Given that Princeton is a pretty sleepy place in the summer (read: in general), our actual town doesn’t often make national headlines. According to our own University news, the most exciting thing that’s been happening on campus is a summer research program run by the grad school, which matches undergrads with professors and tries to reassure them that they really do want to stay in academia. Forever.

Yes, the accompanying photo for our local news headlines is a snapshot of the Princeton Junction parking lot (source: nj.com).

Meanwhile, PFML kids continue to gripe about their GPAs/futures and get insecure about girlfriends’ IIP-sponsored summer flings. PJ’s announces a new partnership with the guy who brought us Princeton Sports Bar this year. And a random naked dude gets arrested for running around in the parking lot of NJ Transit’s Princeton Junction!

Okay, so you know that Triangle is right (”Nothing ever happens in Princeton/Princeton is like an old folks’ home”) when we make much ado about some kid taking off his clothes after getting high and thrill to the thought of having salad and pasta options alongside our pancakes. But small as our town is, it serves as setting for the kinds of minds that do have their names scattered throughout national and global news, whether in commentary, direct participation or surprising background inspiration.

On the domestic front, Cornel West got annoyed at both Reid and Boehner’s budget plans and complained that left, right, and Obama were all failing the poor citizens of America. In true brotha-loving fashion, he also announced an upcoming “poverty tour” to “spotlight… working people['s] humanity, their dignity and their sense of resiliency.”

Outside the U.S., Anne-Marie Slaughter went to a China conference in Singapore and published her meeting notes, listing bullet-pointed observations on how ”Chinese youth really like blogs” and “Businesspeople don’t like hearing about potential problems with Chinese growth.”

Finally, this reading of Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik’s manifesto reveals an unexpected Princeton connection. Breivik directly cites MOL/WWS professor Lee Silver’s book Remaking Eden as partial inspiration for his warped eugenics beliefs. Of course, the article quickly clarifies that Silver is by no means responsible for Breivik’s mass murder crimes. But just the fact of connections like these is a reminder of how far Princetonian influence spreads, for better or for worse, even from a town as quaint (read: kind-of-sort-of-boring) as ours.