Ann Romney said Monday night on ABC that the family dog Seamus “loved” riding on the roof of their car back in the 80s. “The dog loved it,” Romney told Diane Sawyer. “He would see that crate and, you know, he would, like, go crazy because he was going with us on vacation.” Mitt Romney drew major criticism when he revealed that the dog traveled in a crate tied to their car. Mitt confirmed to Sawyer Monday night that the attacks regarding the dog were the most “wounding” so far on the campaign.

The U.S. will maintain the grip it’s kept on the World Bank since WWII, as health expert and Dartmouth College President Jim Yong Kim beat out a number of other nominees for the spot Monday. The Korean-born Kim was supported by the United States and other developed countries, including Japan and Canada. Among his opponents was Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the Nigerian finance minister, who was a favorite among developing nations. The non-unanimous decision among the bank’s executive directors makes this the first time the choice has been hotly contested.

President Obama was dealt a major blow on Monday afternoon as the Senate rejected his proposed tax bill, christened "the Buffett Rule" for its endorsement by billionaire investor Warren Buffett. The bill would have put a 30 percent tax on the income of millionaires in the U.S. The vote fell mostly along party lines, as Democrats failed to garner bipartisan support for the much-debated tax.

Eleven members of the Secret Service have had their security clearances stripped as the government launches a full probe into what went on in Cartagena, Colombia, last week. At least five agents are believed to have broken curfew and brought prostitutes back to their hotel prior to President Obama’s arrival at the Summit of the Americas. The Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Martin Dempsey said the agents had “let their boss down” with their conduct. The agents are all said to have been interviewed at least once in the probe, and range in experience from a 20-year veteran to relative newcomers.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai pointed a finger at NATO for attacks by militants in Kabul and elsewhere in the country Sunday that left 51 people dead. “The terrorists’ infiltration in Kabul and other provinces is an intelligence failure for us and especially for NATO and should be seriously investigated,” Karzai told reporters Monday. The series of clashes incited by insurgents lasted 18 hours, and Karzai praised his country’s security forces for putting down the attacks, which the Taliban said is just the start of their “spring offensive.”

NASA’s Discovery space shuttle will make its final lift-off on Saturday, but there will be no launching involved. The retired space shuttle will be placed atop a giant Boeing 747 jet during its ride from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida to its final home at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum outside Washington, D.C. Weather permitting, the Discovery is set to take off at dawn, with crowds expected to gather in D.C. to watch its landing. NASA flew its last shuttle flight in July and has since been prepping the spaceships to be displayed in museums.

What was once a productive annual gathering became little more than a “raucous, extravagant, arrogant, self-congratulatory event,” said ex-General Services Administration head and remorse-ridden wordsmith Martha Johnson at a House Oversight Committee hearing Monday. Not only that, the bash masquerading as a conference, cost taxpayers $822,000 in 2010 alone, Johnson revealed. The GSA’s inspector-general, Brian Miller, reported that he’s pursuing investigations into other misdeeds at the administration, including “all sorts of improprieties, including bribes, including possible kickbacks.” Looks like party time is over.

Argentina has announced a plan to nationalize its biggest oil company, YPF, taking control of 51 percent of the company that accounts for the country’s second-largest industry. The announcement sent shock waves through the international business community as the Argentines sought to gain more control over the energy it produces. YPF was previously controlled by Repsol, a Spanish corporation. Spanish officials were outraged by the move, saying that reactive measures would be announced later this week. It was a defiant move for President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, who said at the announcement, "I am a head of state and not a hoodlum.”

Why do McDonald’s chicken nuggets taste better in the U.S. than they do in the U.K.? One word: salt. According to a new study, fast foods in the U.S. are much saltier than those in other countries. Data collected on fast-food items from six different restaurant chains in Australia, Canada, France, New Zealand, the U.K., and the U.S. and found that the same foods had dramatically different sodium levels in each country. Chicken products in the U.S., for example, were significantly saltier than chicken products in the U.K. Canada took second place for saltiest fast food. The 2010 U.S. Dietary Guidelines recommend that most adults consume no more than a teaspoon of sodium per day.

