The Hartford Courant is reporting police have responded to a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Local police say they got a call around 9:40 this morning about a shooter in the school's main office.

President Barack Obama has accepted UN Ambassador Susan Rice's request to remove her name from secretary of state consideration.

I don't know why you would, but don't go thinking that a government job will make you happy. It will not. I mean, maybe it will. I don't know your life. But I do know that tons of government workers hate their jobs, just like you.

The best thing about celebrities is that as long as at some point some charity somewhere gets money, they can still be bought and sold like common chattel. This is especially convenient around the holidays, when the awkward rich, flush with cash and scant of social skills, start itching to give one another elaborate gifts.

A Danish historian claims to have found a lost work by fairy tale auteur Hans Christian Andersen. The Associated Press reports Esben Brage was rifling through the belongings of wealthy Danish families at the National Archives last October when he found the six-page story, because he's retired and everyone needs a hobby.

Finally the brave execs at The CW have made the bold move we all saw coming: ordering a new reality series clearly based on The Hunger Games called The Hunt.

After a bizarre, month-long ordeal during which the software pioneer faced questioning for murder and spent a week in Guatemalan prison (after Vice accidentally revealed his location), John McAffe is back in the United States. He arrived earlier today in Miami after Guatemalan authorities deported him.

According to KRQE, two hit men from New Mexico were arrested as part of an elaborate plot to murder and castrate Justin Bieber last month. The plot was reportedly hatched in a New Mexico prison, where convicted murderer and rapist Dana Martin recruited then-fellow inmate Mark Aaron Staake to carry out the gruesome crime (which was to involve strangulation with a paisley tie, apparently Martin's calling card) along with three other similar murders.

Two thousand twelve. The future. We order our hair online and we get our clothes from a pill. We don't have time to cut a piece of chicken or open a can of soda. We only have time for chips.

The clever editors at the Kansas City Star have come up with a way to make layoffs fun. For them, at least. Reporters Karen Dillon and Dawn Bormann have reportedly been told by management that one of them must go, and it's up to the two of them to decide who it is.

Pope Benedict XVI made his much-hyped Twitter debut today, and immediately started clogging up everyone's Twitter feeds with his random observations about life.

For once, it appears North Korea actually did something right. Several weeks after first announcing their plans, Kim Jong-un et al successfully launched a long range rocket Tuesday evening. Before it crashed into the Pacific ocean east of the Philipines, the North Korean government claims the rocket put a weather satellite into orbit, although neither Japan nor South Korea could immediatly confirm their claim (not that there's any reason not to trust the North Korean government at their word).

Look out the window: nice day, probably, eh? Sure, sure. And how about sports? Lots of sports going on right now. The United States Air Force would like to take this time to formally urge you to keep your mind on these and other soothing matters, and not on this morning's launch of the Top Secret Orbiting Space Weapon(?).

It wouldn't be a new year without some media-escalated moral panic over a new and potentially dangerous intoxicant. Except 2012's hazard, a synthetic and cheap legal chemical sold as "bath salts"—varying compositions of mephedrone, methylenedioxypyrovalerone (MDPV), and methylone—did have some fairly harrowing consequences. Users who'd ingested too much recounted super-human strength, feelings of demonic possession, vibrantly nightmarish hallucinations; police reports featuring assailants suspected to be under the influence of bath salts documented rabid-animal behaviors like biting, kicking, and primal viciousness.

When we told you all the reasons you don't want to win the lottery, we mentioned the tragic death of appropriately named lotto winner Abraham Shakespeare. Well, earlier today, Dee Dee Moore, Shakespeare's self-proclaimed biographer and financial advisor, was convicted of the Florida man's 2009 murder.

Last we heard from Glenn Beck, he was dunking Obama dolls in jars full of fake piss, all in the name of art. Well, now he's set his artistic goals even higher; the former Fox News troll is collaborating with Vince Vaughn on a new reality TV project. The show, called "Pursuit of Truth," will set 20 documentary filmmakers against each other for the prize of having their film, which will no doubt be taken seriously, financed and distributed. All nine of the show's episodes will air on Beck's network, The Blaze TV.

Two years after scandal-free former General David Petraeus lifted an eight-month ban on fast-food restaurants on military bases in Afghanistan (Burger King, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut were popular options), the Washington Post is now reporting that obesity is a leading cause of ineligibility for potential army volunteers and current military personnel. Over 1600 soldiers were kicked out of the Army in the first ten months of 2012 alone, or 16 times the amount expelled in 2007.

On Friday, the second winner of the record $587.5 million Powerball jackpot stepped forward to claim his prize anonymously.

Kevin Clash may no longer be shoving his hand deep inside Elmo on a regular basis, but he continues to teach America's children how to count.

"The definition of a college president is someone who lives in a big house and begs for money," goes an old line that college presidents like to say to appear self-deprecating. Fortunately, college presidents are very well compensated for their efforts.