Hear the one about the guy who wanted to set off a bomb in Pioneer Courthouse Square? The local channels last night devoted half their 11 pm broadcasts to the story, and it was the lead story in today's New York Times. Scroll down to see our coverage yesterday if you missed it. And click here, on the O's Web site, for a bunch of links to their stories, the TV coverage, and the national and regional stories.

BUT FIRST! Please shun any story that asked people visiting Pioneer Square on Saturday, or who were actually at the tree-lighting ceremony on Friday, how they "felt" or are currently "feeling." It's a waste of time and resources. A wise old instructor of mine had two words for that kind of post-disaster leering: "GATHERING IGNORANCE."

Already, the FBI-nurtured plot is giving new impetus to quiet talks about whether Portland should rejoin a controversial anti-terrorism task force. Meanwhile, ugly fallout isn't waiting: An arson fire was reported overnight at the Corvallis Islamic center where Mohamed Osman Mohamud attended.

Presumably, other things are happening, too. Oh, right! THE LATEST WIKILEAKS DUMP! Confidential diplomatic missives, some sent as recently as February, are scheduled to start appearing on WikiLeaks' Web site today, with analysis sprouting simultaneously on a few chosen news sites. Among the formerly secret topics revealed so far: A love affair between Russia and Italy; scenarios for the collapse of North Korea; repeated calls by Saudi Arabia for a US attack on Iran's nuke program; and new details about China-directed computer hacking. The Brits call it a global crisis! More to come in the coming days!

In God-scorned Haiti, voters looking to elect a new president are stepping over cholera victims and the lingering rubble of a devastating earthquake on their way to polling places. Dig it: "The ballot is as crowded as the earthquake-ravaged capital itself, and a collapsed presidential palace is the prize. The voter rolls are filled with the dead, and living citizens are still struggling to figure out if and where they can vote while worrying about political violence and a spreading cholera epidemic."

So how soon until Mayor Sam Adams and his staff get on a plane to "observe"? Copenhagen, in proggy ol' Denmark, is planning a "superhighway" for bicycles. Already, the city has more cycles than people able to ride them, and traffic jams in bike lanes are a frequent, maddening occurrence.

This is, like, serious: The US and South Korea are moving ahead with maritime war games off the Korean peninsula, which is annoying North Korea, which last week annoyed the rest of creation with its own artillery rounds. China, the North's only (kinda/sorta) BFF, is stepping in to demand a summit of the cool kids.

Ireland wins a $113 billion bailout from the European Union. Reluctant officials, worried about the euro, think of it like a blast of invasive chemotherapy, hoping it keeps a debt-default cancer, which already has claimed Greece, from spreading to places like Spain and Portugal.

There's no escaping the grid. A couple raising five kids ages 2-13 in a "row house with no heat, electricity or running water," and with "no birth certificates, no schooling, no immunizations or evidence of medical care," were arrested in Pennsylvania on charges of child endangerment.

Kissing the (garish, likely flea-market-obtained) ring. John McCain praises his former running mate, Sarah Palin, on TV this morning and adds more fuel to a fire made up of stupid. He calls her a "powerful political force" and suggests it's cool for her to consider running for president in 2012.

Ah, fuck it. Seriously ...