News of Note
Operation Iraqi Freedom
Military looks at options for Iraq - Video
Bush seeks backing for budget, Iraq
Military sees 2007 Iraq control handover
U.S. on Saddam: "Would have done it differently" - Video
Official held in Saddam hanging video
New video shows 5 kidnapped in Iraq
Podcast: Saddam's Execution and Troop Surge (Military.com)

Homeland Security / War on Terror / Hamas-Hezbollah Happenings
Five killed in fighting between Palestinian rivals
Basque separatists say surprised by deadly ETA bomb
Pentagon Won't Act on FBI's Gitmo Report

Other Military News
Frozen Dinner - PHOTO ESSAY (National Guard drops supplies out west)
Foreign spying on U.S. defense technology seen rising
DoD Studies Patriot Missiles on F-15s

Religion of Peace??
U.S. aims to stop Islamic extremists fleeing Somalia - Video

Homegrown Moonbats
Dems Get Dis-Taste of Power - VIDEO (Ah, irony...Mother Moonbat and friends hassle the Dems)
Trump won't back down in O'Donnell feud

Politics / Government
Gerald Ford Laid to Rest - PHOTO ESSAY
Intelligence czar leaving post to go to State
Bush wants balance budget by 2012
Congressman to be sworn in using Quran
Democrats promise action on ethics, Iraq
Who Writes a Memoir at 34? Obama Does.

Immigration / Border Control
Immigrants behind 25 percent of startups

In the Courts / Crime and Punishment
Gunman kills male student at Washington high school
San Quentin stops taking new inmates amid stomach bug

U.N. News
Op-ed: When the UN Fails

Science / Medicine / Nature
Little Girl Forever?
Televangelist Sued for Alleged Cancer Cure Claim
Panda-monium! China Sees Record '06 Births
Group: ExxonMobil Clouds Warming Debate
2007 set to be world's warmest year: UK Met Office
Quake-prone Istanbul awaits disaster
Dawn simulator curbs wintertime blues
Full-fat dairy products linked to lower weight, study says
Parkinson's drugs can cause heart damage--studies
Woman to give birth after embryo rescue
Scientists may have found Medici murder
Gene test may help lung cancer patients
Irwin's wife gets video of his death

Oddities
Rx for Fido: Woman Uses Dog for Painkillers
Touchdown! Teen Finds Porn in 'Madden NFL' (Yikes!)
Drumstick ad doesn't have a leg to stand on...
French court rules pork soup kitchen not racist
Metal object crashes through N.J. home

Other News of Note
Parents Guilty in Baby Toe-Eating Pet Case
Officials: Tacoma School Shooter in Custody
Two more test positive for polonium in UK probe
Company claims '98 baseballs were juiced

Fox News
Duke Invites Back Lacrosse Players
1/3 of Wives Wouldn't Marry Hubby Again (I would)
Booze Buster? New Cars Brake for Drunks
Boy, 14, Sets Record in Sail Across Atlantic
Buried Feces Offer Clues to Dead Sea Scrolls
Mom Charged for Baby Found on Interstate
Mike Tyson Faces Prison Over Drug Charges
Ships, Planes Scour Ocean for Missing Jet

Reuters: Top News
Japan, U.S. to discuss Asia emergency plans: media
Toyota joined the "Big Three" in 2006
Indonesia seeks missing plane with foreign help
Mexico troops enter Tijuana in drug gang crackdown
Costa Rican fishermen rescued after weeks at sea
Blockbuster shuts down in Peru, piracy blamed
Police reunion rumors reaching fever pitch
Fox studio reports $3.56 billion box office in 2006
Google's biggest bull sets $630 share price target
Shares end flat in 2007 debut after Fed's minutes
Hot Topic tumbles 10.6 percent after slashing view
Blockbuster reaches 2 million online users
Catalyst Pharma trial delayed, stock off
Deciphering student aid
Bond market woes set to stay
AGL proposes A$13 billion tie-up with Origin
Fox studio reports $3.56 billion box office in 2006
DaimlerChrysler to set up van venture in China: paper
Home Depot's Nardelli out after year of criticism
SABMiller's China jv to buy brewer for US$320 mln

