It’s official: General Motors will file its bankruptcy papers at 8 a.m. Monday morning. The government is expected to invest over $30 billion in turning around the company. "Under its restructuring plan, GM will shed more than $79 billion in debt, gain work-force savings worth billions of dollars a year, close unneeded facilities and reduce its dealer network by 40%," reports The Wall Street Journal. And as it begins the long road to recovery, "veteran turnaround specialist" Al Koch will be in the driver’s seat. He’s currently a managing director at AlixPartners LLP and has overseen a number of big bankruptcies, including that of Kmart. Koch will separate the ailing company—which will be liquidated—from its government-owned arm, the “New GM.”

Dr. George Tiller, one of the few U.S. physicians who performed late-term abortions, was shot and killed this morning at his Wichita church, where he was serving as an usher. The 67-year-old’s clinic was vandalized earlier this month—security camera wires and lights were cut, and the FBI was rumored to be investigating the incident. His clinic was been the site of protests for decades, and Tiller was acquitted in March on charges that he did not seek a proper second opinion before performing procedures in 2003. The suspected shooter, a 51-year-old man, is in custody in Johnson County.

After decades of tension and stalled conversations, Cuba has agreed to open talks with the United States on a number of issues ranging from immigration to anti-narcotics cooperation, said a State Department official under anonymity, who added that it was “a very positive development.” Perhaps Obama’s call for a new relationship was finally answered? The head of the Cuban Interest Section in Washington formally accepted an offer from the U.S. to re-open talks on immigration which were shut down by President Bush in 2003. President Obama recently reversed the Bush administration decision to restrict visits by Cuban Americans to the island. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is on her way to Latin America where she will undergo pressure to allow Cuba into the Organization of American States, a move opposed by Cuban American groups and a few U.S. senators.

Pakistani forces are fighting Taliban insurgents on two fronts now—in the former tourist destination of Swat and in South Waziristan, near the Afghanistan border. At one point, the Taliban completely controlled the area, but now Pakistani forces will clear the Swat Valley in a matter of two or three days, Reuters reports. This marks the military's most serious offensive against the growing Taliban insurgency, something the White House has been pressing for. The fighting has created a humanitarian crisis, displacing 2.4 million people, and the Taliban have waged eight bomb attacks since the fighting started in late April.

Susan Boyle may have survived the last few weeks in the spotlight, but fame has finally caught up to her. Boyle suffered an “emotional breakdown” after losing Britain’s Got Talent to a dance troupe and was rushed to a hospital to be treated for exhaustion. Judge Simon Cowell is picking up the tab, The Times of London reports, and Boyle will most likely cancel her U.S. and U.K. tour scheduled to start June 12. Boyle apparently became disoriented at her London hotel and was promptly escorted into an ambulance by paramedics. Sources speculate that her condition is simply the product of months of stress. A spokeswoman said the Scottish phenom was “exhausted and emotionally drained” after the final.

Shocking news from the tennis world—four-time defending champion Rafael Nadal lost for the first time ever at the French Open this afternoon after winning his previous 31 matches at Roland Garros. Swede Robin Soderling beat the number one ranked Spanish superstar with an astounding run in four sets. His defeat came in the fourth round of the Grand Slam and was even more improbable when stacked against their previous match-ups: just earlier this spring Nadal defeated Soderling with a 6-1, 6-0 rout at the Italian Masters.

Sonia Sotomayor’s critics have zeroed in on a firefighter affirmative-lawsuit currently before the Supreme Court to allege that she shows racial favoritism, but does her record bear out the accusation? Tom Goldstein at SCOTUSBlog looks over all 96 cases dealing with race-related claims that she presided over. “Of the 96 cases, Judge Sotomayor and the panel rejected the claim of discrimination roughly 78 times and agreed with the claim of discrimination 10 times; the remaining 8 involved other kinds of claims or dispositions,” he writes. “Of the 10 cases favoring claims of discrimination, 9 were unanimous … Of those 9, in 7, the unanimous panel included at least one Republican-appointed judge.” Conservatives may try to paint her as a radical, but in the cases involving race Sotomayor has only dissented from her colleagues four times.

Sad news: The last survivor of the Titanic died Sunday at the age of 97. Millvina Dean was two months old when she escaped the sinking ship on a lifeboat—leaving behind her father, who went down with the boat. The Deans were third-class passengers, en route to America to look for work after the coal strike in England. Dean worked as a secretary until she retired and lived in a nursing home not far from where the ship set sail. But after she retired, Dean couldn’t afford the cost of living, and—though she never saw Titanic herself—only a month ago Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, and director James Cameron donated £20,000 to the Millvina Fund to pay for her nursing home fees.

