(CBS)  With millions of sites floating through the blogosphere, who really has time to peek at even a fraction of them? Blogophile reads them for you and presents a weekly roundup of the buzz on must-read blogs. Blogophile appears new each Wednesday, and is written by CBSNews.com's Melissa P. McNamara.

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A pizza man's plans for a new town he's financing have at least one blogger switching to Papa John's. Find out why. And, while politicians discuss Shiite-Sunni strife in Iraq, bloggers in Iraq describe what conditions there are like. Hear what they have to say.


Is Ville de Papa John's Next?

One of the most blogged about stories over the weekend was Domino's Pizza founder Thomas S. Monaghan’s plan for a new Florida town he’s building, Ava Maria. Initial reports were that Monaghan said the town would be governed according to strict Roman Catholic principles, with no place to get an abortion, pornography or birth control. The pizza magnate is bankrolling the project with at least $250 million and calls it "God's will."

But last Friday, Monaghan backtracked from his comments, and said the strict Roman Catholic principles apply only to the Catholic university.

Vargas at Minutiae et Obscura says if anyone has a problem with Ava Maria, they can leave. "The people choosing to live there most likely agree that these things should be outlawed anyway and it doesn't stop one from leaving the town and getting what you want from another city or town…I have no idea whether this is feasible but they have every right to try and make it work," she writes.

Christopher Scott Sarno disagrees. "Cordoning off an entire city so that its residents will never have to be exposed to things they don't agree with only perpetuates and even facilitates an anti-pluralist belief system that will most definitely lead to trouble. What we'll ultimately be left with is a society that devalues diversity, children that do not understand the faith and values of people different from themselves, and a breeding ground for hate-filled dogma," Sarno writes.

"Besides, I've always been partial to Papa John, anyway," he says. Ouch.

Katherine at Cut to the Chase simply labels it "another reason to avoid Florida."

Other bloggers had little problem with the religious edicts, but with the fact that Monaghan was pouring so much money into the deal. As The Impolitic writes, "Gotta love the ownership society. If you don't like the America you have, you can just build a new one for yourself. This has to be the ultimate in gated communities."


Baghdad Blogging

By simply scanning CBSNews.com, it's easy to imagine that Baghdad isn't the easiest place to live these days. But what is it really like to be living in Baghdad while sectarian violence rages? For Iraqi bloggers, questioning whether the country is hovering at the level of civil war is hardly a political debate. It's the difference between whether they can leave their house safely or not.

"The last few days have been unsettlingly violent in spite of the curfew. We’ve been at home simply waiting it out and hoping for the best. The phone wasn’t working and the electrical situation hasn’t improved," an Iraqi female writes on Baghdad Burning. She continues: "We are at a point, however, where things like electricity, telephones and fuel seem like minor worries. Even complaining about them is a luxury Iraqis can’t afford these days. I'm reading, and hearing, about the possibility of civil war. Yet I'm sitting here wondering if this is actually what civil war is like. Has it become a reality?...It is like a nightmare in that you don’t realize it's a nightmare while having it - only later, after waking up with your heart throbbing, and your eyes searching the dark for a pinpoint of light, do you realize it was a nightmare."

For Zayed, a young Sunni dentist, the rattle of guns means it was a peaceful night. "I stubbornly refused to go to work today, although it was a semi-peaceful night before, with only the random AK-47 rattle nearby, or the distant mortar shell disturbing our well-deserved sleep," Zayed writes Healing Iraq. “I went out for a stroll in the neighbourhood, meeting friends and neighbours, exchanging gossip and stories of the continuing carnage…I guess I am just sick and disgusted of it all."

By Melissa McNamara
©MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Healing Iraq
Blurb
Lifehacker
Baghdad Girl
The Impolitic

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