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The sole Pakistani terrorist arrested in connection with the attacks in Mumbai told Indian authorities that he received help from locals in India's financial capital, according to the Times of India. Azam Amir Kasab reportedly shared "names and addresses of at least five people from the city who helped the terror operation" that killed 195 people over three days of violence. The police commissioner confirmed: "We suspect there could be local assistants but it is subject to verification. It will be very premature to comment on this at this stage as our investigations is going on." Kasab also told police the terrorists "were sent with a specific mission of targeting Israelis to avenge atrocities on Palestinians."
From his surprising showing in the front-loaded primary season to his shunning of public campaign financing, the conventional wisdom has been that Obama marshaled his massive war chest Howard-Dean style, powered by an army of small donors. But a report by the nonpartisan Campaign Finance Institute has now crunched the numbers, finding (to its own surprise, it says) that Obama's base of small donors was about the same size as that of George W. Bush in 2004. The institute found that, rather than the 50% figure often reported during the campaign, only about one-quarter of Obama's contributions came from people whose total donations were less than $200. It says the disparity emerged by counting donations below $200 as "small" even if that same donor went out to give thousands more.
An interesting analysis by the Wall Street Journal found otherwise unnoticed commonalities among the 14 people that President Bush pardoned last week: "Many of them are church-going, blue-collar workers from rural areas (and ardent Bush supporters) who had little trouble finding jobs after their convictions" and firearms played an important role in their lives. At least half of the 14 are former hunters or shooters and five admitted to seeking a pardon to "win back the right to bear arms."
Former Clinton treasury secretary Robert Rubin, a director at troubled Citigroup, acknowledged in an interview with the Wall Street Journal that he was involved in a board decision to ramp up risk-taking in 2004 and 2005, but said if executives had executed the plan properly, the bank's losses would have been less. And he claimed the board could not oversee everything in detail. “The board can’t run the risk book of a company. The board as a whole is not going to have a granular knowledge” of operations, he said. Rubin, who has earned $115 million from Citi since 1999, excluding stock options, says he could have earned far more. "I bet there's not a single year where I couldn't have gone somewhere else and made more," he told the Journal. Does he have any regrets? “I guess that I don’t think of it quite that way,” he said.
Barack and Michelle Obama aren't just trendsetters in politics and
style: experts say they "represent a welcome change as an openly
affectionate and romantic couple for many Americans." Intentionally or
not, the new First Couple will have the White House bully pulpit to
set an example. "With such a high percentage of black people
unmarried, everyone is looking for images of black love," said Michael
Perry, a librarian at Harlem's Schomburg Center for Research in Black
Culture. "[The Obamas] personify that. It makes people say, 'Wow, we
want to be like them.'"
Two UN contractors were killed and 15 others wounded in a rocket
attack that rattled the Baghdad's Green Zone, the UN confirmed. This
is the first such strike since a ceasefire between the Iraqi
government and supporters of the anti-American Shia cleric Moqtada
Sadr was agreed to earlier this year. On Thursday, the parliament
approved a pact with the U.S. that means American forces would be out
of the country at the end of 2011.
The election is over but interest in former Republican vice
presidential nominee Sarah Palin is not. She "continues to dominate
search engine queries, cable news and online video sites," Politico
reports. "The only American politician who generates comparable
interest is President-elect Barack Obama. No one else is close."
Palin, of course, has helped fuel the attention with high-profile
appearances and interviews.
Chris Matthews, the MSNBC host of Hardball, is plotting a campaign in 2012 for the U.S. Senate from Pennsylvania against long-time Republican incumbent Arlen Specter, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times. Matthews would run as a Democrat; Specter would be 80-years-old then. Matthews denied the report, but Pennsylvania Democratic Party Chairman T.J. Rooney said Matthews had been in the state meeting with local Democratic leaders. If he runs, Matthews might face primary opposition from two U.S. representatives, Joe Shestak, a former admiral, and Allyson Schwartz, who ran for the senate in 2000. A Quinnipiac University poll released on Wednesday showed Specter beating Matthews 45 percent to 33 percent. The Washington Monthly suggests that given the history of Matthews' controversial statements "the MSNBC host would have a lot of explaining to do before Pennsylvania Democrats gave him the nod."
