The Abbreviated Evening Edition

Our Chief News Editor ek hornbeck has the day off and left me in charge. 🙂

Well, I’ve had a busy day with maintenance and shopping, nice buy a new sandals. So tonight’s Evening edition is going to be ABBREVIATED.

Britain deploys top diplomat, helicopters to Libya

by Jean-Pierre Campagne – 2 hrs 36 mins ago

BENGHAZI, Libya (AFP) – British Foreign Minister William Hague on Saturday met leaders of rebels fighting to oust Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi after NATO deployed attack helicopters for the first time.

Russia’s top diplomat, meanwhile, warned that the NATO military operation in Libya was “sliding towards” a land campaign as warplanes again blasted the capital Tripoli.

“We are here today for one principal reason — to show our support for the Libyan people and for the National Transitional Council, the legitimate representative of the Libyan people,” Hague said in a statement.

Hague, accompanied by international development minister Andrew Mitchell, held talks with chief of the rebel National Transitional Council Mustafa al-Jalil.

3 dead in Syria clashes as burials draw 100,000

DAMASCUS (AFP) – Security forces on Saturday killed three demonstrators in northwestern Syria, after more than 100,000 mourners turned out in Hama for the funerals of protesters, rights groups said.

In Jisrash Shughur, “security forces opened fire to scatter more than 1,000 demonstrators protesting after the funeral of a civilian killed on Friday” in protests at the nearby village http://www.thestarshollowgazet… Has in northwestern Idlib province, an activist said on condition of anonymity.

3 dead in Syria clashes as burials draw 100,000

DAMASCUS (AFP) – Security forces on Saturday killed three demonstrators in northwestern Syria, after more than 100,000 mourners turned out in Hama for the funerals of protesters, rights groups said.

In Jisrash Shughur, “security forces opened fire to scatter more than 1,000 demonstrators protesting after the funeral of a civilian killed on Friday” in protests at the nearby village of Has in northwestern Idlib province, an activist said on condition of anonymity.

Mystery deepens over E. coli poisoning

FRANKFURT (AFP) – Scientists have yet to trace the source of an E. coli outbreak that has spread to 12 countries and killed at least 19 people, mainly in Germany, as experts on Saturday ruled out links to a Hamburg festival.

The European Commission said it would send an expert team to Germany to bolster efforts to find the origin of the killer bacteria as Qatar became the latest country to ban imports of salad items from Germany.

Thousands in Hong Kong mark Tiananmen crackdown

by Beh Lih Yi

HONG KONG (AFP) – Tens of thousands of people in Hong Kong on Saturday marked the bloody 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, as China defies world condemnation with an ongoing roundup of political dissidents.

A sea of people, mostly clad in black as a sign of mourning, held up candles and sang solemn songs — some with tears in their eyes — filling the city’s Victoria Park, in the only commemoration on Chinese soil.

Police said 77,000 people had crammed into the park, an area the size of the six football pitches, but organisers put the crowd at more than 150,000.

Human toll of deadly tornado cuts deep in Joplin

JOPLIN, Mo. – They were regular churchgoers, devoted parents, seniors in their retirement years and children with untold promise.

Some gave their lives to save strangers, thrust by circumstance and human instinct into the role of hero. Others faced a parent’s worst fear, losing their lives while also failing to protect their children from death.

Few outside the town of about 50,000 will recognize the names of the dead. But Joplin’s close-knit community lost a staggering array of human capital in the May 22 tornado, including seniors who were the town’s history and young people who were its future. Some lived their lives ordinarily, only to be defined in their final moments by breathtaking courage.

Pitfalls abound for prosecutors in Edwards case

RALEIGH, N.C. – Two crucial witnesses are dead. Another is 100 years old. A fourth was recently held in contempt of court. The daring indictment of two-time presidential candidate John Edwards has pitfalls at every turn for federal prosecutors, adding strain to a Justice Department section still trying to recover after botching its last major political case.

Government attorneys are relying on an untested legal theory to argue that money used to tangentially help a candidate – in this case, by keeping Edwards’ pregnant mistress private during his 2008 presidential run – should have been considered a campaign contribution. Edwards’ attorneys counter with an argument that’s reprehensible but could raise reasonable doubts with a jury: He was only interested in hiding the affair from his cancer-stricken wife, who died in December.

Historic flood begins to abate, but far from over

JACKSON, Miss. – The Mississippi River flood of 2011 may seem like a thing of the past for people who fled rising waters that never came, yet the final toll is shrouded in murky water for thousands of people devastated as the flood made its way from the Midwest to the Gulf of Mexico.

Thousands of acres of crops, timber and catfish farms are still flooded, mostly by tributaries that backed up because the Mississippi River was so high. Hundreds are still displaced from flooded homes. Some people had nothing to go home to.

I said it was ABBREVIATED, I wasn’t foolin’ ya. Now, what’s for dinner? Cooking for two, Dr. TMC is back from his adventures in Libya a few pounds lighter than he should be.