Niall Stanage sends this dispatch from the Irish American Presidential Forum in midtown, where Hillary Clinton is in attendance:

Hillary Clinton just reacted to the announcement from London that British prime minister Gordon Brown will not attend the opening of the Beijing Olympics. She said she "congratulated" Brown on what she termed "an important decision" and called on Barack Obama and John McCain to join her in urging President Bush to also boycott the ceremony.

In a rare loosening of one’s stiff upper-lip, Queen Elizabeth II and her hubby, the Duke of Edinburgh, chose to celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary tonight on the Mediterranean island of Malta, where the crowned couple lived for two years after getting hitched. The private overnight visit will come just one day before the Queen and her main squeeze travel on tomorrow to Uganda for a commonwealth summit.  read more »

Rumors of a return to trans-Atlantic harmony are premature for the moment.  read more »

Requests for a one-word answer from a politician seldom meet with success.

But Gordon Brown, who on June 27 replaced Tony Blair as the United Kingdom’s prime minister, stepped up to the plate in that morning’s London Independent.

The newspaper, which has been particularly critical of British involvement in Iraq, had solicited questions from its readers to put to Mr. Brown on the first day of his premiership.  read more »