I was thinking about a nice cliche of a Christmas song to post, and I came up with this:

"You will get a sentimental feeling
When you hear
voices singing "Let's be jolly
Deck the halls with boughs of holly""

Open Thread.

The Senate has confirmed Michele Leonhart as head of the DEA. No change there either.

I just got home from a miserable day...a completely unexpected, emergency root canal. It hurts way too much to blog, so here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

Good news would especially be welcome.

The more things change....President Obama left for Hawaii today on his Christmas vacation. The U.S. warns Americans to be cautious of terror attacks over the Christmas holiday.

The attack in Rome was the work of anarchists, not al Qaeda.

Over in Somalia, the two largest militant groups, al-Shabab and Hizbul Islam, announced they are merging and "threatened attacks against the African Union peacekeeping force in Mogadishu as well as attacks in Uganda and Burundi."

And the CIA forms a task force to investigate the impact of Wikileaks -- with an appropriate name: WTF.

Some interesting news articles today:

• Fl. Gov-Elect Terminates Jobs in Drug Policy Control office. His spokesman says,

  ``I don't think we're going to have cocaine bales stacking up on the docks of Miami if we close this office.''

  Critics ask, who's going to go after the pill mills? What about the planned prescription drug monitoring database? Salaries for the four full time employees in the office, which was created by Jeb Bush in 1999, are $500k.

• Lack of retroactivity in revised crack penalties results in unequal justice which may last for years, until the five year statute of limitations has run on crack offenses committed prior to Augst 3, 2010.

• New police chief in Mexico (a former General) fires almost his entire police force of 600 cops due to corruption. Then he lets 300 reapply. Only one passed the honesty tests.

• LA Times calls on Schwarznegger to commute potentially innocent death row inmate's sentence to life.

It's the last work day before everything shuts down for Christmas Eve and I've still got so much to do. For those of you procrastinating, or just with leisure time (what a luxury), here's an open thread.

Open Thread.

Congress has passed a stop-gap budget bill. The new census reports are out and the U.S. has 308 million people. The power in Congress has shifted to the West and South. That may prove to help Democrats, notwithstanding recent Republican electoral gains:

[P]opulation gains in the South and West were driven overwhelmingly by minorities, particularly Hispanics, and the new districts, according to the rules of redistricting, will need to be drawn in places where they live, opening potential advantages for Democrats, who tend to be more popular among minorities.

TV seems dead for the next few weeks. It will be On Demand and Netflix till January. Not bad: Ben Affleck's "The Town." It's no "The Departed", but it's okay. Next up: Wall St. II. Not worth the time or money: Eat, Pray, Love. I'm still thinking about how good Intelligence was. If you get Netflix streaming, I highly recommend it. Here's a review. Caution: It's very addictive.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

I'm headed to court. Here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

College football bowl season has started and I have some selections. I'll be doing New Years Day bowl selections on, um, New Years Day. Here are this week's (through Sunday) pre-New Years Day Bowl picks:

Is anyone watching the season finale of Survivor? Or staying up late tomorrow night to catch a glimpse of the total lunar eclipse?

Or following the news of the treaty with Russia, events in N. or S. Korea, the violence on the Ivory Coast, the war in Afghanistan, the terror war in Yemen, the war on drugs, the war on the Constitution or the war on immigrants? There seems to be a war for everything these days. Except Christmas shopping.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

It's a beautiful Saturday here-- and the third weekend in a row I'll be spending it in a visiting booth at the federal detention center. Looking on the bright side, better the jail than the emergency room.

Lying here in the darkness
I Hear the sirens wail
Somebody's going to emergency
Somebody's going to jail
If you find somebody to love in this world
You better hang on tooth and nail
The wolf is always at the door

In a New York Minute, everything can change. If you have your freedom and health this holiday season, and are spending it with your loved ones, take a moment to appreciate it.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

What's going on in your world today?

It looks like the tax bill will pass the House sometime tonight or tomorrow morning at the latest.

Here's an open thread, all topics welcome.

Open Thread.