The Toronto News Desk

The WIRe – Week in Review

David Hunter

TORONTO – Here’s what stuck in my craw this week…the big story of the week of course was President Barack Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize, inviting controversy and surprise. I for one never expected it….two American women, Elizabeth Blackburn and Carol Greider, share the Nobel Prize for medicine, a first….Herta Mueller, a member of Romania’s ethnic minority who was persecuted for her criticisms of life behind the Iron Curtain, won the Nobel Prize for literature on Thursday, on the 20th anniversary of the Communist collapse…. Islamic extremist Zakaria Amara, 24, became the fifth member of the “Toronto 18” to plead guilty for plotting to bomb RCMP headquarters, nuclear power plants, and attacking Parliament; including plans to behead the Canadian Prime minister….earlier this week there were reports that the Toronto School Board was planning to ban the controversial book To Kill a Mockingbird after a parent complained, it has since been revealed that the woman’s child had never read the book, and the ban was taken off the docket. Mockingbird survives again, for now…..former British Prime Minister Tony Blair may be next in line for the newly created European President, or more accurately, the President of the European Union. Tea time for all….in a historic discovery, Canadian scientists decoded all three billion letters in the DNA sequence of a metastatic breast cancer tumor, identifying the mutations that cause the tumor to spread….meanwhile, University of Toronto researchers have developed a prototype chip that measures estrogen from tiny samples of blood and tissue – a technology they believe will assess a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer more quickly. I hope they all share a Nobel Prize if this works….

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In lighter news, Miley Cyrus has quit Twitter, saying in her last tweet “FYI Liam doesn’t have a Twitter and he wants me to delete mine with good reason” ….oh Miley, so young, so stupid….it’s always the 1.5 million followers that have to suffer….Brazilian police are looking for TV host Wallace Souza who is accused of commissioning killings to boost ratings. His show, Canal Livre, features graphic footage of crime victims. The things people will do for ratings….A 25 year-old woman in Stamford Connecticut was attacked by six other women who didn’t like her performance. The woman suffered bruises and chipped teeth. Tough crowd….A New Orleans man has been sentenced to seven years in prison and fined $15,000 dollars after duping the Egyptian Government into paying 7 million bucks for a shipment of frozen chickens he never delivered. He’s getting more time then some accused killers, the Justice System DOES work….Kelly Osbourne is pissed off because a British body spray she used left her with burn marks all over her body. Lesson; buy American next time….Toronto finally gets a Google Street View application. Huzzah…Guy Ritchie says he still loves Madonna, “And of course, here you go, I still love her. But she’s retarded too.” He said. Aw Guy, you old smoothie you….The FBI is probing whether Anna Nicole Smith plotted to kill her tycoon husband, 91 year old J. Howard Marshall. All she had to do was have sex with him….Who wants to see a movie based on the life of Robert Pattinson? A feature length documentary of the Twilight star’s life is forthcoming. I’ll be sure to miss that one….our Prime Minister Harpo decided he was going to play the piano at the National Arts Center Gala this week in order to change his stuffy and uptight image. Mmm, no, it didn’t work, he’s still a tool….Elizabeth Taylor had successful heart valve surgery this week. She’s a fighter, that’s for sure….child rapist Roman Polanski loses his extradition battle, but his team of Lawyers are appealing. I’m appealing too; let him go to jail….Finally, NASA decides to bomb the moon! In an effort to find water on the moon they plan to smash a rocket onto it’s surface. Nothing like a little regression to cure what ails us…

End notes

This week had been rolling along fairly normally until I heard that Barack Obama had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. I was initially surprised at this, since he hasn’t even finished a single year in office. Some wags even suggested that Obama got the award just for not being George Bush. Granted, he hasn’t done much to warrant the award, but he carries a certain intangible that is rare; he galvanizes, communicates, and brings people together. He is a central figure, respected, and I can name no other United States President in recent history who shares those attributes. If I were American, I would be proud. I AM proud, as I view the President of the United States with as much reverence as the Prime Minister of Canada, our present PM Harpo excluded of course. Read our wonderful posts below on this subject…until next week……


David Hunter, Over and Out. -- The Toronto News desk,