It’s 9/11: Relatives of the victims commemorated the day with Michael Bloomberg and Joe Biden.

Two local businessmen plead guilty to massive tax fraud: Part of the plea agreement is that they have to lecture on law and business ethics at their respective grad schools. Maybe these aren’t the guys we want doing that?

Rossi and Murray go head-to-head in meeting with Times editorial board: Rossi pitched himself as more serious about the deficit, going after the strawman of ending earmarks (1-2% of budget, according to story) while saying he would “defer” to General Petraeus on withdrawing from Afghanistan. Nothing says fiscal restraint like continuing to fight a costly war!

Checking in on The Bravern after a year: 82% of shops at the Bellevue center are occupied, but sales for at least one tenant were below expectations and others have already left. The city’s economic development director still says Bellevue is going to be “bigger than anything in Portland or Vancouver.”

Iran reneges on releasing one of the captured American hikers: Ahmadinejad’s personal intervention on her behalf (after a year of captivity) gets blocked by the judicial system. And they were on such a hot streak after agreeing not to stone that woman to death for adultery.

German national identity makes a comeback: It took an economic recession and an underdog World Cup team, but Germans are not ashamed to carry flags again. No word yet on whether they can start being ashamed of liking David Hasselhoff.

Megabus experiences their first-ever fatal crash: Bus headed for Toronto fails to clear a bridge in Syracuse, four killed. The end of the story is just weird: “Megabus will also transport the passengers who have been released from hospital to their final destinations.” I should hope so!

Turks vote tomorrow on constitutional reforms: The reforms would bring the country more in line with EU standards, but have stoked the long-running secularist-Islamist debate. For outsiders, the surprising thing is that it’s the moderate Islamist government pushing for the reforms against the authoritarianish secularists. Have fun picking a side on this issue.

Buddhism makes a comeback in Mongolia: It’s been 20 years since communism fell and decades of state atheism were reversed. Buddhists now compete for souls with “American Mormons and South Korean fundamentalists.” Bonus: this story mentions the voluntary consumption of “fermented horse milk.”

Maybe the Gulf oil spill didn’t dissolve: Scientists taking sediment samples are now finding layers of oil on the seafloor that are “in some places more than 2 inches thick.” They can’t yet say for sure that it came from the BP spill.

13 replies on “Morning News”

  4. @ Baconcat–are you referring to the Baikalo-Amurskaya Magistral (aka Baikal-Amur Railway)? If so, you just warmed this old Slavicist’s heart a little bit.

  7. @1, yeah, Richard Harris is a seasoned science reporter, so I suspect he feigned shock to meet NPR’s “don’t act like your listeners should have known this” rule.

  8. Baconcat, if there’s any justice that freedom intern will post up something on this special day about our fries and penises not measuring up to what’s available on every street corner back home.

    And unpaid Slavicist, you gotta be gnashing, sir. How come they didn’t ask YOU to put up all kindsa photos of yourself looking cute holding fish and things and stuff? (He’s probably a jumped-up Quebecois anyway – you should investigate.)

  12. Fermented horse milk, or kumiss, is the traditional booze of Central Asia. There is nothing particularly gross about it, at least no more so than anything else we eat and drink.

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