According to current polling, January is shaping up to be a tough month for Mitt Romney. There are four contests in January: Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Florida. Romney currently leads only in New Hampshire while Newt Gingrich has a double digit lead in the other three states. But the Republican primary calendar in February looks more favorable for Romney. It could be the month that Romney breaks Gingrich’s January momentum before Super Tuesday, March 6th.

In the couple months since Alabama passed HB 56, among the harshest immigration laws in the nation, they have: a) seen crops rot in the fields because farmers cannot find workers to pick the fruits and vegetables, which has cost the state potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue; b) threatened the water service of potential undocumented immigrants; c) forced charities to seek citizenship papers from their recipients, even though that provision and others have been blocked by multiple courts; d) witnessed frustrated employers speak out about the loss of legal Hispanic workers, who have left the state in droves; e) led to 15% of Hispanic students being afraid to attend school; f) arrested top executives of two automakers, Mercedes-Benz and Honda, who were in the state overseeing their plants there.

Gregory Jaczko, the chairman of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, made some comments to the press earlier this week. Jaczko, it seems, is worried. He believes, as noted in an Associated Press story, that “U.S. nuclear plant operators have become complacent, just nine months after the nuclear disaster in Japan.” The NRC head thinks that a slew of events at over a dozen domestic nuclear facilities reveal the safety of America’s reactors to be something less than optimal.

To be clear, safety concerns at any kind of plant, be it a soda bottler or a microchip manufacturer, are probably not trivial, but when the safe and secure operation of a nuclear facility comes into question–as the aftermath of Chernobyl or the ongoing crisis in Japan will tell you–it ratchets up concern to a whole different level. So, when the man who more or less serves as the chief safety officer for the entirety of the nation’s nuclear infrastructure says he’s worried, many, many other people should be worried, too.

As the lovely Susan O’ Texas points out, our Lady of The $800 Robotic Diamond-Encrusted Fork & Spoonerator has her hotly anticipated Kitchen Gift List up, and by “hotly anticipated” we mean that McMegan is literally being deluged with special pleadings from readers desperately seeking direction lest Christmas become merely a celebration of our Lord and Savior instead of goody orgy… or so she tells us.

Rick Perry’s claims notwithstanding, not all Christians think LGBTs should be discriminated against. Yesterday’s Minneapolis Star-Tribune carried a powerful pro-equality voice: retired ELCA Presiding Bishop Herbert Chilstrom.

The tide is turning, both inside the church and beyond. And it’s not moving in favor of bigotry, homophobia, exclusion, and hate.

Just after 5: 00 a.m. ET, dozens of police and vans rolled up to Dewey Square to evict the remaining occupiers. See comments from eyewitness/occupiers starting at comment 20 below. According to other reports, some of the occupiers sat and linked arms, but, per reports, about 46 were arrested. The camp is now dismantled. Protestors are now gathering outside the city court house awaiting word this morning on the release of those arrested. Another reports says a GA is scheduled for 7:00 – 8:00 p.m. tonight on the Boston Commons.

Remember how worked up conservatives used to get over China’s charging the families of executed prisoners (political and otherwise) for the cost of the bullets used to kill them?

Funny how the killing of free speech in America doesn’t seem to bother them at all.

The only time I’ve ever been unable to communicate, many years ago, was with a nun who spoke no English, in San Jose, Costa Rica. My Spanish is abysmal. We hugged instead.

Andrea Bocelli and The Muppets — Jingle Bells.

For most of this year, Mitt Romney’s strategy seemed to be working beautifully.

With the Iowa caucuses only a few weeks away, though, there’s not much time left for Newt Gingrich — the latest standard-bearer for tea-party Republicans’ tangled fantasies and resentments — to self-destruct.