In addition to his shamefully abandoned 20-years-younger half brother who he met exactly once, Barack Obama also has a grandmother living in Kenya. (This is the lady you used to see photographed with a chicken all the time.) This grandmother has a solar panel on her roof, and thieves tried to steal it under cover of darkness, and now Mrs. Obama fears for her life. What business does Al Gore have terrorizing Barack Obama’s grandmother like that? [Daily Nation]

The people of Ireland (and the Irish diaspora) were left devastated today by the loss of 450 kegs of beer to a cunning, but heartless Dublin thief. The unidentified bogarter drove his truck up to a fully loaded trailer of kegs at the Guinness brewery and drove off into the dark Irish night. In a small bit of good news, the bastard only got 180 kegs of the good stuff but was saddled with 180 kegs of Bud and 90 of Carlsberg. Wonkette editor John Clarke denied all involvement in the theft but shed a manly tear. [Boston.com]

“Report: NASA Employee Stole More Than $150,000″ — ok, NASA, are you too incompetent to do a newsdump correctly? It’s only Thursday, guys! [Local6]

A 40-year-old intern with the National Archives pleaded guilty Wednesday to stealing 164 Civil War documents, including an official announcement of President Lincoln’s death, and putting most of them up for sale on eBay.

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Sandy Berger deserves a medal just for allowing this lede to exist: MORE »

Did you volunteer for the National Prayer Breakfast? Good news: someone’s cleaning out your bank account right now!

Here’s a portion of a letter sent to all volunteers from the “Ushers Team” at last month’s event:

On Wednesday, a briefcase with one of our computers was reported missing from the Washington Hilton. Unfortunately, the computer contained an electronic version of the list of ushers and their information, which included name, date of birth, social security number and work address.

But don’t worry! The power of prayer is sure to bring the briefcase back. And Anna Nicole Smith back to life. And win the war.

Full email after the jump.

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The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee made sure we knew all about today’s George Allen story in the Post the second it showed up on the website. They even provided a handy summary/checklist of just what, precisely, we should all get very outraged and offended about: MORE »

• Tweenagers steal stuff from Old Man Cheney. [AP via DMR]
• If you’re going to run as a write-in candidate, your name had better be easy to spell. [PinkDome]
• Whosoever yearns after the highest office in the land must first endure … pork chop on a stick! [AP via LAT]
• Bloggers selling out: A good idea? Maybe not. [SF Chronicle]
• If only he’d had access to a long extension chord and a time machine. [norvig.com]
• The world’s most patriotic t-shirt, and its crazy owner. [St.PT]