The Hillary-bashing “1984″ ad was one of the year’s first viral video sensations, way back in March.

Make no mistake. This presidential campaign has already changed the face of politics. Remember back when there was no YouTube, no televised debates every other day, no Facebook or MySpace profiles of the candidates? How did we all cope? Did we actually buy newspapers? Ack!

Over the holiday NYTimes.com whipped up a nifty little Top Ten List of the year’s best video-based campaign moments. From “Obama Girl” to that Obama/Hillary “1984″ Apple-spoofing ad to Huckabee’s Xmas ad (behold the glowing holy bookcase!) to talking snowmen it was the year the YouTube rewrote the rules.

This is only bound to get better as Iowa, New Hampshire and all the rest come barrelling through, too.

Lights! Webcam! Action!

A suicide bomber attacked a rally held by Benazir Bhutto in Rawalpindi this morning, killing Bhutto and at least 15 of her supporters.

The assassination of Benazir Bhutto is an alarming development for Pakistan and for the entire region as well as for the United States and U.S. foreign policy. This morning, a suicide bomber shot Bhutto five times and then detonated a bomb at a rally of the People’s Party of Pakistan (PPP). Bhutto died in hospital at 6:16 p.m. local time and more than 20 people were killed in the bomb blast.

A former prime minister and daughter of another former prime minister, Bhutto was far and away the most popular politician in Pakistan and was positioned to win the upcoming elections in Pakistan. George W. Bush and Condoleeza Rice had pinned their hopes on a power-sharing deal between Bhutto and Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s self-declared president, who came to power in a coup d’etat and who has resisted free and fair elections since then.

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As usual I’m a little late to this party, but last week the Washington Blade joined the Des Moines Register and endorsed Hillary Clinton. While major reservations are discussed about Team Clinton (Bill and Hillary) when it comes to gay stuff, “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and DOMA were put into place by Bill Clinton, the editorial makes the case the world when George Bush leaves office will be a wee bit complicated and Hillary Clinton has the experience, and work ethic, to guide the ship of state (sort of surprised Joe Biden’s name didn’t come up in seeing how he is the definition of a foreign policy wonk).

After throwing its weight behind Clinton, the editorial, written by Kevin Naff, goes on to compare the Republican and Democratic candidates when it comes to gay stuff, and the GOP is not up to snuff.

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The troops want to know — will it be war forever…?

The Washington Post would have us consider the Christmas Truce of 1914 — ironic, since the Post, along with the New York Times, were cheerleaders for the Bush administration in the run-up to the Iraq War.

But the Post’s complicity in the initiation of the Iraq war aside, the paper’s editorial is worth considering. The spontaneous outbreak of peace on the Western Front on Christmas Eve 1914 was one of the most remarkable developments of World War I. Dramatized in the 2005 film Joyeux Noel by Christian Carrion, the Christmas Truce represented the moment in which British, French and German troops realized the senselessness of the Great War as well as of war more generally. But it was not a purely altruistic sentiment; the men also seem to have realized that they were ordered to fight a war on behalf of national elites whose interests did not necessarily coincide with their own — namely, their personal survival as individuals. Read more…

You have to admire these kids for passion. A number of college students, even a guy from Romania, have signed up for a little thing called Ron Paul’s Christmas vacation. Get yourself to Iowa and the Republican candidate’s campaign will pay your room board so you can canvas the state for as many Paul voters as possible. One hundred folk signed up for the week before Christmas and 200 for the week leading up to the New Year.

This is some creative marketing. First it sounds sort of fun and it’s a good thing to add to the resume. However, I’m still unclear if this buzz is going to turn into actual votes for Paul. Yeah he’s kicking booty in raising cash from the Internet and has a base of enthusiastic supporters, but Paul has not picked up a major endorsement from a newspaper (unless you count writer Andrew Sullivan). Unlike John McCain, who seems to be gaining steam at the right moment, Paul’s poll ratings are weak (and that’s being charitable on this day after Cab Calloway’s 100th birthday). Will Paul nation get its groove on January 3? I have no idea!

The beginning of six months of primaries is just 10 days away - and the candidates are working harder than ever on the ground, attending church services and shaking hands and appearing on the Sunday talk shows.

Here’s a few things of interest that happened in the last few days:

Anyone But Romney

New Hampshire paper the Concord Monitor spent 13 paragraphs saying that they’d endorse any Republican but Romney, who they say seems like a Republican built from a kit. On its own, the Monitor might not have much sway - those who know say that it isn’t influential with Republican voters in the state. But in a week of slow news, the anti-endorsement has gotten so much play from other publications that it might sway those in NH and elsewhere who are on the fence about Romney.

Latest poll numbers and other news bits after the jump

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