Once was enough for Rosie O'Donnell to try her hand at hosting a variety hour. "There will b no more," she blogged about her much-hyped Thanksgiving Eve special. "No ratings. bad reviews. yet still – a thrill 4 me." Only 5 million viewers tuned into the NBC show while 11.5 million watched Barbara Walters' interview with President-elect Barack Obama on ABC.
There were more shoppers than shopping bags. Even many die-hard Black Friday shoppers —who camp out on sidewalks overnight to be first through the doors — said they were cutting back. Those who did shop were often pleasantly surprised by the ease with which they moved through stores. Only discount chains were bustling long before sunrise. The New York Times reports, “The days of malls clogged with people on Black Friday are fast disappearing.”
Liza Minnelli is heading back to Broadway for the first time in 10 years and in a promotional interview lets slip what it was like to be married, briefly, to her former producer David Gest. “I don’t remember those shows well, because it was so complicated,” she said. I wasn’t in charge of anything. I was being shoved around a lot. … I didn’t have much say,” she told Charles Isherwood of the New York Times. “I don’t have somebody telling me, ‘Be quiet.’ None of that in my life anymore. It’s just so wonderful to not be tied down for the first time.” As for her state of mind, “I have never felt better in my life. I feel free. I feel happy. I feel completely solid. Calmer and more focused. I understand how intelligent I am.”
Frank Gehry is the biggest "starchitect" in the world, but "the biggest threat to Gehry's legacy may be the Gehry brand itself," according to The Washington Post. A pair of new Gehry buildings—a library at Princeton and an expansion at an art museum in Toronto—underscore "a growing sense that his most acclaimed work, buildings made in the style of Bilbao, have turned out to be dead ends. Rather than open up new possibilities for the architect, they seem to have left him in a rut. And as his most recent projects suggest, Gehry's best work today may be his least 'Gehryesque.'" Per author Philip Kennicott: "[W]hat he definitely needs less of is the old Gehry glibness, which dominated his work for two decades, often diminishing it to triviality. The Gehryesque can be left to other architects, who may make more sense of it. What Frank Gehry needs now is a new chapter, a last act, a purifying of his life's work into something final and thoughtful. A summation."
More Rupert Murdoch trivia dribbling out from his authorized hagiographer, Michael Wolff. His book is published in January by Murdoch’s HarperCollins, who we are told was “instantly wild about the notion — and the chance to do something for Murdoch.” How did the book come about? “I sensed he might be open to the attention — that he was proud of winning the Wall Street Journal,” writes Wolff. And what did he find? “Murdoch, at 77, can’t use a computer, doesn’t get email, can’t get his cell phone to work properly, can’t even imagine changing the variables on a spread sheet.” And, “Contravening all rules of modern analytic management, [Murdoch] acts almost entirely on impulse — his method is all based on instinct, urge, gossip (i.e. a more or less random collection of things he’s been told), and the impelling force of immediate and casual circumstance.” And his conclusion? “The joke is that this greatest of modern businessmen, the architect of the synergised, cross-platform, integrated, global media company, has no vision, no method, no strategy.”
Indian commandos finally killed the last Islamist terrorists barricaded in Mumbai's Taj Mahal hotel, ending a three-day battle that has left at least 195 people dead and more than 300 people injured. Troops from India's crack Black Cats unit engaged in a running battle with the remaining terrorists through rooms and corridors this morning. Shortly afterwards, the Mumbai police chief, Hasan Gafoor, said his force had regained control of the hotel, where the terrorists used hostages as human shields. The Indian army found the terrorists were well trained. "At times we found them matching us in combat and movement. They were either army regulars or have done a long stint of commando training," a commando told the Hindustan Times. And they were well equipped. A bag found in the Taj contained 400 rounds of ammunition, grenades, identity cards, rations, $1,000 in cash and credit cards.
“Many of my American colleagues are not quite sure what it is,” said American Vogue editor Anna Wintour, leaving Buckingham Palace after being awarded the Order of the British Empire. “It's a great honor,” she said. The Brits gave her the medal and sash for supporting British fashion. “I've worked very hard to support British fashion in the States through the exhibition called Anglomania, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (in New York), and my support of designers like Alexander McQueen and John Galliano," she explained. True to style, she wore a real fur wrap over a grey two-piece business suit.
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