North Korea’s tense relations with the United States have taken a personal toll for Lisa Ling, former co-host of The View. Her sister, Laura Ling, and fellow American journalist Euna Lee were imprisoned three months ago for ‘illegal entry’ and ‘hostility to the Korean nation.’ As their trial approaches on June 4, the families have finally opened up. “We have been holding our breath everyday as we’ve watched the political situation on the Korean Peninsula grow increasingly tense,” the families wrote in a joint statement. “Our loved ones sit in the midst of it. We desperately urge the governments of the United States and North Korea to keep our issues separate from the larger geopolitical stand-off… Laura was being treated for an ulcer prior to her departure, and in our limited communication with her we fear it has become more serious since her detainment and requires immediate medical attention.”

"Unless you were there, in a position of responsibility after September 11, you cannot possibly imagine the dilemmas that you faced in trying to protect Americans," Condoleezza Rice said last month. Well, Richard Clarke was there, and he still disapproves of Rice’s and Dick Cheney’s tactics, as he makes clear in an op-ed in today’s Washington Post. The national coordinator for security and counterterrorism for presidents Clinton and Bush, Clarke writes, “Listening to Cheney and Rice, it seems that they want to be excused for the measures they authorized after the attacks on the grounds that 9/11 was traumatic.” He goes on, “Yes, we went for days with little sleep, and we all assumed that more attacks were coming. But the decisions that Bush officials made in the following months and years—on Iraq, on detentions, on interrogations, on wiretapping—were not appropriate. Careful analysis could have replaced the impulse to break all the rules, even more so because the Sept. 11 attacks, though horrifying, should not have surprised senior officials.”

The world’s most famous couple made an unexpected weekend jaunt to New York City on Saturday after attending daughter Malia’s soccer game in Washington D.C. President Obama and the First Lady flew to the city aboard a small Gulfstream jet and attended a performance of the raved-about play Joe Turner’s Come and Gone by August Wilson. (Nothing like a Presidential seal of approval to sell tickets.) The couple dined at Blue Hill restaurant near Washington Square Park, which specializes in local cuisine from the Hudson Valley. One group not gawking like tourists over the trip was the Republican National Committee, which issued the statement: “Putting on a show: Obamas wing it into the city for an evening out, while another iconic American company prepares for bankruptcy.” Obama responded, “I am taking my wife to New York City, because I promised her during the campaign that I would take her to a Broadway show after it was all finished.”

Bob Woodward is working on a book about the Obama White House, and the administration is nervous. “Since the inauguration, the Washington Post legend has been quietly reporting a new book on the Obama White House,” Gabriel Sherman writes in The New Republic. "I'm in the preliminary stages of working on it," Woodward tells him. "I'm working on it and making progress." The White House has recently been circulating a memo on how to deal with reporters writing books, though it insists it is not a reaction to Woodward. With Woodward’s last book about the Bush administration having not sold well, he is apparently hungry for a big story, and his book will be about national security—“ the area where Obama has always seemed hypersensitive about being portrayed as weak and directionless.”

Some untidy news the executive branch has tried to bury on the weekend: “The Obama administration has informed a federal judge it will continue to invoke the ‘state secrets’ privilege in a legal battle with an Islamic charity suspected of funding terrorism.” This action flies in the face of Judge Vaughn Walker, who threatened to punish the administration for refusing to turn over information about warrantless wiretaps to the defunct and Oregon-based Al Haramain Islamic Foundation, which the government had designated as a terrorist organization and which is now challenging the wiretap program in court. According to the Obama administration’s filing, “Based on that review, it is the government's position that disclosure of classified information ... would create intolerable risks to national security."

Prince Harry’s whirlwind tour of New York City winded to a close yesterday as he helped score the winning goal in a star-studded polo match on Governor’s Island. Madonna, Kate Hudson, Marc Jacobs and others looked on from white VIP tents, where seats went from $25,000-$50,000 to benefit Princess Diana’s AIDS charity in Lesotho, Africa. Prince Harry also met with singer LL Cool J before the Veuve Clicquot Manhattan Polo Classic, which his team won 6-5. Before the match, the royal met with children from charter-school network The Harlem Children’s Zone and joked with students about his hatred of math. The visit was in part an effort to undo the 24-year-old prince’s youthful troublemaker image.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is not one to shy away from the spotlight, which is why he raised eyebrows by abruptly canceling an episode of his television show, Alo Presidente, yesterday. The last time his show aired, Chavez challenged his most formidable critic, Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa, to debate a group of academics live on his show, with Chavez as moderator. Vargas Llosa fired back, saying he wanted to debate directly with Chavez and that his request wasn’t serious. Chavez has broadcast about 18 hours of special editions of the show in the past week to celebrate its tenth anniversary, calling the TV extravaganza a “soap opera.” An episode is scheduled to air tonight.

