which were released Thursday -- that said Congress and investigators were not given appropriate access to internal documents regarding the incident.
"This issue goes to the heart of the American people's ability to trust the CIA," the Michigan lawmaker said Thursday. "Americans deserve to know that agencies given the power to operate on their behalf aren't abusing that power or their trust."
Hoekstra, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, has called for new hearings into the incident and further declassification of findings.
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Bottom Stories
Dr. Pepper will live up to its promise and offer free Dr. Pepper following the release of the new Guns N' Roses album "Chinese Democracy". Warning: link contains gratuitous Axl photo.
Beginning Sunday at 12:01 a.m., coupons for a free 20-ounce soda will be available for 24 hours on Dr Pepper's Web site. They'll be honored until Feb. 28.
Fox News would like to wish convicted felon seasoned Republican Ted Stevens a happy 85th birthday. Seriously.
By the numbers
Bush has about 60(!!!) days left to finish what he started (whatever that is), before letting President Obama and the Clinton administration in to clean up the mess.
The Operations in Iraq have cost $572,925,000,000, as the race to one trillion dollars of war continues (in the country that is no longer the main front in the war on terror).
In the same time, the national debt has soared from $6,400,000,000,000 to $10,665,250,000,000, an increase of more than 4.25 trillion dollars.
Have a good one.