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Early Sunday morning, firefighters rushed to put out a two-alarm blaze at the Church of St. Luke and St. Matthew, located on the border between Prospect Heights and Fort Greene. Investigators believe that someone poured gasoline around the building's front doors — two canisters were found nearby — and lit the fire at around 3:30 in the morning. Three Occupy Sandy volunteers were asleep inside at the time (the church has served as one of the movement's headquarters since the hurricane), but no injuries were reported.

NYT:

"The Rev. Christopher Ballard, the church’s curate, said the flames had caused “significant damage,” burning the wooden doors of two entrances and charring the foyer. The sanctuary, he said, remained largely unscathed. No one was injured.

Though the police said the cause remained under investigation, Father Ballard said the fire had been fueled by a pair of gasoline containers donated to Occupy Sandy volunteers, who had used the church as a staging area for hurricane relief efforts. The gasoline was intended to be used in a generator for a Christmas party in the Rockaways on Sunday night. Father Ballard said the containers had been put outside when the church was cleared of most donated materials to make way for Christmas services.

“Somebody decided to take those canisters, dump them on the doors of the church and set the gas on fire,” he said. “We don’t know why someone would do this, what darkness is in someone’s heart.”

Father Ballard noted that the church had been rebuilt after a devastating fire in 1914. Councilwoman Letitia James, who represents the area, expressed outrage at what she called a hateful arson. “We will find the sick individual who committed this crime,” she said, standing outside the church."

100 firefighters worked to put out the blaze.

NY1:

Members of the congregation were worried for what the church contained: supplies and Christmas gifts for New Yorkers affected by Hurricane Sandy.

Since the storm struck on October 29, thousands of volunteers, included members of the Occupy Sandy movement, have come to the church to be part of relief efforts.

On Saturday, a group of volunteers wrapped holiday gifts for children affected by Sandy at the church.

"We had about 100 volunteers in the church yesterday, wrapping gifts for children who were displaced by the storm," said Michael Sniffen, the church's rector.

"We've been sending people out to affected areas. We're sending out hot food and clothes, blankets, cleaning supplies, baby supplies, baby food, baby toys," said LJ Marquez, an Occupy Sandy volunteer.

Church members and volunteers said the fire will not hinder their efforts. On Sunday, volunteers were sent to another site, St. John's Episcopal Church in Fort Hamilton.

The Sandy volunteers have pledged to work 7 days a week during the holidays to continue to bring hot meals to Sandy victims in Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island.

Volunteers who want to help Occupy Sandy can go to one of the group's bases, with no need to call beforehand. For more information, visit interoccupy.net/occupysandy.

The Church of St. Luke And St. Matthew will reopen for Christmas Eve services at 10 PM and Christmas Day services at 10 AM on December 25th.

Occupy Sandy will not be taking donations until after December 27th, as was previously scheduled.

This historic essay published in the New Yorker from August 1946 recounts the story of six survivors of the atomic blast at Hiroshima, 8:15 am August 6, 1945. This is an incredible piece of journalism, offering much perspective on nuclear power, especially if it is considered alongside the more recent nuclear meltdown at Fukushima – which is the subject of the documentary, Reaktor, featured in the video above.

What Do You Want for Christmas, Detroit? from The Detroit Journal on Vimeo.

Good morning, today is December 24, 2012. What do you want for Christmas?

Your morning open thread begins below.

In this timely essay, Bill urges us to remember the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre by name. He also rejects the notion of doubling down on guns and body armor as a response, and encourages all of us to work hard on realistic and moral solutions.

“Laws are hard to come by, civilization just as hard” Bill says. “But democracy aims for a moral order as just as possible — which means laws that protect the weak, and not just the strong.”

Today we remember:

Charlotte Bacon, 6

Daniel Barden, 7

Rachel D’Avino, 29

Olivia Engel, 6

Josephine Gay, 7

Ana Marquez-Greene, 6

Dylan Hockley, 6

Dawn Hochsprung, 47

Madeleine Hsu, 6

Catherine Hubbard, 6

Chase Kowalski, 7

Jesse Lewis, 6

James Mattioli, 6

Grace McDonnell, 7

Anne Marie Murphy, 52

Emilie Parker, 6

Jack Pinto, 6

Noah Pozner, 6

Caroline Previdi, 6

Jessica Rekos, 6

Avielle Richman, 6

Lauren Rousseau, 30

Mary Sherlach, 56

Victoria Soto, 27

Benjamin Wheeler, 6

Allison Wyatt, 6

[Via]

Lawrence O'Donnell condemned NRA president Wayne LaPierre on Friday for his press conference about the Newtown massacre in a special edition of his MSNBC show, "The Last Word."

