But it's probably more like a wreath. From the WSJ:

There's no way to be certain, of course, but the speculation is the second woman from left in the group photo above, taken earlier this month at Pyongyang Department Store No. 1, is Mr. Kim's daughter Kim Sol Song. She is the third-eldest of Mr. Kim's seven children and the second-eldest daughter.

(Mr. Kim had children with four different women.)

John Rosenthal, who is one seriously astute SOB, ask rather plainly why it is the Europeans wanted to depose Muammar Qadaffi if they wern't willing to try and win it?

Gates indicated that the US has no vital interest there, and HR Clinton indicated that it was a vital interest based on "our NATO allies saying it was int THEIR vital interest". Since then, it seemed to have stopped being in their vital interest.

The Italians, it seems took a healthier approach: to just no take sides. It looks like UK and French communication fo "vital interest" rolled down-hill to hit the US and then Italy.

Secretary Clinton's inclusion of Italy in the list was dubious to begin with. In fact, from the start of the unrest in Libya, the Italian government warned about taking sides in the conflict and supporting the rebellion. For example, in an interview published on February 23 in the Italian daily Il Corriere della Sera, Foreign Minister Franco Frattini alluded to the creation of an "Islamic Emirate" in the eastern-Libyan heartland of the rebellion. "We do not know more [about it]," Frattini told Il Corriere. "But we know that they are dangerous. There are elements of al-Qaeda there."
The Italian government's caution was hardly surprising, given that the February 17 protests that sparked the rebellion were called to commemorate protests five years earlier that had culminated in the storming of the Italian consulate in Benghazi by an angry mob. Several local residents were killed when Libyan security forces attempting to protect the consulate opened fire on the mob. The outrage of the protesters was tied to the publication of caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten and other European newspapers. (On the 2006 protests, see my article "Our Principles? The Libyan Insurrection and the Mohammed Cartoons.")

The Italian reluctance to support a military intervention also had to do with fears of seeing such an intervention provoke an exodus of tens of thousands of refugees from Libya, many of whom would inevitably end up in Italy. These fears have proven well founded.

But now, according to a report in the Saturday edition of Il Corriere della Sera, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has confided to colleagues not only that he was opposed to the NATO intervention in Libya, but that he was pressured into making available Italian military capabilities by precisely the United States. According to the report, Berlusconi recalled that "at the time I had warned our international partners, and also at home I had explained that the operation would not be easy . . ." "But," Berlusconi is reported to have continued, "in the face of the pressures exerted by the United States, the position of [Italian president Giorgio] Napolitano, and the vote [in favor of the intervention] by our parliament, what could I do?"

ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet said the central bank's controversial program of buying government paper in an effort to stabilize markets, inactive since March, was ongoing. "You will see what we do,'' he told a news conference.

It also raised questions about whether the ECB was waiting for Rome and Madrid to take extra fiscal adjustment measures before it will buy their bonds, or whether the central bank was unable to agree on widening the scope of bond-buying to them.

"I note that the Bank of Japan today launched quantitative easing and the Swiss central bank cut rates to zero. We are waiting for (ECB) decisions if possible, but desirable,'' he said. Tremonti said when he talked to Asian investors, they said: "If your central bank doesn't buy your bonds, why should we buy them?''

Reviving a truly sad academic theory from the 1980's, normally kicked around by undergrads desperate for a subject to write about, it has returned. Strangely enough, having mocked it a few times here is usually sufficient to eliminate it from the zeitgeist:

"The workers own all the capital equally, and there is no upper class of owners/capitalists to oppress them," wrote Mr. Schmidt, author of the book "Secrets of Pop Culture," in an email. "Unlike real-life Marxist countries, the Smurfs managed this feat without resorting to totalitarianism or repressing personal freedom, so it is a utopia."

All of the above was more than enough fodder for Parisian academic Antoine Bueno, who in June published a treatise on the topic, the aptly named "Little Blue Book." In its 250 pages, the 33-year-old university lecturer argued that Smurf society represents a "totalitarian utopia drenched in Stalinism"; in subsequent interviews, he claimed the Smurfs also were racist, and that Gargamel was an anti-Semitic caricature.

The same Smurf fans who approved of a 2005 UNICEF television ad that depicted the Smurf village being bombed by fighter jets - the better to raise money for ex-child soldiers in Africa - called Mr. Bueno's book a disgrace. Thierry Culliford, son of the deceased Smurfs creator, called the author's take "grotesque."

In his YouTube video, Mr. Topham does Mr. Bueno one better, noting widespread Internet belief that "Smurf" is an acronym for "Socialist Men Under Red Father."

Two years ago, a Canadian professor was ridiculed for writing that Thomas the Tank Engine propagated a sexist, ultraconservative ideology. As opposed to being, well, a smiling choo-choo train.

In his dream, an American fleet invades North Korea. The protagonist and his friends try to defend by firing artillery shells made of pencils, but the protagonist doesn't know how to use protractor to aim. Overwhelmed by the evil American fleet, he wakes up from the dream. He says something along the line of "I must study hard and pay attention in class so I can be a great soldier to fight against the Americans". The rest is math lessons.

Dutch Tourist Caught Stealing A Cowbell In Bavaria

Police say the tourist, whose name was not released, says he was just looking for a souvenir.