Lead Stories
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
Last October the BBC News reported that the kingdom of Tonga (the islands between Fiji and American Samoa) had lost $26 million when its court jester allegedly invested the money in “a mysterious company that has now vanished.” The money was accumulated by selling Tongan citizenship and special passports to people in trouble, from Imelda Marcos to Chinese leaving Hong Kong. After American businessman Jesse Bogdonoff notified the king that the money was being held in an interest-free Bank of America account and urged him to invest it, the king appointed him not only advising officer for the funds but court jester. In June 1999 the money was transferred to an asset management company in Nevada, but the kingdom has learned that the company no longer exists, and Bogdonoff’s whereabouts are unknown.
According to several press reports last September, the recent increase in exorcisms worldwide rivals the one that followed the 1973 release of the film The Exorcist. The Roman Catholic Church performed at least 15 last year (versus one in 1995) and has ten official exorcists on duty in the United States. Michael Cuneo, a researcher at Fordham University, said there may be 500 Protestant evangelical exorcism ministries in the U.S. alone. After attending about 50 exorcisms, Cuneo reported “lots of fireworks, lots of dramatic activity,” but nothing supernatural; he thinks the number of exorcisms will increase in proportion to people’s feelings of helplessness.
Least Competent People
In Toronto, a 39-year-old woman was acquitted of abducting her children in a divorce fight, but moments later the judge found her guilty of contempt of court because she insisted on putting her finger in her mouth and making popping sounds while he was speaking….Hun Sen, prime minister of Cambodia, announced that any remaining karaoke bars in the country would be destroyed by military tanks….And in Los Angeles, a 28-year-old man shot his wife to death, drove to a highway overpass, shot himself to death, and toppled over the railing onto a Toyota Camry, killing the driver.
