Despite losing the Massachusetts primary to Hillary Clinton, there’s a lot of love here for presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama. His buddy, Gov. Deval Patrick, came out and gave a glowing oration when the candidate held a rally on Boston Common back in October of last year, and Cambridge native Ben Affleck has also appeared in town to support the candidate.

Boston will play host to yet another special moment for Obama on August 4—Politicker reports the Illinois senator will celebrate his 47th birthday at a fundraiser at the State Room.

Obama is a Leo? This explains so much.

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For years, Ted Kennedy and Utah Republican Orrin Hatch have been the Senate’s odd couple. When the liberal lion and the conservative, um, Rocky Mountain Elk, ended up on the same committee, they found they had to work together to get anything accomplished, and soon became friends. How bromantic.

It’s understandable that Hatch was devastated when he learned about Kennedy’s brain tumor. And like so many tortured souls, he turned to music to soothe his pain and penned a song about his friend Kennedy.

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Governor Deval Patrick had a pretty good half-year, despite the death of his casino bill. The budget he signed on Sunday was largely his creation. He played ping-pong without much controversy. And, he finally showed some ability to use the press to his advantage when his daughter announced she’s gay.

The governor still has the golden touch, apparently. Today’s Globe reports that Patrick is paying off some of his campaign expenses by circumventing the state’s limit on how much an individual can donate to a candidate, and that very few people have gotten worked up over the move.

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Our excitement for the Democratic National Convention continues to build. Ted Kennedy’s return to the Senate fueled our hopes that he will give an oration in Denver that will put Barack Obama’s 2004 speech in Boston to shame. Earlier today we learned Maria Menounos is gonna be there too.

But having all these great people in one location will take a lot of traveling, and if there’s anybody who can’t live with green guilt, it’s a Democrat.

To stop the visions of polar bears without an ice floe that haunts their dreams, the Massachusetts delegates have decided to install compact fluorescent light bulbs in low-income housing around the state to offset the carbon they’ll put out while traveling to Denver.

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During the seemingly endless 2008 presidential campaign cycle, Barack Obama has been careful to not expose his daughters, 10-year-old Malia and 7-year-old Sasha, to much media scrutiny. Which is why it was a huge get for Medford native Maria Menounos when she landed an interview with the entire Obama family for Access Hollywood.

The spot, which aired last week, showed a completely average young family. The kids were excited that they could get a dog when the campaign is over, and admitted they like it when their parents hold hands. But Obama later said that he regretted sitting down with Menounos.

“I think that we got carried away in the moment,” Obama told NBC Wednesday morning. “We were having a birthday party and everybody was laughing, and suddenly this thing cropped up, and I didn’t catch it quickly enough and I was surprised by the attention it got.”

We wanted to know what Menounos thought about the candidate’s reaction, so we checked in with her to see how it all went down.

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Generally, if there’s a controversy to be found at the public library, it’s happening in one of the books in its collection. Aside from responding to the occasional barb, the staff at the library goes about their business without much distraction.

But now that Bernard Margolis has left the building, some drama is unfolding at the Boston Public Library.

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We understand why newspapers don’t use profanity in their stories. In theory, kids may separate themselves from Facebook long enough to read a story, and would read all sorts of unsavory language they certainly never learned from watching late-night FX programing.

But in today’s story about bodybuilding “disabled” firefighter Albert Arroyo, the Globe used a euphemism that even escaped our pre-caffeinated brains.

[Boston fire commissioner Roderick] Fraser said Arroyo told him that his bodybuilding helps ease his back pain - a claim that Fraser dismissed with a barnyard epithet.

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This morning, we alerted you to the beef between Lynn city councilor Rick Ford and WRKO host Reese Hopkins. Ford said he’d “like to slap [Hopkins] in the mouth” and challenged the host to a boxing match after he called Ford’s beloved North Shore town “a dump.”

While Hopkins remains defiant, Councilor Ford tells Boston Daily he feels bad about the way he expressed pride in his city.

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Politicians and the media have a love-hate relationship. Elected officials love to hand stories to reporters, whether it’s to bully a union into a contract or to test the waters on some cockamamie scheme. But that relationship can turn sour fast when the media picks up a juicy scoop (or three, if you’re Sal DiMasi).

While the Speaker may not yet have come to blows with the media, a Lynn city councilor actually challenged WRKO host Reese Hopkins to a fight after Hopkins called the North Shore town “a dump” on his morning radio show.

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With stories like this, we wish we had the rich, sonorous voice of a voice-over artist.

Ted Kennedy’s triumphant return to the floor of the Senate yesterday continues to get more dramatic. Not only did he end the Republican filibuster on an important Medicare bill, but he cast the deciding vote.

If Martin Scorsese isn’t writing a screenplay about the last years of the liberal lion’s life, we’ll eat our hat.

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