News of Note
Operation Iraqi Freedom
Iraq moves troops and tanks to northern city Mosul
Iraqi army reinforcements reach Mosul

Operation Enduring Freedom
Afghan Police Search for Abducted American - VIDEO

Homeland Security / War on Terror / Hamas-Hezbollah Happenings
Egypt vows to take control of Gaza border
Pakistan troops battle militants to control tunnel
Riots Rock Lebanon
'Secret' Talks onTerror Crackdown

Fallen Heroes
MND-B Soldier killed by IED (Baghdad)

Politics / Government
With South Carolina Victory in Hand, Obama Tries to Avoid Being Pigeon-Holed as ‘Black Candidate’ - PHOTOS
VIDEO: Obama Speaks - PART 1 - PART 2
Florida Gov. Charlie Crist Endorses McCain
South Carolina Primary Results
South Carolina Exit Polls
Slideshow: Scenes from South Carolina
Blog: Endorsements for Obama, McCain
Reuters Full Coverage: Profiles, graphs, blogs
Romney climbs into Florida tie with McCain: poll - Video
Edwards keeps on running in presidential race
Obama, Clinton look to next White House fights - Video
Cheney Daughter Backs Romney as Florida Race Tightens
Dem Focus Shifts to Super Tuesday
Clinton Defies DNC, Heads to Florida VIDEO
Paulson pushes Senate for stimulus deal
Race gave Obama advantage in S.C.
Despite wealth, Romney keeps fundraising
Probe launched over Detroit mayor texts
Putin foe barred from Russian election
Italian political crisis enters decisive week

In the Courts / Crime and Punishment / Law and Order
Mexico Nabs Alleged Hitman in Cardinal's Murder
SocGen trader questioned for 2nd day over fraud - Video
Pols Consider Teacher Sex Laws
Regal Robbery
Colleague: Patients feared Ohio nurse
French bank accuses trader of hacking
Report: Cuomo gets cooperation in probe

Science / Medicine and Health / Technology
Legal file-sharing service touts free music with ads
Qtrax aims to offer iPod-friendly tracks
Lead linked to aging in older brains

Mother Nature
TV Actor Dies in Calif. Avalanches, Floods Feared - PICS
3rd avalanche victim found in California

News from My Neck of the Woods
NY's 16-mile car tunnel would be longest

Oddities
Indiana Boys Left With Bleeding Tongues After Licking Flagpole (I'm having a "Christmas Story" flashback...)
Bad Catch: Shark Bites Fisherman Who Reeled It
Tantric master breaks ice record in NYC

Other News of Note
End of genocide tribunal stirs emotions in Rwanda
Heaven-Sent Room for Rent

Fox News
Governor's Son Creates Raunchy Prison Board Game

Reuters
Annan meets Odinga as Kenya clashes kill 10 - Video
Bolivian band festival plays fanfare for Carnival
Coen brothers named best 2007 directors by U.S. peers
Spirit of triumph prevails at Sundance
Financial crisis to hit 20,000 London jobs: report
Trade powers eye new WTO push around Easter
Mortgage analysis firm to cooperate in NY probe
IAC in talks with investors over business units: WSJ
As safe as houses? Dutch history suggests not
BMW eyes U.S. sales of 400,000 cars/year: report
Google eyeing operations in Malaysia: report
Fed rate cut, jobs data may lift stocks
Gold, platinum hit record on South Africa mining halt
Oil rises on stimulus plan
Fading chances for deeper Fed rate cut lift dollar
ING, Fortis fall on talk of profit warning: traders
Honeywell profit up 18 percent; shares jump
E*Trade shares rise as much as 13 percent
Halliburton shares climb on Morgan Stanley upgrade
U.S. stocks damp global rally; oil, dollar up - Video
Washington buys time

AP World News
Coens win for 'No Country for Old Men'
Wall Street braces for more volatility
Djokovic beats Tsonga for Aussie title
Kenya death toll near 800 in a month

