House of Representatives approves stopgap spending bill
WASHINGTON — The House on Thursday gave quick approval to a stopgap spending bill that will finance the government for the first four days of October, until lawmakers can return and vote on a more ambitious seven-week spending bill.
Wall Street rebounds on Europe hopes
Stocks on Wall Street rallied Monday as investors shrugged off some negative figures on the U.S. economy and reacted positively to unconfirmed reports that officials in Europe were developing plans to confront the continent’s fiscal crisis.
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The Iranian lawyer for the two U.S. hikers released on bail and repatriated last week after a two-year odyssey through Iran’s penal system appeared to distance himself from his clients in an interview published Monday, calling their accusations of mistreatment baseless and politically motivated.
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SAN FRANCISCO — One after another, like moths to a flame, technology companies have been seduced into entering the market for tablets. Apple made it look so irresistible, with 29 million eager and sometimes fanatical consumers snapping up an iPad in the device’s first 15 months.
Apple-picking season here; winter, not yet
The next few days look to be warm, humid, and rainy, with a crisp fall cold front moving through toward the end of the week. Along with autumn’s arrival comes the advent of apple-picking season; look for dorm and FSILG trips to nearby orchards in the near future!
Fighters enter Gadhafi stronghold city as toll rises
TRIPOLI, Libya — Fighters battling Moammar Gadhafi’s loyalists Monday entered the coastal city of Sirte from the east as residents fleeing the besieged city, one of the loyalists’ few remaining strongholds, warned of an escalating toll from the fighting. The foray by the former rebels, backed by a heavy bombardment from NATO warplanes, brought them to a traffic circle more than a mile from the city center, Reuters reported. In recent days, the rebels have struck deep into the city from the west, only to be beaten back by heavy resistance from Gadhafi fighters ensconced in the city.
Wangari Maathai, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, dies at 71
NAIROBI, Kenya — Dr. Wangari Maathai, the Kenyan environmentalist who began a movement to reforest her country by paying poor women a few shillings to plant trees and who went on to become the first African woman to win a Nobel Peace Prize, died here Sunday. She was 71.
Medvedev fires Russian finance minister for insubordination
MOSCOW — President Dmitry Medvedev fired Russia’s longtime finance minister for insubordination Monday after the two had an icy confrontation on television that revealed the fault lines in a government where disagreements are usually kept strictly under wraps.
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SAN FRANCISCO — Facebook, the Web’s biggest social network, is where you go to see what your friends are up to. Now it wants to be a force that shapes what you watch, hear, read and buy.
In Europe, a chorus of outrage over execution of Troy Davis
PARIS — Even in a region long disdainful of U.S. attitudes toward the death penalty, public officials, editorial writers and activists across Western Europe reacted with fury Thursday to news that Troy Davis was executed in Georgia on Wednesday night.
US eyes business opportunities in Libya as the embassy reopens
TRIPOLI, Libya — The United States formally reopened its embassy in Libya Thursday as the returning ambassador said that his government was cautiously optimistic about the country’s future and already trying to help U.S. companies exploit business opportunities there.
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The odds that a falling satellite will kill you Friday are probably zero — but maybe not quite.
EU excludes members Romania and Bulgaria entry to bloc’s travel zone
BRUSSELS — Preoccupied with fears of increased migration from the south, the European Union told its two newest members, Romania and Bulgaria, on Thursday that they would have to wait to join the bloc’s passport-free travel zone.
Satellite to rain from sky
A dead NASA satellite looks to make it’s reentry into Earth’s atmosphere sometime in the afternoon Friday, EDT. This large hunk of space debris has been incapacitated and is tumbling towards a most spectacular plunge to the surface. NASA expects 26 sizable pieces to remain intact to the ground, the largest of which may be over 300lbs. Although the re-entry is predicted to leave a awe-inspiring trail in the sky over 500 miles long, don’t get your hopes up. The satellite is most likely to make its hard landing somewhere in Europe or Asia, depending on the exact time of reentry. If you are concerned about your friend overseas getting hurt by the debris, don’t worry. NASA has guesstimated a 1 in 3,200 chance of the satellite harming any human.
Study calls single-sex education misguided & stereotype-reinforcing
Single-sex education is ineffective, misguided and may actually increase gender stereotyping, a team of psychologists asserts in a paper to be published Friday.
Obama: $320 billion cuts in Medicare, Medicaid
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s budget director said Monday that the president’s new deficit reduction plan would impose “a lot of pain,” and that is clearly true of White House proposals to cut $320 billion from projected spending on Medicare and Medicaid in the coming decade.
Cameron and Sarkozy visit Libya, vow continued NATO effort
TRIPOLI, Libya — The leaders of Britain and France visited Libya on Thursday in a triumphal but heavily guarded tour intended to boost the country’s revolutionary leaders, whose forces were propelled to power with NATO’s help last month by routing Moammar Gadhafi and his military in the most violent conflict of the Arab Spring uprisings.
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WASHINGTON — An armed drone operated by the CIA this week killed a top al-Qaida operative responsible for plotting terror attacks inside Pakistan, two U.S. officials said Thursday.
China consolidates grip on rare earths
BEIJING — In the name of fighting pollution, China has sent the price of compact fluorescent light bulbs soaring in the United States.
US to seek fines on oil firms for Gulf spill
WASHINGTON — The federal government will seek to fine BP, Transocean and Halliburton for violations tied to the Deepwater Horizon disaster, the nation’s top offshore drilling regulator said Thursday.