Over in Iraq, another 70 people died in a single suicide bombing.  Iraq Body Count has it, unofficially, at 121 for the week.  (Full incident listing — updated only through June 1, for some reason — is found here.  By comparison, the May 2009 total — unofficial, per Iraq Body Count — is 344.  By further comparison, for years 2003-2007 inclusive, Canada averaged about 607 homicides per year.)

Meanwhile…

Need some weapons // On the double

Call Kim Jong-il // No more trouble

Myanmar Shave

Do you remember when your momma said not to eat the cookie dough, before cookie dough became all hip and wonderful due to the interference of Ben and Jerry? Well, she was right!  Always listen to your momma.

Down in Miami, there’s a trend among condo owners — namely, not paying the assessment after getting foreclosed on.  Which is causing all sorts of problems, certainly.

And a couple of guys in New Orleans printed up a couple “Brad Pitt For Mayor” tee-shirts, and now all holy hell has broken loose.

Apparently, there is an unmet need.  And, thus: The Congressional Sovereignty Caucus.

The newspaper crisis isn’t limited to U.S. America, as the dirty commies working at Canada City’s newspaper of record vote to strike.  (In other tales of Canadian high finance: Molson gets a hockey team, while the chief of Research in Motion does not.)

Ahnold’s plane forced into emergency landing.  In other news of flight: RML’s neighborhood about to get more interesting, as groundbreaking takes place for New Mexico’s spaceport.  Spaceport duty-free shopping to follow presently.

Gordon Brown, after the European election drubbing, opens an inquiry into Iraq, and promptly closes it to the public… possibly at the direct request of Tony Blair.

The Junior Senator From The State Of Illinois (says so right on his pre-fab tombstone, so it’s true!) evades a perjury charge.  Of course he does.

As mentioned in a thread earlier today: Richard M. Daley, Mayor — whilst promoting the Chicago 2016 Olympic bid — kited a check.  A really big one.

Faced with losing the 2016 Summer Games to competing cities offering full government guarantees, Mayor Richard Daley made an about-face Wednesday and said the City of Chicago would sign a contract agreeing to take full financial responsibility for the Games.  In a worst-case situation, such as severe cost-overruns or a catastrophic event, the agreement could leave taxpayers on the hook for hundreds of millions of dollars or even more, a scenario Chicago’s bid team acknowledges but insists is far-fetched.

Far-fetched my ass.  This is Chicago.  There will be “cost-overruns.”  (These are referred to, in other parts of the world, as “kickbacks.”)  Everybody knows this.  And so the City Council — recently burned on a parking meter privatization deal that Rich pushed through and has since gone horribly, horribly wrong — wants another look. 

Now: the reigning World Champion of Hope is going to Denmark in October when the final vote is taken.  If Chicago wins, it shows Barry’s power and influence.  If the bid fails, then it will be taken as a sign of the bloom coming off his rose.  And, in fact, the outcome could have nothing to do with Barry, and everything to do with purely local politics — pressure on the City to use money for other things (like, oh, I don’t know, schools), anger over sudden increases in taxes and fees at precisely the wrong moment, corruption and graft and patronage and on and on. 

The intricacies of all of this could fill a book.  As could the bullshit.  This is going to be fun.

Well, it looks like we have a wiener:

SEOUL, South Korea – The youngest son of North Korea’s authoritarian leader has been given the title of “Brilliant Comrade,” a newspaper reported Friday, a sign the communist regime is preparing to name him as successor to the ailing Kim Jong Il.

U.S. and South Korean intelligence authorities disclosed during a meeting this week that 26-year-old Kim Jong Un is now being referred to in the secretive regime as “Yongmyong-han Dongji,” which translates roughly as “Brilliant Comrade,” South Korea’s mass-circulation JoongAng Ilbo newspaper reported.

News hasn’t reached DPRK populace yet.  Damn DTV switchover.

Posted without further comment — for none is necessary:

“Slain Kansas abortion provider’s clinic to close”

Bad news, everybody — it looks like, apart from the midwestern breakthrough, gay marriage is staying behind the Chowdah Curtain.  See, New York’s Senate just ‘sploded this afternoon.

In a dramatic late afternoon overthrow of the Senate leadership, Senate Republicans joined by two dissident Democrats took control of the upper chamber and installed Sen. Pedro Espada as president… Espada, D-Bronx, who returned to Albany in January after a hiatus, said he is a voice for reform Democrats and that more reformers will be joining his lead. He and Sen. Hiram Monserrate of Queens joined the 30 Senate Republicans to remove all leadership put into place at the start of year when Sen. Malcolm Smith became the majority leader.

Ah, “hiatus.”  Turns out that the two turncoats are as crooked as the day is long.  But whereas this might be a drawback in non-Illinois Democratic circles, this is a definite plus in the GOP of today.  Sheesh.

Oh, sad Gordon Brown. About to get relieved of his pants in elections for the European Parliament tomorrow — with dissatisfaction so rampant that xenophobic clowns from the British National Party are in with a chance to scoop a seat.  Cabinet ministers quitting left and right — with the Chancellor about ready to walk the plank next.  The backbenches in more-or-less open revolt.

Technically speaking, Labour could hang on for another year.  But the stain of self-serving pols on the take has just about set.  Things could change if the economy turns around in a hurry, but … stick a fork in him, methinks.