O'Donnell doesn't usually work on Fridays, but he made a special exception for LaPierre. The gun lobbyist called for armed police officers in every school. To say his comments were widely criticized would be an understatement.

O'Donnell called LaPierre a "lobbyist for mass murderers," and blasted him for trying to score cheap points with NRA members during his press conference by making a point to note that the media had gotten a fact wrong about the power of the gun shooter Adam Lanza used.

“Is there really something to quibble about in how powerful a bullet is when it is heading toward a six-year-old at the speed of 3200 feet per second," asks O'Donnell. "What kind of desperate, cornered rat would dare to mention that the Sandy Hook shooter could have used a more powerful bullet? Could have what? Done more damage? Made the bodies of six-year-olds even more difficult to identify?"

All of O'Donnell's comments were spot on, and I'm just going to give you the full text of the rest of his remarks, and I give him extra kudos for getting through his commentary without a single word that needed bleeped!

"So today, the NRA announced that it has a solution. Complete solution to gun violence in America, mass murders in America. Their solution is the national school shield program, a police officer with a gun in every school.

Now, he didn`t announce a national movie theater shield program with a police officer in every movie theater in America. Wayne LaPierre has in fact never spoken one word about 6-year-old Veronica Moser Sullivan, who was murdered in that movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, along with 11 other people, and 58 wounded, 58.

All of that, death and savagery was delivered from an ammunition delivery system so big it isn`t called a magazine. It`s called a drum. It holds 100 rounds.

Wayne LaPierre is the lobbyist who made it possible for the mass murderer in the Aurora, Colorado, movie theater to be able to shoot and kill and wound so many people without reloading even once.

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The author of a new report on U.S. carbon billionaires give a tour of the Kochtopus — a map of the empire of Charles and David Koch. The Kochs run oil refineries and control thousands of miles of pipeline, giving them a massive personal stake in the fossil fuel industry. Democracy Now! is joined by Victor Menotti, executive director of the International Forum on Globalization.

Read the new report at KochCash.org

Full transcript after the jump.

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In this new ad from MoveOn.org, voters remind President Obama that one of the reasons they voted for him in November is because they trust him to protect Social Security and Medicare.

Bowling for Columbine is a 2002 documentary film written, produced, directed, and narrated by Michael Moore. The film explores what Moore suggests are the causes for the Columbine High School massacre in 1999 and other acts of violence with guns. Moore focuses on the background and environment in which the massacre took place and some common public opinions and assumptions about related issues. The film also looks into the nature of violence in the United States.

The film brought Moore international attention as a rising filmmaker and won numerous awards, including the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, the Independent Spirit Award for Best Documentary Feature, a special 55th Anniversary Prize at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival and the César Award for Best Foreign Film.

Bowling for Columbine will also been shown Friday evening on Current TV.

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Lawrence O'Donnell read the entire op-ed which appeared in the L.A. Times in his rewrite segment this Thursday evening: Loughner’s Judge Makes Conservative Plea For Gun Control:

Larry Alan Burns, the federal district judge in San Diego who just last month sentenced Tuscon shooter Jared Lee Loughner to seven consecutive life terms plus 140 years in federal prison, is no darling of the gun control movement.

Burns is a self-described conservative, appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush, and he agrees with the Supreme Court’s decision in District of Columbia vs. Heller, which held that the 2nd Amendment gives Americans the right to own guns for self-defense. He is also a gun owner.

But while sentencing Loughner in November, Burns questioned the need for high-capacity magazines like the one Loughner had in his Glock, and said he regretted how the Federal Assault Weapons Ban was allowed to lapse in 2004. On Thursday, reacting to last week’s mass shooting in Newtown, Conn., Burns publicly called for a new assault weapons ban “with some teeth this time,” in an op-ed published by The Los Angeles Times.

A conservative case for an assault weapons ban:

If we can't draw a sensible line on guns, we may as well call the American experiment in democracy a failure.

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