AP World News
LSU leads Irish at half of Sugar Bowl
Fox's once-hot 'The O.C.' is canceled
Megan Mullally's talk show canceled
Saban hoping to turn the Tide at Alabama
Home Depot CEO Nardelli abruptly resigns
Dow ends up 11 on housing sector concern
Heat coach Riley takes leave of absence
EarthLink CEO dies of cancer

Military.com
DT: Pentagon Paying Screenwriters
Exclusive: Real Troop Letters Home
Are Marines Physically Prepped for...
Advisors: SEAL Pushup System

CENTCOM: News Releases
COALITION FORCES, NATIONAL POLICE RESCUE TWO DURING RAID IN SOUTHEASTERN BAGHDAD

RAMADI WOMEN AND CHILDREN WOUNDED BY ENEMY ATTACK

PARATROOPERS DISCOVER LARGE MUNITIONS CACHE 4TH BCT (AIRBORNE)

NATIONAL POLICE SEIZE WEAPONS CACHES IN SOUTHEASTERN BAGHDAD

USJFCOM
2006 -- The Year in Review
USJFCOM gets approval to connect U.S., Australian networks - podcast

Department of Defense
NEWS UPDATES
Caldwell: Iraq Will Control Own Ground Forces by Year's End - Story - Video
Stability & Security in Iraq Report (pdf)
For Top News Visit DefenseLink

ON THE GROUND
Iraqi Police Graduates Begin Working in Baqubah - Story
Physical Therapy Team Comes to Front Line - Story
Soldiers Work Fast to Keep Aircraft Refueled - Story
Top Marines Visit Camp Taqaddum in Iraq - Story

IN IRAQ
Raids in Iraq Yield Terrorists, Terror Leaders
Stryker Brigade Reunites in Baghdad
Coalition Troops Kill 4 Terrorists; Iraqis Detain 21
Iraqi Doctors Facilitate Change in Healthcare
U.S. Troops Help Conduct Operations in Siniyah
Soldiers Rescue Kidnapped Iraqis from Insurgents
Cell Leader Killed in Iraq, Weapons Cache Found
Five Iranians Detained in Recent Baghdad Raids

IN AFGHANISTAN
Afghan Officials, U.S. Troops Open Runway
Chief of Chaplains Brings Support to Region
Buccaneers Return from Afghanistan Tour

BACKGROUND
IRAQ
Renewal In Iraq
Iraq: Security, Stability
Fact Sheet: Progress and Work Ahead
Report: Strategy for Victory in Iraq
Iraq Daily Update
This Week in Iraq
Multinational Force Iraq
State Dept. Weekly Iraq Report (PDF)
'Boots on the Ground' Audio Archive
Weekly Reconstruction Report (PDF)
Iraq Reconstruction
Maps

AFGHANISTAN
Afghanistan Update
Maps

WAR ON TERRORISM
Fact Sheet: Budget Request
Fact Sheet: War on Terror
Fact Sheet: Terror Plots Disrupted
Waging and Winning the War on Terror
Terrorism Timeline
Terrorism Knowledge Base

Weather
Afghanistan
Bost/Laskar Ghurian Herat Kabul Qandahar

Germany
Ansbach Aschaffenburg Berlin Berlin-Tempelhof Berlin/Schonefeld Bremerhaven
Darmstadt Frankfurt Frankfurt/Main Freiburg/Breisgau Garmisch
Garmisch-Partenkirchen Geilenkirchen Gelnhausen Giessen Kitzingen
Hanau Am Main Heidelberg Mainz Mannheim Nurnberg Stuttgart Trier
Wiesbaden Wurzburg

Gitmo

Guam
Agana Agana Heights Agat Andersen AFB Asan Barrigada

Iraq
Al Azamiyah Al Basrah Al Hillah Al Karkh Al Kazimiyah Al Kut
An Nasiriyah Baghdad Baqubah Mosul Najaf Nineveh Tall Kayf

Japan
Kadena Air Base Okinawa Tokyo Yokohama

Philippines
Baler Radar Site Catanduanes Radar Site Manila

South Korea
Cheju Upper/Radar Chonju Chunchon Inch'on Kunsan Masan Mokp'o
Osan Pusan Seoul Suwon Taegu Taejon Tonghae Radar Site Ulsan Yosu

* If you're deployed, and want to see your location's weather listed here, please email me! *

