Yesterday, President Obama dared Republicans to continue their obstruction by announcing three nominations to the DC District Court of Appeals. His nominees are U.S. District Court Judge Leon Wilkins, Georgetown law professor Cornelia Pillard, and Patricia Ann Millett, a partner at the prestigious law firm Akin Gump.

Eleven days after a deadly tornado hit the city of Moore, Oklahoma, five more tornadoes hit that state, killing at least 13 people, and injuring more than one hundred. Among the lives lost were three Discovery Channel storm chasers, Carl Young, and Tim and Paul Samaras. The storms hit just as roads and highways were jammed with rush hour traffic, leaving many people stuck in the path of approaching twisters.

Yesterday, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and the non-profit group he founded called Mayors Against Illegal Guns, each received a letter containing the deadly poison ricin. The FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force and the Intelligence Division of the NYPD are investigating the letters, which ABC News reported were postmarked from Louisiana.

Over the weekend, nearly two million people took part in world-wide protests against Monsanto and genetically modified food. Despite demonstrations in over 400 cities, in 52 countries, there was hardly a peep about the event in the corporate media. Apparently, a Koch-Brothers-funded Tea Party march of 300 people is news-worthy... but two million protesters aren't enough to risk upsetting the corporate masters.