Some 15 years after he was shot dead, Tupac Shakur might be going on tour with Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg. It’s actually a hologram of the famed late rapper, not Tupac himself, which has become the sensation of the indie festival Coachella Monday, spurring talks of the creation going on the road. The hologram was created by Digital Domain Media Group, the same company behind the Oscar-winning special effects in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Representatives for Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg reportedly are in talks to take the act on tour after its success in California.

All hail the written word! This year’s Pulitzer Prizes were announced on Monday in 14 journalism categories and seven arts categories, with no prize awarded for fiction. The New York Times was the only media outlet to win two Pulitzers, one for international reporting on Africa and another for explanatory reporting. The highly coveted public service Pulitzer went to The Philadelphia Inquirer. But the biggest twist in this year’s awards is that two exclusively online news outlets, the Huffington Post and Politico, won their first Pulitzer Prizes—a clear nod to the evolving media landscape.

In a long-running battle that rivals the Yankees vs. Red Sox feud, ABC’s Good Morning America bested NBC’s Today show in ratings last week, the first time ABC’s morning show has prevailed over NBC’s in 16 years. Nielsen ratings paid for by both networks showed that GMA had 13,000 more viewers than Today for the week of April 9. An ABC executive told the Times that the whole network was “quite proud, and very thankful to our audience,” while a producer responded with a one-word email: “Speechless.”

Anders Behring Breivik, the man accused of killing 77 people in Norway last summer, claimed he did so in self-defense. “I acknowledge the acts but do not plead guilty, and I claim I was doing it in self-defense.” Breivik’s trial moved forward after an expert found him sane, overruling an earlier diagnosis. Breivik was defiant and unrepentant in court, raising a closed fist in salute and saying he doesn’t recognize the court’s authority.

While some of us are compulsively checking Facebook, watching movies on Netflix, and checking out adorable baby animal photos, one fifth of American adults don’t use the Internet at all. A new study from the Pew Internet Project reports that this demographic doesn’t go online because they don’t see a good reason to, according to the majority response. Many of these who never use the Internet are older, less educated, and in the lower classes, the report revealed.

Five people—including three children—died in Woodward, Oklahoma, when a tornado struck the Midwest town. That was the only tornado that resulted in fatalities over the weekend, and officials are attributing the low rate to days of warnings. A spokesman for the National Weather Service said they received at least 120 tornado reports this weekend. The Service provided a 24-hour advance warning for many in the region. Storms struck Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska, and Oklahoma.

Could Arizona, with its staunchly conservative governor and senators, go blue in the presidential election? President Obama’s campaign thinks it might and is sending workers to campuses and Latino neighborhoods this spring. Analysts show that Arizona is becoming less conservative in national elections, though it might not be ready to vote Democratic. It would be a big change: Arizona has voted for only one Democratic president since Truman.

Despite Syria’s failed start to the ceasefire agreement, United Nations peace monitors are set to begin monitoring the country’s volatile situation. Five unarmed observers arrived Sunday, and an estimated two dozen more are on their way to begin their mission Monday. Special envoy Kofi Annan and the Arab League created the peace plan in an attempt to quell the 13-month-long war, which has killed more than 9,000 people.

Congress is back from recess and ready to start fighting. The Senate is expected to vote on the “Buffett Rule”—the proposal that people who make more than $1 million a year will be required to pay 30 percent in federal taxes. The bill is expected to fail under Republican filibuster. Over in the House, Republicans are preparing to vote on a bill that raises deductions for businesses with fewer than 500 employees. It, too, is expected to fail.

