An American cattleman. The Congressional Budget Office announced that a proposed plan to control health-care spending would save only $2 billion over ten years, compared to a proposed $1 trillion in spending, although the agency also pointed out that the legislation could increase the proportion of people receiving insurance through their employers, despite Republican claims to the contrary. Democrats, with control of both the House and Senate, fought among themselves. House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman threatened to move the bill to the floor without a committee vote if the Blue Dogs, seven conservative Democrats, refused to cooperate; Nancy …

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 …

Claiming that South Ossetian separatists had attacked its villages, U.S. ally Georgia sent troops to capture the city of Tskhinvali. Russia retaliated by sending ground troops into Tskhinvali, then into Georgia proper; Georgia claimed that hundreds of troops had been killed on both sides along with “huge numbers” of civilians. Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili described Russia’s troop actions as “the preplanned, cold-blooded, premeditated murder of a small country.”NYTimes.comItar-TassBloomberg.comThe Olympics began in Beijing, heralded on television by fake, computer-generated fireworks.All Headline NewsPresident George W. Bush told Bob Costas that China “is a big, important nation…it is important for this country to …

The Supreme Court overturned the 32-year ban on handguns in Washington, D.C., ruling 5-4 that there is a Second Amendment right to own a gun for personal use. Justice John Paul Stevens wrote in his dissent that the court’s ruling, its first on the Second Amendment in 70 years, showed a lack of “respect for the well-settled views of all of our predecessors on the court, and for the rule of law itself.” The National Rifle Association promptly brought lawsuits against five other cities with handgun bans, including San Francisco, Chicago, and Oak Park, Illinois. “It’s just completely befuddling,” said …

President George W. Bush predicted a “nuclear holocaust” if Iran develops weapons of mass destruction and accused the country of undertaking “murderous activities in Iraq”; Iran’s foreign minister described Bush’s comments as a sign of “political despair” caused by “a serious problem in creating propaganda for the next election.” BBCBBCBreitbart.com via Drudgereport.comBush announced his intention to found a “fantastic Freedom Institute” after he leaves office,NY Timesand two brothers survived in a collapsed Beijing coal mine for five days by eating coal and drinking their own urine. “You can only take small sips,” said Meng Xianchen, “and when you’ve finished, you …

“Into the palace parlor they stepped; her hand in his paw the old bruin kept,” 1875 Thirty-seven American soldiers were killed in Iraq, ending the deadliest month for U.S. forces in the past two-and-a-half years. U.S. military commanders were negotiating cease-fires with Iraqi militants, Turkish troops shelled northern Iraq, and in Baghdad the country’s preeminent calligrapher was shot to death. icasualties.orgAP via breitbart.comAP via International Herald TribuneBBCIraq was found to be the world’s 121st least peaceful country out of 121 countries; the United States ranked 96, below Yemen but above Iran.BBCThe crowd at the Miss Universe competition in Mexico City …

Paul Wolfowitz announced that he would resign as president of the World Bank on June 30; the Bank in turn said that it accepted Wolfowitz’s assurances that he had acted “in good faith” when he oversaw a promotion for his girlfriend Shaha Riza.Fin24MSNBCThe GuardianJames B. Comey, deputy for former attorney general John Ashcroft, testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee that on March 10, 2004, Alberto Gonzales and Andrew Card had attempted to persuade Ashcroft (who was hospitalized and had temporarily given up his authority as attorney general to Comey) to reauthorize the Bush Administration’s domestic surveillance program, even though the …

Hillary Rodham Clinton announced that she will run for President in 2008, and Barack Hussein Obama released a video on the Internet announcing that he has formed a presidential exploratory committee. It was reported that Obama had concealed that he was raised as a Muslim and had attended a madrassah as a child.BBCWashington PostSeventy Iraqis died and 170 were injured when two bombs exploded at a university in Baghdad.CNNThe United Nations announced that 34,452 civilians were killed in Iraq last year, a number nearly three times higher than previous estimates by the Iraqi interior ministry.BBC“I think,” said President George W. …

The Iraqi parliament voted unanimously to extend the country’s state of emergency, and President George W. Bush, who declared himself a “realist,” disavowed a leaked White House memo that suggested that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was either dumb, weak, or a liar. Maliki responded by canceling a dinner date with the president.New York TimesCybercast News Service and New York TimesInternational Herald TribuneIran’s supreme spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said that “the continuation of Iraq’s occupation is not a mouthful that Americans can swallow.”Breitbart.comMarine Corps intelligence in the Sunni Triangle determined that U.S. forces were “no longer capable of militarily defeating …

The Cloaca Maxima, 1872 Iran criticized Australia, Bahrain, Britain, France, Italy, and the United States for carrying out a practice naval exercise in the Persian Gulf, then announced ten days of “Great Prophet II” war games.AP via International Herald TribuneBreitbartThe International Atomic Energy Agency said that it has been approached by at least six Arab countries interested in developing their own nuclear programs,Reuters via Yahoo! Newsand the U.S. government shut down its “Operation Iraqi Freedom Document Portal” website after the New York Times pointed out that it contained instructions for building an atomic bomb. “It’s a cookbook,” explained a senior …

