Bloggers are bristling at comparisons between the lives lost on 9/11 and soldiers lost in the Iraq war, ruminating on the end of Turkmenistan's eccentric dictator, and mourning the loss of James Brown.

An unjustified comparison: An Associated Press story about Christmas Day casualties in Iraq took pains to point out that the number of American soldiers who have perished in Iraq—2,978—is now greater than the Sept. 11 death toll—2,973. Bloggers of all political persuasions are wondering why these numbers are being compared.

Conservative heavyweight Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs is all fire and brimstone at the way this milestone is being spun: "They've obviously been watching and waiting for this magic number, to file a report like this—an empty-headed, amoral attempt to equate things that are not equivalent, serving a sick, anti-American left-wing agenda."

At Islam-focused blog Clarity & Resolve, Patrick is breathless with anger: "It's an insulting pathological anti-America yellow journalism bonanza as the deaths of our young heroes in Iraq are mashed through the mainstream media moral equivalence filter." At Fore Left!, moderate A.C. McCloud's suspicions about the mainstream media are confirmed by this story. "Glorifying this factoid is perhaps the clearest indication yet of media bias," he writes.

"A key question—with an unknowable answer—is: How many Americans would have died in post-9/11 attacks if we had not chosen the path of fighting back?" moderate law prof Ann Althouse wonders.

Some bloggers do see significance in the numbers. Over at Blondesense, liberal Liz is livid—and not at the AP. "[T]o to me it means that we doubled the amount of people killed on 9/11 plus we actually made terrorism worse, not to mention we practically obliterated Iraq for no good reason and Afghanistan is worse than ever. Heck of a job, bushie," she writes.

Chicagoan Driftglass laments, "Of course since the conquest and occupation of Iraq had nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11, passing this particular number should have no intrinsically tragic value greater or less than any other, but it does."

Read more about the 9/11 and Iraq death toll comparison.

Turkmenbashi is dead—long live Turkmenbashi: Pity the megalomaniac who dies on the Friday before Christmas! Troubled Turkmenistan's president-for-life, 66-year-old Saparmurat Niyazov, passed away from an apparent heart attack on Dec. 22. Buried on Dec. 24, Turkmenbashi—or "father of all Turkmen," a name he gave himself—is survived by an elaborate personality cult complete with heliotropic gold statue, a trove of arbitrary legislation (including laws banning facial hair and lip synching), 5.1 million mourning Turkmen, and the world's fifth-largest proven reserves of natural gas.

Peter at New Eurasia's Turkmenistan blog thinks a thaw will be slow to arrive: "[W]hatever should happen, rapid change is not and cannot be possible. For all the bogus qualities that Niyazov's personality cult may have had, it has still left a indelible cultural legacy and an overwhelming physical one. Even an unlikely vehemently anti-Niyazov ascendant would be ill-advised to consider pulling down statues and renaming streets, monuments and cities."