Mitt Romney is feeling confident. His campaign is offering supporters “preferred status at the first Presidential Inaugural retreat” in exchange for a $50,000 donation. In an email obtained by BuzzFeed, the campaign lays out perks associated with various levels of donation, including $10,000 for a photo with Romney and $50,000 for access to his presidential inauguration. Romney and other Republicans have criticized President Obama for favoring campaign donors. The email was forwarded from Richard Stormont, a former executive at the Marriott hotel company, where Romney was on the board.

Hillary Clinton knows how to let her hair down—scrunchie or no scrunchie. The secretary of state cut loose at a bar in Colombia on Saturday night following meetings for the Summit of the Americas, which was due to wrap up Sunday. Clinton was photographed dancing and sipping beer at Café Havana in Cartagena. Hillary has been quite the 21st-century woman this week after it was revealed she partook in the satirical site, Texts from Hillary, by submitting her own texts.

In a new development in the hacking scandal, it appears that a senior British police official worked to undermine Sir Ian Blair, the commissioner several years ago. The Independent obtained a report, written in 2006, that was part of the police’s internal inquiry into phone hacking at the News of the World. The report says a member of Scotland Yard’s management board was briefing against the commissioner’s performance and leaking information about cases. Blair demanded to know why he was never told of the report and has submitted it to Scotland Yard’s investigation into the hacking scandal. One of the key figures on the board was Dick Fedorcio, the former communications chief who resigned over his decision to hire a former News of the World executive to do PR for the police force.

After 18 hours of gunfire in Kabul, Afghan-led forces and U.S. helicopters finally defeated a massive, coordinated Taliban assault. Authorities say at least 17 militants were killed in the attacks on embassies, government buildings, and NATO bases that began Sunday afternoon. Like the attack last September by the Pakistan-based Haqqani network, the militants took over half-built buildings and fired on nearby embassies and bases.

With Trayvon Martin, Chardon High School, and One Goh, it’s rare to go a month in the U.S. without a high-profile shooting. That’s because in the U.S. there are nearly as many guns as people—second only to Yemen, with half the ownership rate—and the last decades have seen concealed-carry laws and the rollback of the Assault Weapons Ban. At the forefront of this push has been the National Rifle Association, which champions the “right to bear arms,” guaranteed by the Second Amendment. Yet as Jill Lepore explains in The New Yorker, the Second Amendment was only recently reinterpreted as guaranteeing the right to bear arms, rather than the right to form a militia for community defense. In fact, until the 1970s, the NRA, which started as a hunting association, backed many of the nation’s first modern gun-control laws.

The pristine year in the press for the Middleton sisters might be over. Duchess Kate’s younger sister, Pippa, was photographed in the passenger seat of a friend's convertible in Paris while the driver pointed a pistol at a photographer who was following the car. According to London paper The Sun, the maximum jail sentence for brandishing a weapon in public is seven years "for all parties involved." The French probably won't view the event mildly, in light of a recent string of killings that swept the city. Pippa was said to have been taken in for questioning, and the incident reportedly sent shock waves through Buckingham Palace.

Mitt Romney was overheard giving real details about his would-be presidential plans while at a private fundraiser Sunday night. “I’m going to take a lot of departments in Washington, and agencies, and combine them,” he said, according to an NBC News report. “Things like Housing and Urban Development, which my dad was head of, that might not be around later.” He also mentioned an interest in either shrinking the Department of Education or consolidating it with another agency and eliminating the mortgage deduction on second homes for “high-income people,” as well as property and state-income tax deductions.

More supporters of President Obama are preparing to let their money do the talking for them as his reelection campaign goes into gear. Obama and the Democratic National Committee scooped up $53 million in March, the two announced in a video Monday, a $9 million increase over February and a nearly $14 million jump from January. Now that Mitt Romney is far and away the presumed Republican nominee, the level of donor participation may continue to rise, but it remains to be seen whether enthusiasm for the president’s campaign will reach the levels of 2008, when he raised more than $42 million in March without a dime from the DNC.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon didn’t exactly kick in the door on Syria Monday, but he had strong words for the government there, saying they are responsible “to guarantee freedom of access” to observers monitoring the ceasefire. The U.N.-led attempt to quell violence in the country through peaceful means seemed to be falling to pieces as forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad continued their assaults on the opposition, particularly in the city of Homs. Ban said the ceasefire, such as it is, remains “very fragile” and urged both sides to cooperate.

