A Christian martyr. A car bomb killed 10 people at a Shiite shrine in Najaf, Iraq, and a suicide bombing killed 85 people at a Shiite mosque in Baghdad. BBC NewsThe U.S. military announced that 1,313 Iraqi civilians had been killed in the sectarian violence of March. “Civil war,” said Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, “has almost started among Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, and those who are coming from Asia.”BBC NewsChron.comThe case against Abdul Ameer Younis Hussein, an Iraqi cameraman for CBS who was arrested in April 2005 after filming the wreckage of a car bomb, was finally dismissed for lack of …

The Senate, with Dick Cheney casting the deciding vote, cut $40 billion in funding for foster care, child support, and student loans.Democracy Now!U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice asked Congress for $50 million to support African troops in Darfur, but her request was rejected.Herald News DailyAmericans had spent $18.48 billion on gift cards this holiday season.USA TodayThe House voted to extend the Patriot Act by five weeks.APPresident George W. Bush called nine U.S. servicemen and servicewomen and wished them a Merry Christmas,APwhile British Prime Minister Tony Blair visited Iraq.BBC NewsIt was revealed that undercover police in New York City had …

I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, pleaded not guilty to charges of obstruction of justice, perjury, and making false statements.The Los Angeles TimesSenator Harry Reid and Representative Nancy Pelosi called for Karl Rove to be stripped of his security clearance.KHON2/Fox NewsJudith Miller was expected to return to her job at the New York Times.The New York ObserverSir Christopher Meyer, the former British ambassador to the United States, said that the Iraq war was inspiring acts of terrorism: “God,” he said, “it does not look good.”BBC NewsThe FBI, under the Patriot Act, was issuing 30,000 …

Mahmoud Abbas was elected president of the Palestinian Authority. He dedicated his victory to “the soul of the brother martyr Yasir Arafat and to our people.”New York TimesEarlier in the week, Abbas called Israel the “Zionist Enemy” at an election rally,The Indian Expressthen announced he would pursue peace talks with it.ReutersIsrael shut the border at Gaza,Xinhuathen offered Abbas personal security in Jerusalem, which he refused.Azcentral.comKofi Annan visited the site of the South Asia tsunami disaster and said, “I have never seen such utter destruction.”CBS NewsColin Powell toured Indonesia and called it “amazing” and “heartbreaking.”ABC NewsHe also said providing disaster relief …

White House photo. George W. Bush named national security advisor Condoleezza Rice to replace Colin Powell as secretary of state.Washington Post A few days later,Condoleezza Rice entered the hospital for minor surgery of an undisclosed nature.ReutersBush spared two Thanksgiving turkeys from death.Reuters “By virtue of an unconditional presidential pardon, they are safe from harm,” he said.White House The turkeys, named Biscuits and Gravy, were chosen by an Internet poll, beating out Patience and Fortitude.White HouseTexas prisoner Anthony Fuentes was executed.Houston Chronicle A buck was captured and euthanized after running through Chicago’s O’Hare AirportABC 7 Chicago, and a Texas website was …

After maintaining for three years that Yaser Esam Hamdi, an American citizen captured in Afghanistan, was so grave a threat to the United States that merely permitting him to meet with his lawyer would fatally compromise national security, the Bush Administration (having been told by Justice Antonin Scalia that “the very core of liberty secured by our Anglo-Saxon system of separated powers has been freedom from indefinite imprisonment at the will of the Executive”) declined to defend its case against Hamdi in open court and announced that he will be stripped of his citizenship and released in Saudi Arabia.Boston Globe, …

A burning plain. The United Nations Security Council passed another resolution asking the Sudanese government to prevent its proxies from slaughtering people in Darfur (China, Algeria, Pakistan, and Russia abstained). The resolution, which for the first time formally invokes the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, says that the council will “consider” sanctions if the genocide continues.New York TimesChaos continued to rule Iraq; there were many attacks by insurgents, including several large suicide bombings, hostages were beheaded, and many civilians, including women and children, were killed in American airstrikes.New York TimesIraqi prime minister Iyad …

Chechen militants took more than 1,000 children and adults hostage at a school in southern Russia, though the Russian government lied at first and claimed that there were only 354 hostages; at least 338 died, half of whom were children, when security forces stormed the school.Washington Post, ReutersA suicide bomber blew herself up in a Moscow subway station, killing at least 10 people.Associated PressPalestinian suicide bombers blew up two buses in Beersheba, killing 16 and wounding at least 80.Associated PressIraqi insurgents blew up another oil pipeline, and aAssociated Presscar bomb killed seven American marines and three Iraqi soldiers near Falluja.ReutersTwelve …

The wire master and his puppets, 1875. In a furtive ceremony held two days ahead of schedule in order to pre-empt violence, the United States transferred “sovereignty” to Iraq. About 140,000 American troops remained in the country, with no mechanism in place between the two countries to govern the troops, and 150 Americans stayed on in Iraqi ministries as advisers.New York TimesOf the 2,300 construction projects promised by coalition forces, fewer than 140 were underway at the time of the transfer of power.New York TimesOutgoing proconsul L. Paul Bremer warned that Iraq’s path to democracy would be messy, and noted, …

