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July 22, 2012 | | EMPIRE Rupert Murdoch stunned Fleet Street on Saturday with news that he had surrendered his posts on the boards of several of his British newspapers, including The Sunday Times and The Sun, his last remaining tabloid. Though the move sparked rumors that the media mogul was getting ready to abdicate from his empire, The Daily Beast's Andrew Neil writes that the spin doctors need to relax—Murdoch isn't getting out of the newspaper business anytime soon. Plus, Howard Kurtz on why Murdoch surrendered. WEAPONS Police said that Colorado shooting suspect James Holmes built up a personal stockpile of weaponry—a sign that he was planning his deadly night months in advance. But his relatives, who descended from the Pilgrims and America’s first militia, had a very different relationship to arms, reports The Daily Beast's Michael Daly. Plus, Christine Pelisek and Eliza Shapiro on how the alleged killer bought his guns. SYRIA An activist released an estimate that 19,000 people have died in Syrian fighting as bloodshed worsened in the city of Aleppo on Sunday. Military forces there fought opposition forces in the important commercial center, focusing around an intelligence service base. “Sounds of explosions from different areas are shaking the whole city,” one resident told Reuters. Opposition fighters have reportedly been streaming into the important city near the country’s border with Turkey. Angry Syrians defaced a statue of President Bashar al-Assad’s father in the city Saturday night. Meanwhile, helicopter gunships were deployed against rebels in Damascus, the capital city where fighting has intensified in recent days. TOPPLED A statue of onetime unimpeachable former coach Joe Paterno outside Penn State’s football stadium will come down, the university said Sunday. A report into the school’s response to sex-abuse allegations leveled against disgraced former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky found that Paterno was one of several top-level Penn State employees who helped conceal suspicions against the convicted offender when they first emerged more than 10 years ago. The statue was covered with a blue tarp Sunday as construction equipment was moved in to take it down. The report found that Paterno was aware of Sandusky’s activities in 2001 but chose not to report them. MUZZLED The man who runs our country and the man who wants to may have decided that speaking out against weapons of mass murder is just not worth the political hassle. President Obama and presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney have mostly declined to mention the issue of restricting access to certain types of firearms in the wake of the Colorado massacre that killed 12 Americans. “There are more downside risks than upside gains in talking about it,” said University of Maryland professor Don Kettl. The alleged shooter bought 6,000 rounds of ammunition and four guns in the months before the shooting, all legally. | | 
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