The Central American country plagued by bloodthirsty gangs marked its first day without a murder in three years Saturday. “After years when the number of murders reached alarming levels of up to 18 per day, we saw not one homicide in the country,” said President Carlos Mauricio Funes. The average number of murders has risen in recent years, from 12 a day in 2009 to about 18 a day this year. Violence among the nation’s most powerful gangs, Mara 18 and Mara Salvatrucha, has been on the decline this year. El Salvador has a murder rate of 66 per 100,000 people, near the top of the world’s list.

A 28-year-old jihadist made plans to set off a suicide bomb in the New York City subway, an assistant attorney said in court Monday. Bosnian-born Adis Medunjanin stands trial alone in Brooklyn federal court for what prosecutors have said was an al Qaeda–inspired scheme in 2009. “These three men agreed to return to the U.S. to conduct suicide bombings against the U.S. for al Qaeda” after a trip to Pakistan, said attorney James Loonam. “Al Qaeda wanted to show it could still hit the U.S. on American soil.”

This isn’t a good sign: because of scorching weather in Boston, organizers of the city’s marathon asked participants to consider sitting it out. The 27,000 runners had low-70s temperatures as the race began, but forecasts call for temperatures to hit the mid-80s by the race’s end. In a startling email to runners, the race organizers reminded them that the Boston Marathon was an “experience” and not a “race.” Luckily the brave athletes taking on the 26.2-mile run will not have to deal with humidity.

Media outlets including NBC and The New York Times filed Monday to have the court records unsealed in the case against George Zimmerman, who has been charged with second-degree murder after shooting 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Florida. Court files are normally considered public records in the Sunshine State, but a judge sealed Zimmerman’s file last week. In the eight-page motion filed this morning, lawyers for the media outlets argued that there’s no reason to seal the file, especially because much of the evidence in the case has already been reported.

Mitt Romney has a message for President Obama: “Start packing.” Mitt relayed the message to Diane Sawyer during an interview, which will air Monday night, and wife Ann backed him up. “I believe it’s ... Mitt’s time ... it’s our turn now,” she said. Ann also clarified that when she called her Twitter altercation with a Democratic strategist a “birthday gift,” she meant she was glad for the opportunity to discuss Democratic attacks against her for being a stay-at-home mom—which fed perfectly into her husband’s attempt to paint Obama responsible for the so-called war on women.

With the Republican field considerably narrowed, we’re back to the criterion of electability with which Americans are most concerned: who do you want to have a beer with? A new CNN/ORC International poll released Monday shows that more Americans favor President Obama over Mitt Romney because they see him as likable and in touch. The same poll shows that Obama is favored by female voters by about 16 points, a small decrease from the lead he held among women last month. Most of the American public is as yet undecided on who’s best suited to get the economy back on its feet, according to the poll.

Kanye took on the drug industry—and failed. After initially weathering a backlash against his song “Theraflu” from the manufacturer of the drug Theraflu, the rapper has made the “creative decision” to change the title. The catchy tune will henceforth be known as “Way Too Cold.” It’s important to note that with lyrics like “Tell PETA my mink is dragging on the floor,” West has annoyed still a few other major organizations.

The Pentagon announced Monday that the Secret Service scandal that overshadowed President Obama’s trip to the Summit of the Americas in Colombia may involve more agents than originally thought. “We believe there are more than five [agents],” a spokesman said. Eleven agents have been suspended in connection with the case as Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta promised a full investigation. Agents are believed to have missed their curfew in Cartagena and brought prostitutes back to the hotel where the president was set to arrive a day later. President Obama said he would be “angry” if the accusations turn out to be true.