Turnover: A former federal judge acting as an arbitrator overturned the indefinite suspension of former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice for domestic violence. It’s a big setback for the NFL trying to police domestic violence by players, but the league also fumbled the Rice case.

Rice was suspended by the NFL and fired by the Ravens after the release of a video showing him knocking out his then fiancée in a hotel elevator. Rice successfully argued that he was punished twice for the same offense. He had been suspended for two games and fined $500,000 for the incident, but the league came back with the more severe penalty after the video went public. Rice could still have trouble finding a team that wants to pick up a guy who punched out the woman he married.

World: An Egyptian court has dismissed all remaining criminal charges against former President Hosni Mubarek, raising the possibility that he could go free. The 86-year-old Mubarek has been held since he was unseated in 2011. The judge ruled that Mubarek was not responsible for the deaths of hundreds of demonstrators during the Arab Spring.

>At least 81 people died yesterday in a suicide attack that appears to have been carried out by Boko Haram on a central mosque in Kano, one of Nigeria’s biggest cities. Many more were wounded. The assault involved gunfire and suicide bombers, one of whom was a woman. The blast took place near the palace of the emir of Kano, who has called for Nigerians to arm themselves and resist Boko Haram. He was not home.

>Islamic State forces have stepped up their attacks on the Syrian border town of Kobane. Syria claims that US-led airstrikes have failed to weaken the Islamic State extremists.

Taxi Wars: A Nevada judge has ordered the Uber ride service to stop operating in that state because it’s not regulated like regular taxi and transportation services. Uber’s lawyers argued that they should be exempt from regulations, but the judge asked, “Why did Uber choose to operate first without regulation? Why didn’t you try to change the law first, then operate?”

Culture Wars: Japan’s largest daily newspaper has apologized for using the term “sex slaves” for the last 20 years in reference to the women forced into sexual servitude for the Imperial army during World War II. The conservative Yomiuri Shimbun wrote that it has been a mistake to use the term “as if coercion by the Japanese government or the army was an objective fact.” There’s been a movement in Japan to paint a different face on some of the country’s behavior during the war. By varying estimates between 50,000 and 200,000 women from Japanese occupied countries, the majority of them Korean, were forced into prostitution. It’s an objective fact.

Full Metal Christmas: Nothing says “Merry Christmas” like a new gun. The FBI reports that yesterday, on what’s become the busiest shopping day of the year, gun buyers set a record of 144,000 background checks through the federal system. That’s about three per second. Let’s leave some extra milk, cookies, and ammo for Santa this year.

-30-