* Pressing China and Russia for action, UN says more than 5,000 people have died in the nine-month-long Syrian uprising. * United Russia's rally in Moscow sparsely attended; many people forced to be there. * List of the worst sounds in the world, with YouTube links. * Reddit meets
* Brief history of price fluctuations in the cost of Barbie dolls and associated real estate. * Norway suffers butter shortage after fad diet depletes national stock. * Researchers analyze email response time and find we reply to friends first (within seven hours). * Study finds low speaking pattern, once classified as speech disorder,
* For-profit colleges caught scamming students lobbied the hell out of the White House and won the day. * Once more, "Coplandisms" are scoring political commercials. * Timeline of shady dealings in American campaign finance. * Republicans object to so-called "millionaires surtax" but can't find millionaires
* U.S. troops could remain in Afghanistan through 2014. * A female soldier in Iraq is more likely to be attacked by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire. * Thousands march today across Russia in biggest protests since fall of the Soviet Union. * Profile of the blogger and leading dissident
* Success of Egypt's Islamists marks a trend in the Middle East. * This year may see the end of "those heartless perennials" in politics, the three Gs: God, guns, gays. * Today's best joke on Twitter about the founding fathers. * Economic downturn finds the cremation business
* At about 5 a.m. today, the EU's plates diverged along the English Channel. * Mogadishu sees new, fierce fighting between al-Shabab militants and government and AU troops. * Al-Shabab takes to Twitter. * American jailed in Thailand for 2.5 years for posting links to banned biography of
* China on climate change: bumbling, probably devious, and definitely confusing. * Letter from inside Damascus. * Costco shows what Americans want to buy: milk, eggs, and diamond rings. * Giving a kidney to a stranger shouldn't be applauded or considered heroic—it should be worth money. * Kurt Anderson on contemporary style&
* By calling Russia's election rigged, Putin says Clinton "gave a signal" to his enemies. * Brief account of Gorbachev's long road to becoming a dissident who is ignored at home. * Uproar after Medvedev retweets an insult directed at a jailed activist. * Seven easy steps to
* "Prepare for War: The Insane Plan to Outlaw Diplomacy With Iran." * The surge of Newt is real, causing Obama's advisors to rewrite the playbook, or at least write a new one. * Obama takes the Roosevelt raceway while gunning for Romney, Republicans, etc. * Tom Bartlett profiles Gene
* Kremlin arrests 300 following election-fraud protests, including star of the opposition, Alexey Navalny. * Assad: "No government in the world kills its people, unless it's led by a crazy person." * Merkel's Euro strategy: clever, risky, dangerous; if the euro is preserved, she'll