Today in History
0274 - St Eutychian begins his reign as Catholic Pope
0871 - Battle at Reading Ethelred of Wessex beats Danish invasion army
1357 - Flemish Earl Louis & Luxembourg Duke Wenceslaus sign peace treaty
1493 - Columbus left new world on return from 1st voyage
1570 - Spanish viceroy Alva banishes Zutphen City's only physician, Joost Sweiter, "because he is a Jew"
1642 - King Charles I with 400 soldiers attacks the English parliament
1717 - Netherlands, England & France sign Triple Alliance
1725 - Benjamin Franklin arrives in London
1762 - England declares war on Spain & Naples
1780 - Snowstorm hits Washington's army at Morristown New Jersey
1781 - André Méchain discovers M80 (globular cluster in Scorpio)
1832 - Insurrection of Blacks in Trinidad
1861 - US Fort Morgan, Mobile, seized by Alabama
1862 - Battle of Fort Hindman, AR (Arkansas Post); Battle of Helena, AR; Romney Campaign-Stonewall Jackson occupies Bath
1863 - 4 wheeled roller skates patented by James Plimpton of NY
1884 - Last sighting of an eastern cougar (Ontario)
1885 - Dr. W.W. Grant of Iowa performs 1st appendectomy (on Mary Gartside, 22)
1887 - Thomas Stevens is 1st man to bicycle around the world (San Francisco-San Francisco); 21,700km
1893 - US President Harrison grants amnesty to Mormon polygamy
1894 - France ratifies Duple Alliance with Russia
1896 - Following Mormon abandonment of polygamy, Utah admitted as 45th state
1912 - Smallest earth-moon distance in the 20th century, 356,375 km center-to-center
1915 - 1st elected Jewish Governor, Moses Alexander, takes office in Idaho; Trans-Caucausus Russian defeat Turkish troops
1920 - 1st Black baseball league, the National Negro Baseball League, organizes
1923 - Lenin's "Political Testament" calls for removal of Stalin
1925 - French psychologist Emil Coué brings his self-esteem therapy to US "Every day in every way I am getting better & better"
1926 - Theodorus Pangalos resigns as Greek dictator
1932 - British East Indies Viceroy Willingdon arrests Gandhi & Nehru; State of siege proclaimed in Honduras
1935 - Fort Jefferson National Monument, Florida established; Bob Hope 1st heard on network radio as part of "The Intimate Revue"
1936 - Billboard magazine publishes its 1st music hit parade
1939 - Hermann Goering appoints Reinhard Heydrich head of Jewish Emigration
1941 - Resistance fighters counter d'Estienne d'Orves/Jan Doornik, 1st meet
1942 - Premier Churchill & General Marshall fly to Florida
1944 - Ralph Bunche appointed 1st Negro official in US State Department
1945 - Germans execute resistance fighters in Amsterdam; US jeep-aircraft carrier Ommaney Bay sinks after kamikaze attack
1948 - Britain grants independence to Burma
1951 - During Korean conflict, North Korean forces captured Seoul
1954 - Elvis Presley records a 10 minute demo in Nashville
1958 - Sputnik 1 reenters atmosphere & burns up
1959 - Luna 1 (Mechta) becomes 1st craft to leave Earth's gravity
1960 - European Free Trade Association forms in Stockholm
1961 - Longest recorded strike ends-33 years-Danish barbers' assistants
1962 - 1st automated (unmanned) subway train (New York City NY)
1963 - Soviet Luna (4) reaches Earth orbit but fails to reach Moon
1965 - LBJ's "Great Society" State of the Union Address
1968 - Duck hunter accidentally shoots endangered whooping crane in Texas
1969 - France begins arms embargo against Israel
1970 - Walter Cronkite ends hosting weekly documentary
1971 - Dr. Melvin H. Evans inaugurated as 1st elected Governor of Virgin Islands; Ohio agrees to pay $675,000 to relatives of Kent State victims; Philadelphia's Veteran Stadium dedicated; Congressional Black Caucus organizes
1974 - Nixon refuses to hand over tapes subpoenaed by Watergate Committee
1975 - Ice thickness measured at 4776 m, Wilkes Land, Antarctica; Ford Executive Order on CIA Activities within the US (No 11828)
1980 - President Carter announces US boycott of Moscow Olympics
1981 - British police arrest Peter Sutcliffe, the "Yorkshire Ripper"
1982 - Golden Gate Bridge closed for 3rd time by fierce storm
1989 - Vice President Bush is 1st since Vice President Van Buren to declare himself President; US F-14s shoot down 2 Libyan jet fighters over Mediterranean
1991 - AT&T workers in Newark accidentally snap a cable; Iraq agrees to send Aziz to Geneva to meet Baker on Jan 9th; Jan Krzystof Bielecki becomes premier of Poland
1995 - Newt Gingrich (R) becomes Speaker of the House