CENTCOM: News Releases

USJFCOM
USJFCOM readies for Noble Resolve 08 - podcast
More about Noble Resolve
Combined Joint Task Force – Horn of Africa Mission Rehearsal Exercise prepares forces to help “Africans solve African problems” - podcast
Combined Joint Task Force – Horn of Africa Mission Rehearsal Exercise commences - podcast
2007 -- The Year in Review - photos

Multi-National Force-Iraq
Abu Ajeel’s Police Come Back Strong
Iraqi Army Receives Vehicle Shipment Through FMS Program
Reconstruction Efforts Near Baghdad Airport Improves Economy
Sixteen IEDs, cache turned in by CLCs
CLCs contribute to finding enemy weapons
CLC leader killed by car bomb
MND Soldiers, Iraqi Police conduct combined operation with CLCs in support of Operation Phantom Phoe
Iraqi civilians lead troops to explosives cache (Ramadi)

DefenseLink
TOP NEWS
Mrs. Mullen Christens Guided-Missile Destroyer
U.S. Ready to Aid Pakistan

IRAQ NEWS
Local Security Gains Influence National Action

AFGHANISTAN NEWS
General Discusses Afghan Army Air Corps Progress

AMERICA SUPPORTS YOU
Gates Thanks Support Groups at ASY Summit
Summit Helps Troop Support Groups Build Momentum
Joint Staff Ops Director Cites Value of Support Program
General Briefs Volunteers on Military Efforts Worldwide
Caregivers Learn About ‘Compassion Fatigue’

