Honestly, if Shaquille O'Neal gets his honorary sheriff's badges taken away for requesting an ass taste report from Kobe Bryant, it more than makes sense that the Queen of England should strip Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe of his honorary knighthood, even if it's something that's not often done. Mugabe was given honorary knighthood in 1994, when he was considered an "anti-colonial hero" and not a "maniac." The title was stripped, at the urging of Foreign Secretary David Miliband, to show that Great Britain is "repulsed" by his actions and doesn't recognize him as the leader of Zimbabwe. He's probably too busy wreaking havoc, murder, and mayhem to care. [BBC]

Much like the servant Grusha in the famous allegory The Caucasian Chalk Circle, Morgan Tsvangirai, Robert Mugabe's main opponent in Zimbabwe's presidential race, has dropped out of the runoff election rather than tear his beloved nation apart.

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MUGABE'S WHITE REFUGEES BRING PROSPERITY TO NIGERIA "Musa Mogadi says he is better off since 'the whites' came. He's got a new job, learned new farming skills, and he can chat on a mobile phone while zipping around the countryside on a motorbike. Three years ago, Mr. Mogadi got by as a subsistence farmer. But he now earns a regular wage as a supervisor on one of this town's new commercial farms. He's applied skills he learned from some of the two dozen white Zimbabwean farmers who moved to Nigeria in 2005, after being kicked off their land by President Robert Mugabe and later attracted by large parcels of land on offer under 25-year leases and commitments of support from the Nigerian government."

Robert Mugabe, gruesome overlord of Zimbabwe, has come forward to officially proclaim that he accepts the victory of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai in last month's presidential election. Good news, right? Wrong, as Mugabe and his party, ZANU-PF, will not concede that Tsvangirai won by a margin wide enough to avoid a runoff election.

Political theorists believe that Mugabe's uncharacteristic concession, coupled with his insistence for a second election, can only mean one thing: He has ensured that he will win a runoff by threatening his constituents with unimaginable violence.

Soon after results began to indicate he was losing to Tsvangirai, Mugabe initiated campaigns to terrorize and starve members of the opposition party. Human rights workers say ZANU-PF also imprisoned 150 teachers who volunteered to oversee the elections, charging them with favoritism.

Tsvangirai is threatening to boycott a runoff. If he does, Mugabe will be declared the winner by default.

Robert Mugabe, prick president of Zimbabwe for over 20 years and head of its ZANU-PF party, continues to request a runoff election before he will leave office. Surprisingly, independent monitors say Mugabe deserves what he demands. According to them, Morgan Tsvangirai, the opposition party's candidate, did win last month's elections, but not by a wide enough margin to immediately claim the presidency. Tsvangirai, of course, begs to differ.

Anyone with some knowledge of Zimbabwe's history under Mugabe can understand his opponent's resistance to a second election. The president is known for his fishy victories and the current contested election is progressing in a way that is dashing the world's hopes for a democratic Zimbabwe. Roving ZANU-PF mobs calling themselves war veterans have begun terrorizing Zimbabwe's agrarian countryside, destroying crops and running away farmers. Most of the displaced have been white, but black members who support the opposition have been attacked, also. It is believed Mugabe set these gangs into motion in order to intimidate Zimbabwe's citizenry into supporting him in a runoff.

There is now little hope for the nation's maize and wheat crops, and starvation seems imminent.

NYT REPORTER RELEASED FROM ZIMBABWE JAIL ON $7 BAIL Pulitzer-Prize winner Barry Bearak was released, on bail, by Zimbabwean authorities after being detained for penning a critical (factual?) article on Robert Mugabe. Bearak originally requested to keep his byline off the piece, for fear of retribution, but later allowed it to be included. “Under the terms of his bail, Mr. Bearak was released to a clinic; he suffered some injuries to his back as the result of a fall from the concrete bunk in his dark, crowded cell to the floor, seven feet below.."

Barry Bearak, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who had been covering Zimbabwe's recent controversial elections, was arrested today in the capital city of Harare. Officially, the Zimbabwean authorities are charging Bearak with "practicing without accreditation," but everyone knows his real crime is trying to let the world know how insanely steely and totalitarian President Robert Mugabe's administration is. Judging by this, pretty steely!

Related: Mugabe continues to refuse to step down, despite many claims that he lost at the polls. He is demanding a runoff election.

Yeah, it was kind of silly for us to believe Zimbabwe's arrogant president, Robert Mugabe, was going to leave office without a fight, but we were going by what the "experts" said. Now, of course, the "experts" say that Mugabe and his party, ZANU-PF, will continue squabbling for control of the presidency in the likely event that last Friday's election results show that neither he nor his main opponent, Morgan Tsvangirai, claimed a majority of the votes. “ZANU-PF is ready for a runoff,” Mugabe's deputy information minister told the press. “We are ready for a resulting victory.” According to a source close to ZANU-PF, who spoke to the New York Times under condition of anonymity, one reason the party is so confident about its chances in a runoff is because it's fully prepared to brutalize any voter intent on standing in its way:

… Mr. Mugabe … met Tuesday evening first with the chiefs of military and intelligence and then with top members of his cabinet and the party presidium.

“They urged him to go to the bush,” the [source] said, meaning that in a runoff the party would employ tactics of intimidation and bloodshed that had worked well in earlier campaigns, especially in rural areas that could be closed off to opposition candidates.

Kinda makes all this "supercaucus" stuff a bit more tolerable, huh?

The month of March came to a close yesterday and Robert Mugabe, the ruthless leader of Zimbabwe for the last 28 years, is rumored to be ending his presidency accordingly: like a lamb.

The 84-year-old Mugabe certainly came in like a lion, crushing his opponents with threats and torture. But now political analysts say his advisers are encouraging him to resign following a defeat at the polls at the hands of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai. Why must he resign if he's been defeated? Good question, but that's Zimbabwe under this freakin' guy's yoke of tyranny.

The inflation rate in the nation is now 100,000 percent. Good riddance, Bobby!