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(Mar 2, 2013 12:28 PM) The next Atkins? The New York Times says the Fast Diet has the potential to be a blockbuster in the US after becoming a best-seller in Britain. The premise is simple: Eat whatever you want for five days, then fast for two. Well, almost fast: The authors recommend two light meals a day of about 300 calories each on fasting days. Jennifer Conlin of the Times sums it up thusly: Co-author Michael Mosley is a medical journalist who came up with the 5:2 ratio after looking into the idea of intermittent fasting, experimenting on himself, and producing a popular documentary on the subject. The book followed, and the US edition came out last week. Britain's National Health System, meanwhile, cautions that despite its increasing popularity, there is a great deal of uncertainty about I.F. (intermittent fasting) with significant gaps in the evidence.

(Jun 26, 2018 11:22 AM CDT) This year's hurricane season is expected to be relatively tame, but it's no time to get complacent. Some of the worst storms in recent decades have hit during slower hurricane seasons, notes 24/7 Wall St. in an introduction to its list of the biggest hurricanes since 1851. The top 10, based on estimated central pressure at time of landfall, show that four of them have occurred since 2005: 1. The Labor Day Storm of 1935; affecting Andros Island in the Bahamas 2. Hurricane Camille, 1969; affecting Cuba and the southern US 3. Hurricane Gilbert, 1988; affecting the Caribbean, Central America, and the US 4. Hurricane Dean, 2007; affecting Jamaica and eastern Mexico 5. Hurricane Janet, 1955; affecting the Caribbean and Mexico 6. Hurricane Irma, 2017; affecting the Caribbean and Florida 7. Hurricane Katrina, 2005; affecting Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama 8. Hurricane Maria, 2017: affecting Puerto Rico and northeastern Caribbean islands 9. Hurricane Andrew, 1992; affecting Bermuda, Puerto Rico, Florida and Louisiana 10. The Great Indianola Hurricane of 1886; affecting southeastern Texas Click for the full list or see history's deadliest natural disasters.

(May 21, 2015 12:32 PM CDT) A 65-year-old woman in Israel has just become a mother for the first time. The ultra-Orthodox woman gave birth to a healthy 5.9-pound baby boy this week, reports the Jerusalem Post. Haya Shahar did so thanks to IVF treatment she had outside the country, likely Russia, because Israel forbids the procedure for women older than 54. We do not recommend this, says Dr. Tal Biron of Kfar Saba hospital. Nevertheless, he added that the baby is very cute. Shahar's husband is 67, and they'd been trying unsuccessfully to have a baby throughout their 46-year marriage. The Post notes the sperm was either donated or bought, but the hospital won't specify; Haaretz says the couple used a donor egg. While the delivery (by C-section) makes Shahar the oldest woman to give birth in Israel, it's not a world record. Among the older verified births are one in Spain and another in Romania, both with women who delivered at age 66 after IVF treatments, notes the Mommy Files blog at the San Francisco Chronicle. The oldest woman on record to conceive naturally is a woman in the UK who gave birth at 59, it adds. Shahar and her husband credit a rabbi's blessing for their new son. The baby is a darling and there is no despair in the world, and the chapter never ends, they said. (A 65-year-old woman in Germany is expecting quadruplets.)

(Mar 4, 2017 3:14 PM) Somalia's prime minister said Saturday that 110 people have died from hunger in the past 48 hours in a single region--the first death toll announced in a severe drought threatening millions of people across the country. Somalia's government declared the drought a national disaster on Tuesday. The UN estimates that 5 million people in Somalia need aid, amid warnings of a full-blown famine, the AP reports. The death toll announced by Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire is from the Bay region in the southwest part of the country alone. Somalia was one of four regions singled out by the UN secretary-general last month in a $4.4 billion aid appeal to avert catastrophic hunger and famine. Thousands have been streaming into Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, in search of food aid, overwhelming local and international aid agencies. Over 7,000 internally displaced people checked into one feeding center recently. The drought is the first crisis for Somalia's newly elected Somali-American leader, President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed. Previous droughts and a quarter-century of conflict, including ongoing attacks by extremist group al-Shabab, have left the country fragile. Mohamed has appealed to the international community for help. About 363,000 acutely malnourished children in Somalia need urgent treatment and nutrition support, including 71,000 who are severely malnourished, the US Agency for International Development's Famine Early Warning Systems Network has warned.

(Apr 4, 2012 7:47 AM CDT) How dire is the situation in Greece? It's come to this: A 77-year-old killed himself in an Athens square this morning, apparently distraught over his mounting debt. Police say the unidentified man shot himself about 300 feet from the parliament building in Syntagma Square, as rush-hour commuters passed by. Though the man left no suicide note, witnesses heard him shouting, So I won't leave debts for my children. The Wall Street Journal notes that suicides were up 20% in 2010 and 2011 in Greece, compared to pre-crisis 2009. But a government rep downplayed the incident, saying, We must all be calm and respect the real causes (of the suicide), which are not yet known. The death follows similar occurrences in Italy: Reuters reports that a 78-year-old woman jumped out of her fourth-floor balcony yesterday after her pension was chopped by 25%. The week prior, two men stricken with debt set themselves on fire; both survived.

