Wonkette

Shinzo Abe announced his retirement today as Japan’s least favorite Prime Minister. Try to read this New York Times description without being reminded of someone: “the nationalist leader whose vision of an unapologetic and strong Japan foundered on scandals, incompetence and gaffes…” Nationalistic? Scandal-ridden? Gafes? That’s right, it sounds just like Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov.

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When he’s not having his rivals imprisoned or murdered, Russian president Vladimir Putin likes to be photographed inappropriately kissing stuff, like the bellies of little boys. Today, we present this AP photo of Putin kissing a sturgeon.

Russian President Vladimir Putin [AP/Yahoo News]

Remember those creepy half-naked pictures of Vladimir Putin? (Experience them all over again!) The natural reaction to such weird photos of a middle-aged guy with man titties is revulsion, but in crazy Russia the people thought that was the sexiest thing since Stalin showed his thong. MORE »

Vladimir Putin, like so many powerful men before him, is apparently now trolling for love on Craigslist. Maybe he can enjoy a brief fling to end his New Hampshire summer on a high note, far from the prying eyes of the European media. Won’t you look into his soul, and let him make you disappear?

Russian Dictator Seeks Love - 55 [craigslist]

What kind of president is Vladimir Putin? The kind who goes on fishing trips in the wilderness and then strips down for the cameras. Go see the whole photo essay over at Der Spiegel. (UPDATE: And here’s the English version for you English speakers out there.)

Vladimir Putin’s Kennebunkport visit ended with a surprising shared defense proposal that both sides will debate for a while before ultimately shelving until both presidents are replaced by overwhelmed successors. Also, G. H. W. Bush gave Vlad a present! MORE »

Oh how cute, the War Family makes little peace signs at the photographers. What other kind of douchebag behavior did our Royal Family partake in this weekend with Russian buddy Vlad the Putin?

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Yesterday: MORE »

Good news, everyone! The Russia’s despotic leader is just kidding about all this “point nuclear weapons at European targets” business! MORE »

We keep trying to build a big useless threatening mysterious missile defense system in Eastern Europe, and our bestest ally ever Vladimir Putin doesn’t seem to care for it. So he recently said he was going to point all of Russia’s decaying, decrepit nuclear missiles back at Europe. MORE »

President Bush’s food tester is going to have a shitty Independence Day — Vladimir Putin’s coming to Kennebunkport! MORE »

Vladimir Putin’s bloody war against his critics finally made it to Washington last week, when KGB expert Paul Joyal was shot outside his Prince George’s County house — four days after NBC Dateline broadcast Joyal’s accusation that Putin ordered the radioactive poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko.

Joyal had just returned home from a meeting with an ex-KGB general “at a restaurant next to the International Spy Museum in downtown Washington,” the International Herald Tribune helpfully notes, when he was shot in the groin.

Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, and the rest is after the jump.

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Each week, the Comics Curmudgeon helps explain Today’s Cartoons.

So, what with the recent Democratic victory in the midterm elections, everyone knows that the People Have Spoken and there’ll be no more arguments or hate ever, right? Ha! That was a good one. No, in fact, there’ll just be more carnage, because the Democrats not only have to tackle a Republican president, but will also have to take on the one enemy who is always most pernicious to any Democrat: other Democrats. It’s going to be like an Elizabethan bear-baiting contest, but with fewer rules! And so, in honor of the upcoming carnage, we here at Cartoon Violence are pitting similarly themed entries from the week’s cartoons to decide who is the cartooniest.

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Photo credit: NYT via AP via Canadian Press

Once we saw the above picture in the Times, we knew we had on our hands a motherlode of hilariously awkward Presidential photos. The wires did not disappoint. After the jump, join us in a moving pictorial tribute to President Bush’s awesome Vietnam adventure.

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