L. Paul Bremer, the American proconsul in Iraq, in one of his final acts before handing over “sovereignty” to Iraq’s new interim government, decreed that American forces will remain immune from prosecution by Iraqi courts for crimes against Iraqi citizens or destruction of property. It was noted that a similar grant of immunity in Iran in the 1960s had unfortunate consequences. “Our honor has been trampled underfoot; the dignity of Iran has been destroyed,” said the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1964. He said that the order “reduced the Iranian people to a level lower than that of an American dog.”Washington …

Devils Galore. Members of Congress were given a private viewing of unreleased photographs and videos from the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq; some showed Pfc. Lynndie England having sex with other soldiers in front of prisoners; other images showed prisoners cowering before attack dogs, Iraqi women being forced to expose their breasts, naked prisoners tied up together, prisoners being forced to masturbate, and a prisoner repeatedly smashing his head against a wall. “It was pretty disgusting, not what you’d expect from Americans,” said Senator Norm Coleman of Minnesota. “There was lots of sexual stuff �?? not of the Iraqis, but …

President George W. Bush held a prime-time press conference and refused several times to apologize or accept responsibility for his government’s failure to prevent the September 11 attacks; theNew York Timespresident defended his decision to conquer Iraq and said that the Iraqis were “deceptive at hiding things. We knew they were hiding things. A country that hides things is a country that is afraid of getting caught. And that was part of our calculation.”New York TimesBush also said that “freedom is the Almighty’s gift to every man and woman in this world. And as the greatest power on the face …

Caught in the Web. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice testified publicly and under oath before the commission investigating September 11; Rice acknowledged that President Bush had received a classified CIA briefing on August 6, 2001, entitled “Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States,” though she characterized the report as “historical information based on old reporting.” She also acknowledged that the report mentioned the existence of Al Qaeda sleeper cells in the United States but “there was no recommendation that we do something about this.” Rice also admitted that Richard Clarke, whose book on the Bush Administration’s antiterrorism failures …

A Small Family. Killing Ground. Four American mercenaries employed by Blackwater Security Consulting were pulled from their vehicles in Fallujah, Iraq, hacked to death, burned, and dragged through the streets; the remains of two were then hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River along with a sign that said “Fallujah is the cemetery for Americans.”BBC“Despite an uptick in local engagements,” said General Mark Kimmit at a press briefing a few hours later, “the overall area of operations remains relatively stable with negligible impact on the coalition’s ability to continue progress in governance, economic development, and restoration of essential services.”New …

More than 60 prominent scientists, including 20 Nobel prize winners and 19 winners of the National Medal of Science, denounced the Bush Administration for its systematic distortion of scientific facts for political gain; John H. Marburger III, the administration’s head of science and technology policy, dismissed the report and said that it was politically motivated.Chemical and Environmental NewsPresident Bush’s Council of Economic Advisors decided to move the official start date of the last recession from the generally accepted March 2001 to the fourth quarter of 2000, when Bill Clinton was still president.Business WeekHealth and Human Services officials admitted that a …

Caught in the Web, 1860. President George W. Bush, apparently worried that John Kerry was beating him in recent opinion polls, appeared on a Sunday morning talk show. Bush defended his decision to conquerIraq, and although he admitted that his stated reason for invading was false, he also suggested that weapons of mass destruction might still be found. The president said that he had total confidence in the CIA but suggested that he had been misled by incorrect intelligence. “Saddam Hussein was dangerous with weapons. Saddam Hussein was dangerous with the ability to make weapons,” Bush said. “I believe it …

A Christian martyr. Former secretary of the treasury Paul O’Neill revealed in a new book that President George W. Bush was already looking for an excuse to invade Iraq during the first few weeks of his presidency. “It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it,” O’Neill said. “The president saying ‘Go find me a way to do this.’”CBS NewsO’Neill said that the very first meeting of the National Security Council involved discussions of a “post-Saddam Iraq,” peacekeeping troops, and war-crimes tribunals. O’Neill provided the book’s author, a former Wall Street Journal reporter, …

A federal appeals court ordered President Bush to release Jose Padilla, a U.S. citizen who was arrested last year in Chicago and has been held since then as an enemy combatant. The court ruled that “the president, acting alone, possesses no inherent constitutional authority to detain American citizens seized within the United States, away from the zone of combat, as enemy combatants.”New York TimesA class-action lawsuit was filed against the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security accusing the agencies of illegally using a national crime database to enforce civil immigration laws.New York TimesFederal investigators found videotapes of guards …

A British parliamentary report concluded that the Blair government did not intentionally lie in its controversial dossier on Iraq’s military threat; the report did criticize the government, however, and said that its false claim that Iraq was capable of launching weapons of mass destruction in 45 minutes was “unhelpful,” and that the dossier should have made clear that Iraq was not, in the opinion of the intelligence services, an imminent threat to Great Britain.BBCA new poll found that 70 percent of Americans believe, contrary to all evidence, that Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11 attacks.New York TimesPresident Bush …

President George W. Bush refused to declassify the twenty-eight pages of Congress’s September 11 report that pertained to Saudi Arabia, despite calls to do so by members of Congress and by the Saudi government itself, which said it intended to rebut the contents.New York TimesAccording to those who have read it, the redacted section lays out far more financial connections between the September 11 hijackers, fifteen of whom were Saudi, and the Saudi government than had been previously revealed.The most specific allegations concerned Omar al-Bayoumi, a Saudi man who had provided funds and assistance to two of the hijackers in …