Cheat Sheet

Prepare for even more protests: The 47-year-old newspaper seller who died of a heart attack outside the G-20 summit in London was struck with a baton and thrown to the ground by a police officer in riot gear shortly before his death, new video footage reveals. The tape shows that Ian Tomlinson did not offer any resistance to officers before being attacked from behind and forced to the ground. Witnesses say he was assaulted by police even before the footage begins and was trying to walk away when he was attacked again. The Guardian has also produced sequences of photos from three photographers that confirm the video’s findings. After Tomlinson’s death, London’s Metropolitan police issued a statement complaining that protesters impeded their quest to get him medical help. A police watchdog group is investigating the incident.

Could your TV attack? National security officials say cyberspies from Russia, China, and other countries have penetrated the U.S. electrical grid and are preparing to wreak havoc. Intelligence officials worry the attackers could hijack electrical facilities, nuclear power plants, or financial networks if they choose; water and sewage systems are also at risk. Russia and China have denied any involvement in the hacking, and it is almost impossible to know if the cyberspies are government-sponsored. A little hacking can go a long way: In 2000, an angry employee rigged a water-treatment plant in Australia to release more than 200,000 gallons of sewage into parks and other public places.

It’s restitution time: Peter Madoff, Bernie’s younger brother, could be forced to pay back the Ponzi schemer’s victims. The New York Post reports Peter is being investigated by the bankruptcy trustee liquidating Bernie’s securities firm, for which he was chief compliance officer. The investigation will focus on funds transferred from the firm to Peter as a possible site of compensation for his brother’s financial fraud victims. But there might not be enough to go around—a lawyer for the trustee overseeing the restitution warned a law student who is suing Peter for the $480,000 he invested and lost with him that the trustee could go after the law student’s potential winnings and use it to pay off the victims instead. What a family.

Is he back? Fidel Castro may no longer formally rule Cuba, but he’s just met with U.S. lawmakers for the first time since he fell ill. The longtime dictator, who handed the reins of power over to brother Raul at the end of in July 2006, talked with three members of the Congressional Black Caucus—Rep. Barbara Lee, Democrat of California, and two other unidentified lawmakers—in Havana before they left the island after a five-day trip meant to improve communication between the U.S. and Cuba. A spokesman at the U.S. Interests Section in Havana confirmed the meeting.

Chloé and Florent Lemaçon quit their white-collar jobs in France last year to fix up an old boat and sail away from consumer culture with their 3-year-old son, Colin. Unfortunately, the Lemaçons set their sights on Zanzibar, an archipelago off the coast of Somalia, where gun-wielding pirates attacked 15 crews last month alone. French officials are furious the family, who were snatched by pirates over the weekend, did not heed their warnings, but Lemaçon’s father, Francis, said the couple was told only to stay away from commercial shipping routes. “They are confirmed sailors and definitely not irresponsible,” he said. “They followed the advice they were given.” The family will probably be held for ransom, but the French government might try to wrest them free by force, as it has done in past pirate kidnappings. “We simply want to show Colin that we don’t need all that (Christmas catalogues, magic cereals, Spider-Man) to be happy,” Florent Lemaçon wrote of the trip.

Tony Dejak / AP Photo

House fans were shocked last night when Kutner, played by Kal Penn, committed suicide. But little did they know that Penn, who also plays Kumar in the Harold and Kumar movies, was offed by the show’s producers at his own request—because he’s accepted a post as associate director in the White House’s Office of Public Liaison. The new job will require Penn, a serious campaigner for Obama during election season, to develop art programs in communities for the administration. He’ll be taking a big pay cut, of course, but is excited about the new job—which means a hiatus from acting, and most likely an official sayonara to Harold and Kumar. “I’ve been thinking about [moving into politics] for a while,” he said. “I love what I do as an actor. I couldn’t love it more. But probably from the time I was a kid, I really enjoyed that balance between the arts and public service.”

Will this be the Red Revolution? Thousands of Moldovan protesters ransacked the country’s Parliament building in Chisinau and stormed the offices of President Vladimir Voronin on Tuesday over what they say are rigged elections. The estimated 10,000 protesters are outraged over legislative election results, which they say Voronin’s Communist Party faked. The elections are crucial in the tiny, poverty-stricken country, as lawmakers choose the president: Voronin has already served the legal maximum of two terms but Sunday’s results keep his party in power. The demonstrators broke through police barriers, pelted the Parliament’s windows with rocks and concrete, set furniture on fire, and threw computers out of windows, before riot police regained control of the building.

