2012 in three paragraphs

Swine flu, renamed under pork-lobby pressure to “influenza A (H1N1) virus, human,” and referred to as “killer Mexican flu” by anti-immigration activists, had infected 985 people, or 0.0000145 percent of the world’s population. Twenty countries reported infections; one death from the flu was confirmed in the United States; and 25 people had died in Mexico, where a cute five-year-old boy named Edgar Hernandez was presented to the media as “patient zero.”SFGate.comUSA TodayThe World Health OrganizationThe GuardianThe New York Daily NewsMexico shut down for five days to contain the illness,The TelegraphChina began to quarantine Mexicans,The Wall Street Journaland Vice President Joe …

An American cattleman. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that 651,000 jobs were lost in February (making it the third straight month in which more than 650,000 jobs have been lost) thus increasing the unemployment rate to 8.1 percent, the highest level since 1983. The Obama Administration pointed to 60 new highway-paving jobs in Maryland as proof that the $787 billion stimulus package was succeeding. “That’s how we’re going to get the country back on its feet,” said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood. The White House hopes that the stimulus package will generate 3.5 million jobs; 4.4 million have been …

An American cattleman. Gunmen terrorizedMumbai for more than two days, killing at least 180 people during attacks at a train station, a restaurant, two five-star hotels, a movie theater, a hospital, a police station, and a Jewish center. At the peak of the violence more than one tweet per second with the word “Mumbai” was being posted to Twitter.com. Indian authorities claimed there were only ten attackers, with nine killed and one captured, but others, including the captive gunman, suggested that many others were involved in the attacks. Evidence suggested that the Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistani militant group that has fought …

The Treasury Department seized control of mortgage and loan giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, firing the companies’ chief executives and promising to provide as much as $200 billion to prevent insolvency.New York TimesThe jobless rate rose from 5.7 percent to a five-year high of 6.1 percent, with more than 84,000 jobs lost in August,Yahoo and Senator John McCain accepted the Republican Party’s nomination for the presidency.KTLA.com“This campaign is not about issues,” said McCain’s campaign manager, Rick Davis. “This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates.”Washington PostIt emerged that McCain did not properly …

The U.S. Office of Thrift Supervision seized the IndyMac Bank of California, worth an estimated 32 billion dollars, after the bank’s closure in the wake of mortgage industry collapse,AFPand the Bush Administration proposed a rescue package for ailing mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that would allow the Treasury to buy billions of dollars of their stock and lend them billions more to meet their short-term funding needs. The two companies’ total debt is estimated at $1.54 trillion.NYTimesAbu Dhabi bought New York City’sChrysler building for $800 million,GuardianUKand the Belgian brewer InBev planned to buy Anheuser-Busch for nearly $50 billion.AP …

Senator Barack Obama, having amassed more than the 2,118 delegates needed to secure a majority, was acknowledged as the Democratic presidential nominee and claimed victory before a crowd of almost 20,000 people in St. Paul, Minnesota, knocking knuckles with his wife, Michelle, in a gesture known as “dap.” “It thrilled a lot of black folks,” said author Ta-Nehisi Coates. “He wears his cultural blackness all over the place. Barack is like Black Folks 2.0.”New York TimesWashington PostEarlier that evening, Senator John McCain delivered a speech to a crowd of a few hundred in Kenner, Louisiana, in which he tried to …

Hillary Clinton gained nine more delegates than Barack Obama in the Pennsylvania primary and challenged him to debate without a moderator. Obama, who declined, reportedly seemed “tired” and “brittle” campaigning in Indiana. “Seniors, listen up,” he said. “I’m getting gray hair myself. Running for president will age you quick.” New York TimesAPTelegraphJohn McCain’s campaign received a $1,000 discount on the rental fee for a public space for a fundraiser in Homewood, Alabama, along with $100 worth of free labor from the inmates of a local jail.Birmingham NewsAll three candidates taped messages for World Wrestling Entertainment’s “W.W.E. Raw”: Clinton declared herself …

Caught in the Web, 1860. Senator Barack Obama beat Senator Hillary Clinton by huge margins in primaries in Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia, and Senator John McCain beat former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee. The close Democratic race worried party superdelegates, who will play a decisive role in choosing a candidate. Nancy Larson, a lobbyist and superdelegate from Minnesota, characterized superdelegates in general as “big schmucks.” Alaskan superdelegate Cindi Spanyers received a call from former president Bill Clinton, who recalled his wife’s work on a fish cannery slime line there, and Obama was endorsed by the fishing village of …

The Cloaca Maxima, 1872 Friday marked Mexico‘s Day of the Dead, which was celebrated as hundreds of thousands of people attempted to flee the flooded state of Tabasco by boat, helicopter, jet ski, tractor, or by swimming through murky, snake-infested currents.AP via Yahoo! The town of Orme, Tennessee, which has suffered from a prolonged drought, announced that it had run out of water.APFormer FEMA director Michael D. Brown, who now works for a disaster recovery company, was made available for comment regarding the wildfires raging in California,.PR Newswireand the ten-year-old boy who started a fire that spanned 60 square miles …