President George W. Bush signed the Military Commissions Act, which suspends the right of habeas corpus for terrorism suspects and grants immunity to CIA interrogators and government officials, such as President Bush, for violations of the War Crimes Act. New York TimesChicago Sun-TimesDomestic security officials notified seven football stadiums of a discredited threat of radiological bomb attacks out of an “abundance of caution,” New York Timesand the United States Coast Guard announced plans to mount 7.62 mm, M-240B machine guns on official boats in the Great Lakes. Rear Adm. John E. Crowley Jr. said, “I don�??t know when or if …

Further allegations emerged regarding the behavior of recently-resigned Congressman Mark Foley (R., Fla.) with underage pages. “He didn’t want to talk about politics,” said one former page. “He wanted to talk about sex or my penis.” Congressman Jim Kolbe (R., Ariz.) said that he had confronted Foley over inappropriate contact with pages as early as 2000, and House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert vowed not to resign over the scandal.ABC NewsSouth Korean soldiers fired 60 warning shots after North Korean soldiers crossed into the demilitarized zone, but it was not clear if North Korea’s action was a deliberate provocation or an …

Hezbollah declared victory in its 34-day war with Israel. “I guess,” said President George W. Bush, “I would have done the same thing if I were them.” Prime Minister Ehud Olmert pledged that Israel would “do better” in what Defense Minister Amir Peretz referred to as “the next round.” An official said killing Hezbollah leader Sheikh Nasrallah was a top priority.The Daily Telegraph (Australia)Dan Halutz, chief of staff of the Israeli Defense Forces, was under fire for selling all of his stocks in the hours before the war began.The Wall Street JournalThe New York TimesThe Daily Telegraph (UK)The New York …

It was revealed that the National Security Agency, with the assistance of AT&T, Verizon, and BellSouth, has secretly stored the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans. “It’s the largest database ever assembled in the world” said an anonymous whistleblower. A poll found that 63 percent of Americans feel that it is acceptable for the NSA to build such a database.USA TodayMedia Matters for AmericaABC NewsIt was reported that the United States was analyzing phone call records of reporters from ABC News, the New York Times, and the Washington Post to determine the identities of CIA employees who …

In Iraq car bombs killed 24 people,BBC Newsand a British helicopter was shot down over Basra, killing all five crew members.The GuardianIn Anbar, at a ceremony for new Iraqi soldiers, the graduates were told that they would be sent outside of their home province to serve, leading several soldiers to tear off their clothes in protest.The Washington PostIraqipoliceshot a 14-year-old boy named Ahmed Khalil in the head for being a gayprostitute.Gay.comIn Afghanistan the power of the Taliban was growing.The New York TimesAnalysts found that President George W. Bush had claimed exemption from 750 laws,The Boston Globeand Bush said that the …

White House photo. General George Casey, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, presented a plan for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.CNN.comSaddam Hussein, on trial with seven other defendants for killing civilians in 1982, complained to a judge about being denied a pen and paper;CNN.comIraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said that human-rights abuses in Iraq are “the same . . . and worse” than they were under Saddam Hussein.Guardian UnlimitedGunmen in Baghdad killed a Sunni Arab chief, his three sons, and his son-in-law,BBC Newsand south of Baghdad thirty people were killed when a …

John G. Roberts, Jr. was sworn in as Chief Justice of the United States,CNN.comand President George W. Bush nominated Harriet Miers, a White House lawyer who has never been a judge, to the Supreme Court. Miers has allegedly described Bush as “brilliant.”David Frum�??s Diary/NROJapanese scientists photographed a giant squid and managed to tear off one of its tentacles.MSNBCA New York judge ruled that several suppressed photographs of torture at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq must be released,BBC Newsand the U.S. Army was looking into claims that its soldiers had traded digital pictures of burned and dismembered Iraqi and Afghani bodies …

The United Nations warned that 2.5 million people will die of hunger in Niger if the country does not receive foreign food aid immediately. President Mamadou Tandja responded that “the people of Niger look well-fed.”AlertNetBBC NewsMauritania, Burkina Faso, and Mali were also facing major food shortages.BBC NewsA study found that the worldwide percentage of land stricken by drought has doubled within the last 30 years.Vail DailyThe Space Shuttle Discovery landed safely in California.BBC NewsIran decided to start producing enriched uranium,Reutersand the Environmental Protection Agency was working on ways to limit the radioactivity of the planned Yucca Mountain, Nevada, nuclear-waste dump …

A Christian martyr. The world marked the sixtieth anniversary of America’s decision to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan.LATimes.comThe United States sentenced a South African man to three years in jail for smuggling nuclear bomb parts to Pakistan and India,IOL.co.zaIran rejected a plan put forth by the European Union that would have limited its ability to manufacture weapons-grade uranium,The Australianand North Korea would not make changes to its nuclear program, despite the efforts of China, Japan, Russia, the United States, and South Korea.VOA.comWisconsin opened a school for children who had been bullied.Local6.comAn archaeologist claimed to have found King David’s …

A bovine idyll. It was the 229th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.Arrivenet.comThe U.S. Capitol was evacuated for a few minutes,CNN.comChina Export & Credit Insurance Corporation was planning to buyHuffy Bikes,BBC NewsSenator Gaylord Nelson died,The New York TimesNASA smashed a coffee-table-sized device traveling at 23,000 miles per hour into the Tempel 1 comet,Nasa.govand Toyota announced that it would open a new $800 million plant in Ontario. The company turned down hundreds of millions of dollars in subsidies in the United States because, when compared to Canadians, U.S. workers are too hard to train, often illiterate, and expensive …