Could this possibly be the shortest prison sentence ever for attacking a head of state? Muntadhar al-Zaidi, the Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at George W. Bush and called him a dog, has had his prison sentence reduced to one year from three on appeal. His crime also was downgraded, from assault to insulting a foreign leader, the BBC reports. The Iraqi court cited its decision as proof of its “independence and integrity,” adding that Zaidi had no previous criminal record. When Zaidi emerges from prison in September, he will likely enjoy a reception befitting a celebrity: A new poll finds that 62 percent of Iraqis consider him a hero.

The never-ending story continues: The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports that, after a recount of 350 formerly rejected absentee ballots, Al Franken has extended his lead over Norm Coleman in the Minnesota Senate race. Franken took 198 of the ballots, extending his lead to 312. The result makes it more likely that Franken will win the election lawsuit that Coleman filed in January, when Franken led by 225 votes. Coleman, of course, said he will appeal to the Minnesota Supreme Court if he loses.

When GM’s troubles first surfaced last fall, many suggested a managed bankruptcy was the best remedy. Now, a source tells Reuters that GM is in “intense” and “earnest” preparations for a possible bankruptcy filing. One likely solution is to split the company into a “new” company made up off GM’s most successful brands and an “old” one of less-profitable brands. According to Reuters, “If the plan goes through, the new GM is expected to assume some previous creditor debt from bankruptcy proceedings, such as secured debt, said the second source, adding that GM bondholders are likely to lose substantial value in bankruptcy.”

A 13-foot, 1,102-pound megamouth shark—only the 41st such shark ever found—was recently discovered off the coast of the Philippines. Locals then celebrated the discovery by eating said shark. The shark is so rare that the species is classified by the International union for Conservation of Nature as “data deficient.” The shark’s huge mouth is filled with tiny teeth. Like the whale shark, it feeds on tiny animals and does not threaten humans.

Alberto Fujimori, the infamous former president of Peru known for corruption and disregard for civil liberties, has been convicted of ordering two mass killings and a kidnapping during a civil war in the 1990s. Fujimori was president of Peru during some of the most violent conflicts with the Shining Path revolutionary movement, and the president used a "by any means necessary" approach to squash the insurgency. He was found guilty of having directed a death squad that executed 25 suspected revolutionaries. The conviction is a watershed moment for those wishing to bring corrupt leaders to justice in developing nations, as it is the first time a democratically elected leader in Latin America has been found guilty in his own country.

Is the old media finally taking lessons from the new? Today in San Diego, Google CEO addressed the Newspaper Association of America. How’d it go? Schmidt advised newspapers to not “piss off consumers.” “I would encourage everybody, think in terms of what your reader wants,” he said. “These are ultimately consumer businesses and if you piss off enough of them, you will not have any more.” He added, “all of these partially thought-through legal systems are being challenged by the ubiquity of the internet.”

To an unwitting pig, being strapped into a "Humvee simulator" in the Pentagon probably caused some anxiety. When the scientists covered the swine in armor, that undoubtedly led to lots of squeals. And then, the coup de grace: an imitation of an IED being blown up under the pig, who at that point was probably quite confused. For nearly a year, the Pentagon conducted experiments studying the connection between explosions and brain injuries using porcine subjects. Some wounds suffered in battle left the pigs hurting for 48 hours before oinking for the last time. Scientists claim that pigs' organs are similar to humans, and they needed to determine if soldiers' body armor was effective. One animal rights activist summed up their outrage: "Is this the best they can do after several years of losing soldiers to roadside bombs?"

Binghamton Police Department / AP Photo

"I am Jiverly Wong shooting the people," reads a letter received by a news station in Syracuse yesterday. Authorities have not yet verified that the author is actually Wong, the gunman who killed 14 at an immigration services center in Binghamton, but it included two photos of Wong with firearms, a gun permit, and his driver’s license. Described as “rambling” and “disjointed” by the Associated Press, the letter’s author blames the police for most of his ills, claiming that the cops snuck into his room and touched him, stole money from his wallet, and cost him his job. "I am sorry I know a little English," the letter reads. The letter was dated March 18, more than two weeks before the shooting.