FACE OF DEFENSE
Cook's Added Touch Bolsters Morale

WHY WE SERVE
Soldier Takes Pride in Role as Mentor

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

Today in History
0672 - St Vitalian ends his reign as Catholic Pope
0847 - Sergius II ends his reign as Catholic Pope
1302 - Dante becomes a Florentine political exile
1538 - States of Gelderland accepts Willem van Kleef as viceroy
1556 - Willem of Orange becomes knight of Guilder Flies
1593 - Vatican opens 7 year trial against scholar Giordano Bruno
1662 - 1st American lime kiln begins operation (Providence RI)
1671 - Pirate Henry Morgen lands at Panama City
1710 - Czar Peter the Great sets 1st Russian state budget
1736 - Abdication of Stanislas, last king of Poland
1785 - 1st US state university chartered, Athens GA
1823 - President Monroe appoints 1st US ambassadors to South America
1864 - Civil War skirmish at Kelly's Ford, VA; Battle of Fair Gardens, Tennessee
1870 - Manitoba & Northwest Territories incorporated; After accepting 15th amendment, Virginia is readmitted to Union
1880 - Thomas Edison patents electric incandescent lamp
1886 - 1st British government of Salisbury resigns
1888 - National Geographic Society organizes (Washington DC)
1891 - Mine explosion kills 109 at Mount Pleasant, PA
1897 - British troops occupy Bida Gold Coast (Ghana)
1900 - Social Democrat Party of America (Debs' party) holds 1st convention
1902 - 5 workers killed on explosion during IRT subway construction (New York City NY)
1905 - Maurice Rouvier forms government in France
1908 - Pasiphaë, a satellite of Jupiter, discovered by Melotte
1915 - US Marines occupy Haiti
1916 - Communist party "Spartacus Letters" 1st published in Berlin
1918 - "Tarzan of the Apes", 1st Tarzan film, premieres at Broadway Theater
1924 - Egyptian king Foead nominates Saad Zaghloel Pasja premier
1924 - Lenin placed in Mausoleum in Red Square
1926 - US Senate agrees to join World Court
1927 - Harlem Globetrotters play their 1st game
1934 - French government of Chautemps falls (Stavisky Affair)
1941 - Peruvian agent Rivera-Schreibér warns of Japanese assault on Pearl Harbor
1943 - 1st US air attack on Germany (Wilhelmshafen)
1944 - Leningrad liberated from Germany in 880 days, with 600,000 killed
1945 - Nazi occupiers forbid food transport to West (The Netherlands); Russia liberates Auschwitz & Birkenau Concentration Camp (Poland); Wally van Hall, "banker in defiance", arrested
1948 - 1st locomotive to carry 1,000,000 pounds (450,000 kg) operates; 1st tape recorder sold
1951 - US begins 126 nuclear tests at Nevada Test Site
1953 - Netherlands end Marshall aid
1958 - Ferenc Münnich follows Kádár as premier of Hungary
1961 - "Sing Along with Mitch" [Miller] premieres on NBC TV
1963 - Sam Rice, Eppa Rixey, Elmer Flick, & John Clarkson elected to Baseball Hall of Fame
1965 - 1st ground station-to-aircraft radio communication via satellite
1967 - Apollo 1 fire kills astronauts Grissom, White & Chaffee
1967 - Treaty signed banning military use of nuclear weapons in space
1969 - 14 spies hanged in Baghdad; 9 Jews publicly executed in Damascus Syria
1970 - Movie rating system modifies "M" rating to "PG"
1971 - Montgomery St Station, last link in BART, `holed thru'
1973 - William Rogers & Nguyen Duy Trinh sign US-N Vietnam treaty
1976 - "Laverne & Shirley" spin-off from "Happy Days" premieres on ABC TV; Morocco-Algeria battles in Westerly Sahara
1977 - President Carter pardons most Vietnam War draft evaders (10,000); 1st broadcast of "Roots" mini-series on ABC TV
1982 - Mauno Koivisto installed as President of Finland; Roberto S. Cordova installed as President of Honduras
1984 - Michael Jackson is burned during filming for Pepsi commercial
1985 - 15th Space Shuttle (51-C) Mission-Discovery 3 returns to Earth
1988 - Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously approves nomination of Judge Anthony M. Kennedy to US Supreme Court
1989 - German war criminals Fischer & Austrian der Fünten freed
1990 - Dissolution of Polish communist party
1991 - Dutch PSP, Pacifist Socialistic Party, disbands
1992 - Mike Tyson goes on trial for rape (he is found guilty); Presidential candidate Bill Clinton (D) & Genifer Flowers accuse each other of lying over her assertion they had a 12-year affair
1993 - DC-3 crashes in Kinshasa, killing 12
1994 - Carlos Reina succeeds President Callejas in Honduras; Romanian social-democrats form government with anti-Semites
1996 - 15 day old siamese twins separated-Sarah Morales survives, Sarahi dies; Germany celebrates its 1st Holocaust Remembrance Day
1998 - Crane crashes into Roosevelt Is (New York City NY) Tram, injuring 10

