As we enter the new year, the most important question on people’s mind is whether or not the world will officially end as we know it by next December. But let’s face it, if 2012 is really going to bring about end times (because we should clearly be basing our plans for the end on the Mayan calendar), it’s going to have a tough act to follow. Many people are writing up 2011 as the year of this or the year of that, but let’s keep things in perspective here: 2011 was the year that the world descended into random chaos.

Glenn Beck took to the airwaves today with a fairly large set of grievances: the President’s response to the S&P downgrade; the violence of the Arab Spring and, by proxy, the London riots; S&P’s abysmal credit rating system itself. Discussing the riots, all these topics seem to have blended together for him– mocking the President’s support of the Arab spring by asking him to support the UK riots and calling the downgrade symptomatic of the “economic Archduke Ferdinand moment” that was the earthquake in Japan.

In the wake of Japane’s recent massive earthquake and accompanying tsunami, the daily Ishinomaki Hibi Shimbun, based in Japan’s Miyagi Prefecture, found itself without power… So it produced new issues during a crucial time using what was available to editors – paper, and pen.

Newly-released video from Japan shows just how sudden tsunamis can be. The footage shows several people walking in a lot bordered by a tree-lined slope when, suddenly, they break into a run to get away from the rising water as it approaches – quickly – several feet behind them. As people scramble to higher ground, screaming, cars and other debris are carried away by the fast-moving water.

By now, you’re probably familiar with the idea that animals can often “predict” natural disasters and changes in weather with their behavior. Well, the humble oarfish, a long, serpentine fish found in warm waters, may have helped the more observant become aware that an earthquake was about to hit Japan.

CNN Newsroom‘s Don Lemon spoke with the Japanese journalist Tetsuo Jimbo, who drove–and, when the roads became impassable, walked–into the radiation zone near Fukushima, Japan. He videotaped the surreal scenes of abandoned animals and empty streets, and says he risked his own health and safety because he’s a journalist.

“We did take precautions,” he said. “We took iodine pills, we had our mouth and nose covered, stuff like that. But basically we went in in plain clothes,” he said, indicating that “radiation suits” worn by some emergency workers may be of little help in the zone around the crippled nuclear plant.

The devastation in Japan after the massive earthquake and tsunami last month appears to have no end, and within a year’s time much of what was destroyed may end up on U.S. shores. Scientists are now predicting that it will take a year for the wreckage from towns essentially erased off the map to end up in Washington, Oregon and California, wreckage including whole houses, cars, and human remains.

As Japan reels from yet another earthquake (not to mention resulting aftershocks and power outages), officials have forced area residents to evacuate Fukushima, the prefecture housing the now-notorious Fukushima I nuclear power plant, which you’ll likely recall suffered much damage as a result of previous earthquakes and a powerful tsunami.

You remember the dog rescued from floating debris three weeks after Japan’s initial earthquake / tsunami disaster, don’t you? Well, it seems that the pup is the human interest story that keeps on giving: Against all odds, the dog – named Ban – has been reunited with his owner! Here, have a tissue. Hell, have five tissues and a Xanax.

Officials at the damaged Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant in Japan have finally managed to explain the exorbitant spikes in radiation in the seawater surrounding the plant: an eight-inch crack in the radioactive deuterium and tritium containment basin that has been leaking water into the ocean. The leak has been mostly contained, but concrete filling with continue [...]

There is no silver lining, no “good side,” nothing remotely redeeming about the atrocious devastation the earthquake earlier this month and subsequent tsunami in Japan submitted that nation’s people to, but even in the darkest of news stories there sometimes arises a story that inspires some good feelings. Rescue workers saved a dog today that had been floating out at sea for the three weeks since the tsunami, alive and as well as can be expected.

Sometimes, when a person becomes bombarded with headlines and photographs chronicling a devastating event, it’s difficult to fully process the terror and confusion experienced by those who had to endure it – which is where video footage can come in handy. It helps put things in perspective, and brings a dose of reality where words and still images cannot.

And that’s exactly why we couldn’t turn away from this newly-released video showing the impact of the recent tsunami as it pummels Kesennuma port.

In a number of American states, trace amounts of radiation that originated in Japan has been found in the rainwater. Hearing this, most people are going to want to know whether or not we need to worry. Earlier, Megyn Kelly posed this question to Dr. Richard Firshein.