Turkey shelled the village of Dashta Takh in Iraqi Kurdistan and declared plans to send its ground troops to attack outposts of the Kurdish separatist PKK in the north of Iraq; criticized for the announcement, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan pointed out that the United States invaded Iraq without anyone�??s permission. Al JazeeraHürriyetAfter the House Foreign Affairs Committee voted for a resolution affirming that a genocide was committed by Ottoman Turks against Armenians during World War I, General Yasar Buyukanit, commander of the Turkish armed forces, said that, should Congress pass the resolution, his country�??s military alliance with the United …

The Cloaca Maxima, 1872 Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, hailed by his countrymen as the “Socrates of the Third Millennium” for “disarming other speakers through his sharp reasoning,” gave a speech on Monday in which he claimed that Iran had no homosexuals and disavowed reports of his nuclear ambitions. “Let me tell a joke here,” Ahmadinejad said. “I think the politicians who are after atomic bombs, or testing them, making them, politically they are backward, retarded.” On Tuesday he met with Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe, addressed the United Nations (where he announced that he would disregard any resolutions adopted by the …

An American cattleman. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales resigned.New York TimesThe CIA’s inspector general released a report recommending that former CIA director George Tenet and other senior officials be held accountable for failing to prepare for the threat of Al Qaeda before the September 11 attacks,New York Timesand the Pentagon announced it would close Talon, the database created after September 11 to monitor and store information about security threats and peace activists. Washington PostGrace Paley died.New York TimesIn a motion filed by the Justice Department, the Bush Administration argued that the White House Office of Administration is not subject to the …

At least 150 Iraqis were killed by a truck bomb in northern Iraq in possibly the deadliest bombing since the United States invaded in 2003, and it was reported that, despite a police security drive, the number of unidentified bodies found in Baghdad had increased sharply in June. New York TimesBBCnews.comAustralia’s defense minister, Brendan Nelson, admitted that securing oil is one of the reasons Australian troops stay in Iraq. “This government,” said Labor leader Kevin Rudd, “simply makes it up as it goes along.”BBCnews.comThe White House rejected demands to hand over documents related to the firings of eight U.S. attorneys …

Saddam Hussein’s cousin Ali Hassan al-Majeed, also known as “Chemical Ali,” was sentenced to death for his role in Iraq’s Kurdish genocide.Reuters CanadaHamas militants released an audio recording of captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in which he states, “I am sorry that the Israeli government has not shown more interest. It should meet the demands of my kidnappers so I can be released.”BBCSeven children were killed during a coalition-led airstrike in Afghanistan,.NYTand the Gaza kidnappers of Britishjournalist Alan Johnston released a video of Johnston wearing an explosives vest, which he says will be detonated if force is used to try …

The Cloaca Maxima, 1872 Congress passed a bill allocating $100 billion for war spending without a timetable for troop withdrawal. CongressionalDemocrats allowed the vote to reach the House and Senate floors despite widespread opposition among their ranks because they didn’t want to go on Memorial Day break while soldiers remained wanting. Ten Democratic senators including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton voted against the bill. “I was very disappointed to see Senator Obama and Senator Clinton embrace the policy of surrender,” said Senator John McCain. “This vote may win favor with MoveOn and liberal primary voters, but it’s the equivalent of …

An American cattleman. The United StatesSupreme Court ruled in a 5 to 4 decision that the 2003 Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act is legal.Washington PostAttorney General Alberto Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding the firing of federal prosecutors; Senator Jeff Sessions (R., Ala.) told Gonzales his ability to lead was in question, and Senator Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) asked Gonzales to resign. One prominent Republican said the hearing was like “clubbing a baby seal.”New York TimesRaw StoryA series of attacks in Shiite districts of Baghdad killed at least 158 people, the largest number of people killed in a …

At Virginia Tech University, a gunman opened fire in a dormitory and in classrooms, killing 32 people and then himself.The New York TimesIn Iraq,suicide bombs exploded in the parliament cafeteria and on a bridge over the Tigris, toppling cars into the river and killing 10 people.AP via IHTAP via NYTAn explosion near a Shiite shrine in Karbala killed 16 children,AP via Tehran Timesand the U.S. Defense Department extended troops’ tours of duty from 12 to 15 months.BBCIt was reported that a forthcoming book by the editor of the Washington Post suggests that a Google search might have prevented the Iraq …

“Into the palace parlor they stepped; her hand in his paw the old bruin kept,” 1875 In Tal Afar, Iraq, a truck bomb killed 152 people, making it the deadliest attack of the war. Two hundred and fifty more people died in other bombings carried out against Shiite targets.Reuters via China PostPresident George W. Bush asserted that withdrawing from Iraq would be disastrous and supported his claims by citing two Baghdad bloggers.AP via BreitbartThe newly appointed U.S. ambassador to Iraq spoke of “encouraging signals of progress,”Reuters via China Postand the British Ministry of Defence found that a study which had …

The Cloaca Maxima, 1872 The U.S. House of Representatives passed a timetable for ending the Iraq war by a six-vote margin. The bill mandates American withdrawal in September 2008 if the Bush Administration meets certain benchmarks, earlier if it does not. Several Democrats voted against the timetable because it was not sufficiently antiwar, and Republicans derided the inclusion of domestic provisions benefiting spinach growers, citrus farmers, salmon fishermen, and peanut storers. “What does throwing money at Bubba Gump, Popeye the sailor man, and Mr. Peanut have to do with winning a war?” asked Representative Sam Johnson of Texas. “I will …