The nurse who was the famous receiver of the lip-locking depicted in the iconic 1945 “Kissing Sailor” photo from Times Square symbolically marking the end of WWII attests she was actually manhandled against her will by the sailor, who was a complete stranger; by modern standards, that’s an instance of sexual assault that’s been glorified. WORLD -2    

The Ohio Democratic Party sent Ohio Treasurer/Senate candidate Josh Mandel a new pair of pants on his birthday, poking fun at Mandel’s PolitiFact Ohio record for most “Pants on Fire” ratings, which evaluate the honesty of politicians’ public statements. CINCINNATI +2
  

In Ohio, presidential candidates have beefed up on everyone’s favorite kind of television commercial: political ads. Between April and September 2008, Ohio political ads totaled 43,827; during that same period in 2012, that number has more than doubled: 114,840. CINCINNATI -1
  

A Gaza resident and taxi driver tired of dealing with the region’s ongoing fuel crisis created Gaza’s first electric car, made from all recycled materials for less than $1,000. WORLD +2    

Gina Rinehart, an Australian billionaire mining tycoon who inherited her fortune, stated that the key to economic success for Australians is to cut labor costs to compete with Africans who “are willing to work for less than $2 a day.” Rinehart earns $600 a second from her mining company, BBC reported. WORLD -2   

How romantic: A wealthy Russian businessman decided to test his fiancée-to-be’s love before popping the question by staging his own death, saying, “I wanted her to realise how empty her life would be without me and how life would have no meaning without me.” WORLD -2   

A 10-year-old distraught over smoothie company Jamba Juice’s use of giant Styrofoam cups created a Change.org petition to end Styrofoam usage, garnering more than 130,000 signatures and a call from corporate Jamba promising to phase out the stuff by 2013. WORLD +2  

Some farmers are feeding cows discounted expired candy supplemented with nutrients instead of grain to deal with corn shortages due to drought. WORLD -2  

Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary’s 2012 updates included crowning “F-bomb,” “sexting” and “man cave” official words. ’Murica! WORLD +1
  

An 80-year-old Connecticut lobster escaped narrow death at a seafood restaurant when a sympathetic old human bought the crustacean just to set it free. WORLD +2 
  

This year’s first human case of West Nile Virus in Ohio has been found in an 85-year-old Clermont County man and arrived about a month earlier than expected, thanks to an unseasonably dry, warm summer.  CINCINNATI -2
  

Villagers in Russia’s Sverdlovsk region have discovered four barrels containing 248 human fetuses preserved in formaldehyde in a forest in the Ural Mountains. Police suspect a nearby hospital dumped the barrels. WORLD -2  

Meat eaters beware: Antibiotics fed to grocery store chickens are being blamed for the drug-resistant spread of “superbugs” from poultry to humans, causing an outbreak of difficult-to-treat bladder infections in about eight million U.S. women. WORLD -1  

The Tristate’s extreme heat wave is blamed for the deaths of about 1,000 chicks at a mail processing plant in Louisville, Ky. The chicks were mailed from Iowa to recipients all over Kentucky in perforated cardboard boxes. CINCINNATI -2  

The volatile Asian silver carp, an invasive fish species notorious for its ability to “leap” out of water and injure boaters, has been discovered at the mouth of the Great Miami River, its first-ever spotting in the Cincinnati region. CINCINNATI -2