Reformation Sunday! In honor of it, here's an article about the place where Martin Luther did his best thinking (thanks for the heads-up, C.A.W.). Here's a nice collection of readings by Luther and other reformers.

• A dispatch from a Reality-Based Community:

  A comprehensive four-year study of warming in the Arctic shows that heat-trapping gases from tailpipes and smokestacks around the world are contributing to profound environmental changes, including sharp retreats of glaciers and sea ice, thawing of permafrost and shifts in the weather, the oceans and the atmosphere...
  
  The report says that "while some historical changes in climate have resulted from natural causes and variations, the strength of the trends and the patterns of change that have emerged in recent decades indicate that human influences, resulting primarily from increased emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, have now become the dominant factor."
  
  The Arctic "is now experiencing some of the most rapid and severe climate change on Earth," the report says, adding, "Over the next 100 years, climate change is expected to accelerate, contributing to major physical, ecological, social and economic changes, many of which have already begun."

• Matthew Yglesias agrees with me about the impact of the new OBL tape; so does Digsby; and Richard Clarke; and, um, the Bush Campaign, who are calling it (with uncharacteristic candor) Osama's "little gift." I'm not saying it's going to sway the election to Bush; I'm just saying I think that's the intent. (Here's a little theory to chew on.)
  
  (Update: I wrote that paragraph last night (but didn't post it until today), and today's polls are showing that - regardless of the intent - it doesn't seem to be working; folks are either largely unmoved by it, or it just confirms their earlier position (and here).
  
  
• It sounds remarkably shallow to call Farnaz Fassihi's Baghdad Diary a "must-read." But you really must read it. (You might have seen an excerpt of it earlier, either here on Left At The Altar or in an email that circulated widely.)
  
  
• Look quickly! There are genuine reporters working for Knight Ridder!
  
  
• An extra big thanks to the Packers, but we still have to do our part and GOTV!