LIBYA UPDATE – AT 10:35 A.M. ET:  We are following the report that Gaddafi's son and three grandchildren were killed yesterday in a NATO air raid.  There still is no confirmation, and Western countries are not accepting the report at face value, a wise decision considering that the source is the Libyan regime.  From Reuters:

Britain cannot confirm reports that a son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was killed in a NATO air strike, junior Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt said on Sunday. "We've no verification of that at the moment. These are still unconfirmed reports. I'm afraid we don't know one way or the other," Burt told Sky News when asked about a Libyan government statement that a NATO air strike in Tripoli had killed Gaddafi's youngest son and three grandchildren.

Burt said command and control centers were "often placed in civilian areas by forces overseas".

A Libyan government spokesman said on Saturday that Gaddafi survived a NATO air strike that killed his youngest son and three grandchildren and destroyed a Tripoli house.

"What we have now is the law of the jungle," government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim told a news conference. "We think now it is clear to everyone that what is happening in Libya has nothing to do with the protection of civilians."

Authorities said Gaddafi's youngest son, Saif Al-Arab, had been killed in the attack. Saif al-Arab is one of Gaddafi's less prominent sons, with a limited role in the Tripoli power structure.

Of course, condemnations of the attack are coming from the usual suspects, most prominent among them Hugo Chavez, star of stage and screen, and a Hollywood favorite. 

Other reports this morning say that smoke has been pouring from the Italian embassy in Tripoli, as well as other Western embassies:

A day after Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's son was killed in a NATO airstrike that targeted the strongman's compound, reports surfaced of attacks on Western embassies in Tripoli and renewed fighting broke out across the country.

Witnesses told Reuters that smoke was rising from the Italian embassy building in the Libyan capital Sunday afternoon. The UK said it was investigating reports that its own mission in Tripoli had been destroyed, the BBC reported, and protests were said to be taking place outside the US embassy.

Oh, the president of the United States spent last night telling jokes at the White House Correspondents Dinner, a dinner that received lavish press coverage, as if it were a state occasion.  There was a time when journalists were told to report the news, not to make the news.  Ah, but times have changed.

We'll follow the Libya story to see if there are any hints of serious change.  We won't have much to say about the dinner. 

May 1, 2011