Cheers and jeers from around the news:

• An otherwise peaceful Thanksgiving in the U.S. was shattered by news of terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India. The scenes of sorrow from the metropolitan capital were sadly, and shockingly, reminiscent of the 9/11 attacks in New York City. Offering a simple “jeers” would be understatement.

As India grapples with its tragedy, the world has turned attention to the United States and its leadership transition. How the president and president-elect handle this matter, internally and externally, is a critical moment in geopolitics.

President-elect Barack Obama and President George W. Bush must cast aside ideological differences to confront this crisis with unity and clarity. For Bush, this is a chance to restore luster on a foreign policy legacy that could be described as calamitous.

For Obama, this is an opportunity to establish his credentials on foreign affairs, in which his experience was questioned in the campaign.

The attacks in Mumbai may throw a strategically important and dangerous region of the world into turmoil. Prospects of growing hostilities between India and Pakistan – and their nuclear arsenals – will require delicate diplomacy to quiet. A divided U.S. effort cannot offer that.

Obama and Bush must work as a team.

• Cheers to the turnout in Lewiston on Nov. 24 regarding the $1.5 billion electrical transmission project proposed by Central Maine Power. Public interest and engagement in CMP’s plans is needed to shape the future of an important infrastructure upgrade.

Before going further, the Maine Public Utilities Commission should insist CMP re-route its proposed transmission lines to avoid infringing on or bisecting the sanctuaries managed by the Stanton Bird Club, Woodbury in Monmouth and Litchfield, and Thorncrag in Lewiston.

Doing so would be a good-faith move by CMP, to recognize the importance of these preserves and the necessity to balance its project’s interests with those of the communities.

The lengthy review of this project, the Maine Power Reliability Program, is just starting. By agreeing to re-route lines to preserve the sanctuaries, CMP would set the right tone of compromise going forward.

• And cheers to Sen. Susan Collins and Sen. Olympia Snowe, for co-authoring and co-sponsoring, respectively, a Senate resolution condemning the insane stoning death of a 13-year-old Somali girl for the farcical crime of adultery.

While the senators deserve applause for issuing this stinging condemnation – the girl, Aisha Ibrahim Duhulow, was a victim of rape – they must also recognize that the troubles in Somalia are deeper than one betrayal of justice.

Snowe, Collins and their Senate colleagues seized on the savage treatment of Duhulow to draw greater attention to the overall plight of Somalia. They, and their counterparts in Europe who acted likewise, have done so.

Yet their words must be followed by action. Somalia has been deaf to the world for too long.

The country must be made to listen.