The rogue pilot who stole a small plane from a Canadian flight school has been captured in southern Missouri after hours of eluding authorities and U.S. military aircraft. Yavuz Burke, a native of Turkey and a Canadian citizen, took off on foot after landing the Cessna 172 but was later caught, federal officials said. U.S. military pilots who tracked and intercepted the aircraft during its erratic, lengthy flight tried to get Burke’s attention earlier in the day; at one point, Burke appeared to see the F-16 fighter jets, according to a spokesman for NORAD, but would not respond. Canadian officials say Burke, who was a student at the flight school but had not clocked many hours before absconding with the plane, is “not a happy individual.” He became a Canadian citizen last year.

One thing we know, at this stage in history, that’s not good for the Jews: economic turmoil. Whether it be 1095, 1492, or 1935, economic crisis has fueled anti-Semitism. In an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, Ira Stoll writes of a “foreboding that the financial crisis may trigger a new outbreak of anti-Semitism.” And the Jews’ two havens—Israel and the United States—may not be as safe as they seem. The former may soon be threatened by a nuclear attack from Iran, while the high social standing of Jews in Vienna in 1900 indicates that even places that are friendly, like the United States, can turn quickly.

Tell us how you really feel. Allen Stanford, the eccentric Texas financier accused of defrauding investors of $8 billion, cried, vehemently proclaimed his innocence, and even threatened to punch a reporter in the face in a new interview. “I would die and go to hell if it’s a Ponzi scheme,” he said of the allegations. “It makes me madder than hell and it touches the core of my soul.” Stanford says he expects to be indicted by a federal grand jury in the next few weeks, but in the meantime, the SEC has frozen his assets, with truly tragic results. Stripped of all but a few changes of clothes and access to his six private jets, Stanford was—brace yourself—forced to fly on a commercial airplane for the first time in almost 20 years. “They make you take your shoes off and everything, it’s terrible,” a tearful Stanford said of the experience. The self-described “maverick” threatened violence when asked about his alleged connection to Mexican drug cartels. “If you say that to my face again, I will punch you in the mouth,” he said.

Marco Di Lauro / Getty Images

Aftershocks continued throughout the night in the town of Abruzzo, as the once-peaceful town continued to suffer from the aftereffects of the 6.3 earthquake. Two young girls were rescued from the rubble during a torrential rainstorm, although the death toll has reached 179, and 34 people are still missing. L’Aquila and the outlying villages of Onna and Castelnuovo have been devastated and nearly deserted as firefighters attempt to search for remaining survivors in the 10,000 to 15,000 fallen buildings. One 23-year-old survivor, Guido Marini, was buried for three hours next to his dead flatmate before being dug out from the rubble by his neighbors. “I shouted and shouted,” he said. “Thank God they heard me.”

In Obama We Trust? A new New York Times/CBS poll gives President Obama a 66 percent approval rating and finds that 39 percent of Americans think the country is headed in the right direction, up from a mere 7 percent in October. 56 percent of Americans approve of Obama's handling of the economy. 20 percent think the economy is getting better, up from 7 percent in January. 31 percent, meanwhile, have a favorable review of the Republican Party—the lowest in the 25 years since The New York Times started asking the question.

While Bernie Madoff’s stony silence and seemingly unrepentant demeanor make him the perfect villain, the less visible J. Ezra Merkin, who allegedly funneled money from nonprofits into Madoff’s clutches while serving as a leader of New York philanthropy, might be just as bad. Merkin, charged Monday with civil fraud, is accused of “investing” $2.4 billion of clients’ funds in Madoff’s Ponzi scheme without their knowledge. “Merkin held himself out to investors as an investing guru ... In reality, Merkin was but a master marketer,” New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo wrote in the complaint. Cuomo says Merkin lied to about 85 percent of his investors about where he was putting their money but does not allege that Merkin knew that Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme.

When the recession first started, it seemed for awhile that art might retain its value. Now, not so much: The Financial Times reports that art prices plunged 35 percent in the first quarter of 2009. The bust has particularly hit postwar and contemporary artists, including Andy Warhol. The decline has been fueled by art collectors in London and New York, including Madoff victims, selling off their pieces in order to raise capital. The worst year for art prices on record is 1991, when they fell 41 percent.