A presidential candidate has never been as unpopular, this late in the campaign season, as Willard Romney is right now: 40 percent. So... next week's Republican nominating convention won't be about making anyone love the unlovable robot. It'll be about convincing you that his programming is the best for making sure the wealthy stay wealthy and the poor stay poor and the developing world stays developing.

Because Romney's running mate, Paul Ryan, earns much of his money from investments and other income sources that aren't his generous congressional salary, he also pays income taxes at a lesser rate than you or me.

Everyone in Israel is freaking out over rumors that an attack on Iran is imminent. Imminent like before this November's presidential election. Iran's president responds to the furor by inciting his compatriots' most favorite party-time chant: "Death to America, death to Israel."

The Russian Orthodox Church—O, what magnanimity! O, what solemnity!—has decided to forgive Pussy Riot's punk rock protest in its cathedral and pray that the band changes its sinful, reprobate ways. Too bad the band will still fester in prison for two years in what amounts to a political prank.

North Korea's chubby boy king, Kim Jong Eun, visited soldiers whose posts will overlook military exercises between America and South Korea. Kim very helpfully told them to be ready for a "sacred war."

Pieces of Amelia Earhart's plane, according to a new survey of the ocean floor, may have been found. Around the Nikumaroro reef, where she may have tried landing, scientists say the ocean often "tears things up and tries to bury" them.

Carbon dioxide emissions in the United States have dropped to their lowest level in 20 years, according to an Associated Press investigation. The finding, spurred by utilities' conversion to cheaper, cleaner natural gas from coal, surprised climate scientists and others who didn't expect the market to play so strong a role in changing habits. But cheap gas is also made possible by fracking, and, well... read this.

A college in Denver is embracing the Obama adminstration's relaxation of rules for undocumented students by offering those students, provided they live in Colorado currently, a discounted rate.

If Barack Obama is voted out of office this fall he will have wasted—to an historic degree—an opportunity to shape the federal judiciary. Because he moved slowly early in his tenure, to avoid distracting fights when he was trying to push through health care reform, and because he undertook long, painstaking searches for moderate candidates, the president has yet to fill dozens of positions on the federal bench. Willard Romney, should he get to fill those jobs, will hardly be so deliberate.

WHAT I LEARNED ON MY SUMMER VACATION. (WEIRDLY, NOW AVAILABLE AT SAFEWAY. AT LEAST THE ONE IN ST. JOHNS)