Birthdays
1546 - Joachim III, Frederick elector (Brandenburg); Abbas I "the Great", shah of Persia (1587-1629)
1822 - Thomas Leiper Kane, Union Brevet Major General
1826 - Richard Taylor, Confederate Lieutenant-General
1828 - Samuel Allen Rice, Union Brigadier General
1830 - William Henry Fitzhugh Payne, Confederate Brigadier General
1832 - Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson], author (Alice in Wonderland)
1834 - Dmitri Mendeleev, chemist (discovered periodic table of the elements); Robert Sanford Foster, Union Brevet Major General
1850 - Samuel Gompers, Dutch/US 1st president-American Federation of Labor
1859 - Kaiser Wilhelm II Potsdam, German emperor (1888-1918)
1872 - Learned Hand, Chief judge (US Court of Appeals)
1887 - Carl Blegen, archaeologist (excavator at Troy, Pylos)
1900 - Hyman G. Rickover, US Admiral (father of modern nuclear navy)
1908 - William Randolph Hearst, Jr., newspaper publisher (Hearst Publishing)
1914 - Anna Larina, revolutionary
1921 - Donna Reed, actress (From Here to Eternity, Wonderful Life)
1922 - Wilfrid Bourne, QC/Clerk of the Crown in Chancery
1924 - Kenneth Corfield CEO (STC); Rauf Denktasj Turkish-Cypriot politician; William van Straubenzee, British MP
1925 - Geoffrey Tucker, British political consultant
1927 - Nancy Dickerson, journalist (NBC)
1930 - Esteban Edward Torres (Representative-CA); Roger Sims, British MP
1932 - Neville Trotter, British MP
1933 - Mohamed Al Fayed, CEO (Harrods); Rita Hennessy, matron-in-chief (QARANC)
1934 - Federico Mayor Zaragoza Barcelona, Spain, UNESCO directorl Donald Spiers, controller (Aircraft MoD); Edithe Cresson, premier of France (1991-92); Julian Ogilvie Thompson, CEO (De Beers)
1935 - Gillian Beer, professor/president (Clare Hall-Cambridge)
1938 - Timothy, Captain of The Queen's Flight
1940 - Brian T. O'Leary, astronaut
1945 - Mairead Corrigan-Maguire, North Irish peace activist (Nobel 1976)
1958 - Alan Milburn, British MP
1970 - Carlos Javier Bernardo, Dutch prince

Passings
0098 - Marius Cocceius Nerva, Emperor of Rome (96-98), dies at about 67
0672 - Vitalianus, pope (657-72)/saint
0847 - Sergius II, pope (844-47)
1565 - Robrecht de Berghes, prince-bishop of Liege (1557-64)
1699 - William Temple, statesman
1763 - John Theodor of Bavaria, prince-bishop of Liege/cardinal, dies
1816 - Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood/admiral
1851 - John James Audubon, conservationist (Audubon Society), dies at 65
1857 - Dorothea von Benckendorff. Baltic monarch of Lieven, dies at 72
1889 - Ivan S. Aksakov, Russian journalist, dies at 65
1893 - James G. Blaine, US minister of foreign affairs, dies at 62
1967 - Roger B. Chaffee astronaut, dies at 31 in Apollo I fire; Virgil I. (Gus) Grissom astronaut, dies at 41 in Apollo I fire; Edward Higgins White II, Lieutenant-Colonel USAF/astronaut (Gemini 4), dies in Apollo I fire at 36; Alphonse Juin, French marshal, dies at 78
1974 - Georgios Grivas, Greek General/opposition leader on Cyprus (EOKA), dies at 75
1981 - Leo Collard, Belgian minister of Education (1946/54-58), dies at 78
1983 - Paul "Bear" Bryant, US football coach (Alabama), dies at 69
1986 - L. Ron Hubbard, novelist/founder (Church of Scientology), dies at 74
1993 - Andre "the Giant" Roussimoff, WWF wrestler, dies of heart attack at 49
1995 - Halsey S. Colchester, British SAS/MI6-spy/priest, dies at 76
1996 - Olga Havlova, political activist, dies at 63; Ralph Webster, Yarborough, politician, dies at 92
1997 - Cecil Lewis, airman/writer, dies at 98; Matthew Coady, journalist, dies at 73

Reported Missing in Action
1968
Cordova, Robert J., USN (NE); reported missing overboard, KIA

1969
Conger, John E., US Army (OH); reported WIA

1973
Hall, Harley H., USN (WA); F4J shot down (pilot, w/Kientzler) - Killed in Captivity, remains returned June, 1995 (ID disputed)

Kientzler, Phillip A., USN (CA); F4J shot down (RIO, w/Hall), released by PRG March, 1973

Morris, George W., Jr., USAF (CA); OV10 shot down while looking for Hall and Kientzler (co-pilot), ejected

Peterson, Mark A., USAF (OH); OV10A shot down while looking for Hall and Kientzler (pilot, w/Morris), ejected

1974
Bell, Steve, Civilian; detained 24 hours and released

Collins, Peter, Civilian; detained 24 hours and released

Labels: Headlines, History