A few weeks ago, I was in Universal Studios theme park in Orlando riding the ride based on The Simpsons, which has a plot based partly around a nuclear accident in the fictional town of Springfield. With most of the globe watching anxiously and nervously to see the full extent of Japan’s nuclear problems, jokes involving the cartoon Professor Frink desperately trying to warn Krusty the Clown about a dangerous nuclear reactor were suddenly less funny. Clearly, I’m not the only one to notice the tricky issue of the long-running series’ prevalent radiation-based humor (after all, Homer Simpson works in a nuclear power plant), as European TV networks are now going through and picking out certain episodes to stop airing until the danger subsides.

The huge resources required to cover the disaster in Japan, uprisings in Egypt and war in Libya have drained budgets at American news networks, according to an analysis by TheWrap. “We’ve already had a year’s worth of breaking news coverage, and it’s not even the end of March,” David Verdi, NBC News VP of worldwide newsgathering, told TheWrap.

Brent Lang and Dylan Stableford ran the numbers, adding up all the airfare to shuttle correspondents around the world, plus the costs of keeping them on scene and the satellite costs of getting their stories on television, and concluded a continued big news year could be a problem:

On The Factor tonight, Bill O’Reilly took on, again, the question of how much people, including those of us here in the U.S., should worry about the situation at the Fukushima nuclear power plant… and gave CNN a compliment or two in the process.

Initially, the Fukushima 50 – the name given to the 180 nuclear plant workers working in shifts to keep the plant’s reactors cool – were shrouded in mystery, their identities kept hidden from the public at the request of the plant’s management. Now, however, photo from inside the plant have allowed the public a glimpse at the conditions these workers must face every day.

As the concerns over Fukushima’s Daiichi plant continue to make headlines, one has to wonder: How do you explain a possible nuclear crisis to young, impressionable children? It’s a daunting task, certainly, but nothing a little poo can’t help.

Meet “Nuclear Boy.” He’s a bit of a blockhead (I’m here all week, folks) and has something of an…embarrassing problem. Luckily, doctors are on call around-the-clock to supply our flatulent little friend with his much-needed medicine: sea water and boron.

A CBS News survey shows half of Americans approve of how President Obama is handling the situation in Libya, with just 29 percent saying they disapprove. Twenty-one percent said they did not have an opinion. CBS pollsters say the solid support includes an unusually strong showing from Republicans:

Cable news ratings, March 18, 2011:

•Maybe viewers wanted to see Sean Hannity. Fox News aired a special on Japan in Hannity’s 9 p.m. timeslot Friday, and the network had a rare second-place finish among viewers 25-54. CNN’s Piers Morgan Tonight was first, with 388,000 viewers, just ahead of Fox’s 385,000. MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow Show was a distant third (Maddow herself was off) with 154,000 viewers.

CNN’s political director, Sam Feist, had only two things to tell his eight thousand Twitter followers over the weekend: On Saturday night, he said CNN was busy on a multitude of major news stories (quoting Wolf Blitzer, who anchored live primetime coverage Saturday and Sunday, he said “we’re live on five continents”) and he took a shot at cable news rival MSNBC. “Must be a Big news day: MSNBC running Lockup.”

The Fukushima 50 – the name given to the 180 Japanese workers, working in shifts of 50, valiantly trying to keep the Fukushima Daiichi plant’s reactors and exposed fuel rods from leaking radiation – have been evacuated from the plant after a plume of gray smoke began rising from one of its reactor units, specifically from the unit 3 reactor building’s dried-up fuel storage pool.

President Obama is getting criticism from all directions regarding America’s response to the Libyan crisis, whether it’s because he’s too hesitant to lead international efforts in the country or because he’s too eager to go along with them. Yet he’s got at least one supporter in Juan Williams, who said on the Libya and Japan issues, “I think he’s just done fine.”

It has been more than a week since Japan was hit with a devastating earthquake and tsunami, and yet only now are religious celebrities beginning to come out of the woodwork to give a spiritual explanation for what occurred. Talking to Newsmax TV, Rev. Franklin Graham confirmed that, indeed, these recent natural disasters could signal the Second Coming of Jesus, but Bill O’Reilly was right in calling out the media for exaggerating the severity of the disaster in Japan.

The back and forth between MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell and Fox News’ Glenn Beck continues… And, is it our imagination, or do both men seem to be kind of in on the joke? They seem to be genuinely enjoying this.