The New York Public Library has abandoned its plan to hollow out its central building and eliminate its research stacks. It was undone by critical and public opposition, and possibly by the fact that the whole scheme—for which Sir Norman Foster took home $7.9 million regardless—was structurally unfeasible.

Say, whatever happened with that Norm Coleman/Rev. Al Franken thing? Well, Norm's political career is dying the death of a thousand judicial setbacks and yet refusing, oddly, to concede.