Many have long anticipated the arrival of Disney’s first black princess. Will the company flub it? Princess Tiana will debut in December’s The Princess and the Frog, but critics are already debating her depiction. Decisions to set the film in New Orleans amidst a backdrop of voodoo and jazz, pair Tiana with a non-black prince, give her relatively light skin, and apparently have her character appear as a frog for a majority of the film (among others) have drawn criticism. “Because of Disney’s history of stereotyping,” says a Harvard child psychologist, “people are really excited to see how Disney will handle her language, her culture, her physical attributes,” adding “People think that kids don’t catch subtle messages about race and gender in movies, but it’s quite the opposite.” The debate is being driven almost entirely by a one-minute trailer and merchandise for the film. Few have seen the actual movie, though Oprah has: She was asked for input on its racial aspects.

Retired Army General Antonio Taguba says he was quoted out of context claiming the prisoner-abuse photos President Obama is fighting to keep secret depict rape. Taguba was referring to photos he’d seen while investigating the Abu Ghraib scandal, not the 44 photos that are the subject of an ACLU investigation, which he has never seen. "These pictures show torture, abuse, rape and every indecency," Taguba said to the The Telegraph, which attributed the quote to the new photos. White House officials blasted the account. Taguba agrees with Obama that the 44 photos should not be released because they pose a danger to U.S. troops.

With former DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe in the running, Virginia’s gubernatorial race is already hotly anticipated. And current RNC Chairman Michael Steele is fanning the flames. McAuliffe’s electoral opponent, Bob McDonnell, accepted his nomination on Sunday to Steele’s praise: McDonnell is part of the “Republican renaissance that starts this year in Virginia.” Steele pledged to devote “full attention and significant resources” to McDonnell’s race but acknowledged, “It is going to be a tough fight, but are well positioned for victory in November.” Talk about pressure.

Brace yourself, dreamers—Susan Boyle, she of the quaint Scottish village and overgrown eyebrows—came in second place on the Britain’s Got Talent finale Saturday night. Even more shocking: she lost to a ten-person dance troupe called “Diversity.” Despite returning to the song that made her an Internet sensation during her finals performance, Boyle couldn’t eke by with a win. The troupe earned a $159,000 prize and will perform before Queen Elizabeth II at the Royal Variety Show. Upon learning of her fate, Susan curtsied to the crowd and waggled her hips. Oh Susan, you’re not going anywhere.

Some may praise the U.S. for repurposing Saddam Hussein’s ornate palaces into temporary housing for the military, but photographer Richard Mosse, who has published images of the extravagant buildings for the first time, asks why the U.S. would want to sit in the throne of someone they have overthrown? “A savvier place to station the garrison would have been a place free from associations with Saddam, and the terror and injustices that the occupying forces were convinced they'd done away with. Instead, they made the mistake of repeating history,” said Mosse. The series of photographs, entitled Breach, shows weight sets and flags of soldiers decorating the columned marble halls. While most of the palaces have been turned back to the Iraqis, some soldiers still live there in cramped conditions on the front line.

LeBron James came close, but it turns out that a single superstar can’t shoulder a bunch of mediocrities to an NBA finals. James’s Cleveland Cavaliers lost 103-90 to the Orlando Magic last night. The Magic’s Dwight Howard scored 40 points to lead his team to victory in Game Six and on to a date in the finals with the Los Angeles Lakers. James scored 25 points in his worst game of the series. Afterward, “James put on his headphones and stormed out of Amway Arena without saying a word,” according to the Associated Press.

How could a little-known dance troupe beat out YouTube sensation and international sweetheart Susan Boyle? One theory is the Brit was losing her sweet, maiden aunt vibe. Boyle reportedly “blew up” after judge Piers Morgan called her 12-year-old rival the best singer in the semifinals, and later had an altercation with two tabloid photographers that had to be broken up by police. A contestant, Fred Bowers, said she was alienating: “We realized she can be really aggressive. One minute she’s laughing and then she turns.” Other theories: she shouldn’t have sung “I Dreamed a Dream” over again, and rebellious voters might have been turned off by judges proclaiming her the early winner. Either way, the bookies are happy: they raked in big-time profits from the unexpected win of young dance troupe Diversity.