Birthdays
1334 - Amadeus VI [Green Earl], Earl of Savoye
1785 - Jacob Ludwig Carl Grimm, German librarian (fairy tale collector)
1789 - Benjamin Lundy, philanthropist/abolitionist
1797 - Wilhelm Beer, German amateur astronomer (constructed 1st Moon map)
1809 - Louis Braille, developer (reading system for blind)
1813 - Alexander Freiherr von Bach, Austrian attorney/premier (1852-59); Louis L. Bonaparte, English/French linguist/senator
1821 - John James Peck, Union Major General
1822 - Joseph Jones Reynolds, Union Major General
1823 - Otto van Rees, Governor-General of Dutch-Indies (1884-88)
1823 - Peter Joseph Osterhaus, Union Major General
1838 - Charles Stratton, (General Tom Thumb - famous short person)
1890 - Alfred G. Jodl, German Wehrmacht General/Chief of Staff; Mosa Pijade, Yugoslavia, MP (communist)
1895 - Lourens G.M. Baas Becking, Dutch botanist/resistance fighter
1896 - Everett McKinley Dirkson (Senator-R-IL)
1903 - Ramón Ernesto Cruz Uclés Honduras President (1971-72); overthrown
1908 - Angela Maria "Geli" Raubal Austrian nude model/Hitler's lover
1913 - Malietoa Tanumafili II King of West-Samoa (1962- )
1914 - Jane Wyman, 1st Mrs. Ronald Reagan / actress; Mohammed Sahir shah (Afghanistan)
1920 - William Egan Colby, CIA director (Nixon)
1933 - Ed Jenkins (Representative-GA, 1977-1992)
1935 - Kenneth Money, Canadian-born astronaut (STS 42-alt)
1940 - Brian Josephson, British physicist (Nobel 1973)
1947 - J. Danforth Quayle (Senator-IN, 44th Vice President - 1989-1993)

Passings
0041 - Caligula, Roman emperor, murdered
1678 - Johan Maetsuyker, Dutch Governor-General of Ceylon (1653-78), dies at 71
1695 - Duke of Luxembourg, Luxembourg/French marshal, dies
1701 - Ernst R. Tarhemberg, Austrian field marshal, dies at 62
1707 - Louis Willem I, count of Baden-Baden, dies
1729 - Joseph de Montesquiou Earl d'Artagnan, French Lieutenant-General , dies at 77
1821 - Elizabeth Ann Seton, 1st native-born American saint, dies in Maryland
1877 - Cornelius Vanderbilt, US robber baron, dies at 82
1910 - Léon Delagrange, French aviation pioneer
1913 - Alfred von Schlieffen, Prussian General-field marshal, dies at 79
1957 - Theodor Körner von Siegringen, Austrian President (1951-57), dies at 84
1958 - Waverley John Anderson, Viscount/Governor of Bengal, dies at 75
1967 - Donald Campbell, boat racer, dies trying to break 300 mph on water
1968 - Joseph Pholien, Belgian PM (1950-52) / communist fighter, dies at 83
1985 - Brian Gwynne Horrocks, English Lieutenant-General (A Full Life), dies at 89
1990 - Alberto Lleras Camargo, President of Colombia (1945-46, 58-62)
1994 - Michiel P. "Michael" Gorsira, Governor of Curaçao (1951-67), dies at 80
1996 - Roy McKelvie, soldier/sports writer, dies at 83
1997 - Harry B. Helmsley, owner (Empire State Building), dies at 87

Reported Missing in Action
1968
Minnich, Richard W., USN (PA); F8E shot down, remains recovered December, 1985

1969
Lane, Mitchell S., USAF (NM); F100C disappeared while on mission

Neeld, Bobby G., USAF (NM); F100C disappeared while on mission

1973
Johnston, Steven B., USAF (OK); F4D shot down, presumed Killed in ejection, body not recovered