(Dec 27, 2018 8:22 AM) A milestone in the cable wars: MSNBC has beaten Fox News in total daytime viewers for the first time since 2000. For the week of Dec. 17-21, MSNBC averaged 1.56 million viewers between 6am and 2pm, ahead of Fox (1.54 million) and CNN (975,000), according to a release from NBCUniversal. The last time the liberal network beat its counterpart on the right in this metric was Nov. 6, 2000, just ahead of the election that would put George W. Bush in the White House. MSNBC also came out on top in the key daytime demographic of 25- to 54-year-olds for the first time since 2001, reports Politico. In terms of prime time, MSNBC beat its competitors for the fourth straight week, with Rachel Maddow's show No. 1 at 3.2 million viewers. Fox's Sean Hannity was off that week, though the AP notes that his ratings have been slipping since the election. Overall, Hannity will still end 2018 as the most popular personality on cable news, a title he held last year as well. However, his show has pulled in an average 2.76 million viewers from the election through Dec. 17, a drop of 19% from the previous month. He's also down 30% in the 25- to 54-year-old demographic.

(Mar 9, 2011 4:25 AM) Stolen gems worth $25 million have been found stashed in a rain sewer in a Paris suburb. Police say the gems--taken in a spectacular $100 million heist in 2008--were hidden in a plastic container embedded in cement, the BBC reports. The home above the sewer belongs to one of nine people jailed for the armed raid on luxury jeweler Harry Winston's Paris boutique, AP reports. (Click to read about another heist-gone-wrong.

(Jul 29, 2014 7:36 AM CDT) When it comes to climate change, the United States can pay to cut carbon emissions now, or we can pay about $150 billion a year down the road as costs soar by about 40% a decade, according to a White House Council of Economic Advisers analysis out today, as per the New York Times. The main reason, as cited by Mashable: Dodging emissions cuts now means steeper reductions will be required at a later date to reach a given temperature target. The report comes ahead of a coal-focused EPA proposal to slash carbon dioxide emissions by 30% by 2030; that plan, which could shut hundreds of coal-powered plants, faces scrutiny this week vis-a-vis hearings across the country. Based on an analysis of 16 different studies on climate change, the White House report warns about the economic impact of climate catastrophes, including elevated sea levels and rising temperatures--and says that getting a handle on carbon emissions would serve as a sort of climate insurance, notes Time. The cuts are catching heat, adds the Times, from sources including Mitch McConnell, a Koch brothers-backed Tea Party group that complains the EPA is waging a war on traditional affordable energy, and, not surprisingly, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity. But Dems are pitching it as fiscally responsible. It's becoming clearer and clearer that if you care about the deficit, you need to care about climate change, says Sen. Patty Murray. Also on the docket for today: new mandates on methane, reports CNN. The White House's latest report follows May's pretty dire National Climate Assessment.

(Jun 19, 2009 1:30 AM CDT) A work believed to be Michelangelo's first painting has made its American debut at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the New York Times reports. St. Anthony Tormented by Demons, a customized copy of a German print, is thought to have been painted in 1487 when Michelangelo was a 12-year-old apprentice trying to prove he could make it as an artist. The Met's exhibition puts the work side-by-side with the template young Michelangelo used, noting the personal touches the artist added that would become themes throughout his career. Tests performed at the museum show that the young artist made many revisions to the painting before completion, repeatedly changing shapes and scraping away paint. The finished work left Michelangelo's workshop master unnerved at the display of skill, according to historians.

(Jul 26, 2015 10:59 AM CDT) We've all heard we should drink eight glasses of water a day. But the advice isn't based on scientific evidence, and for some people it may be flat out wrong, report researchers in Harvard Health Letter. They conclude that 30 to 50 ounces of fluid intake a day is ideal, and that works out to more like four to six (8-ounce) glasses a day. Note the word fluid: It doesn't have to be water to hydrate, reports CBS News. It's really about fluids in general, one doctor in Cleveland says. Doesn't necessarily have to be water. Lettuce, spinach, fruits in general, soups ... those are all things that are going to have a lot of water in them as well. (Of course, Americans may not be getting a ton of help from fruits and vegetables: Per a new CDC report, just 13% of adults eat the daily recommended amount of fruit; for vegetables, just 9% of adults, LiveScience reports. The piece in Harvard Health Letter also specifies that the water shouldn't be consumed all at once. It's important to stay hydrated gradually, throughout the day. To do that, it recommends taking fluids at meals, with medicine, and socially. The Mayo Clinic suggests that while eight glasses is something of a myth, it lines up pretty well with recommendations by the Institute of Medicine, which suggest 3 liters of beverages a day for men and 2.2 for women, where all beverages count toward one's fluid intake. Also important, especially if you're in the middle of a heat wave? Paying attention to signs of dehydration, which include dizziness, weakness, heart palpitations, and dark urine. (No one knows where the eight-glass water myth comes from, but it's not the only one floating around.)

(Oct 23, 2018 4:44 PM CDT) At least 20 people were injured when an escalator in the Rome metropolitan system collapsed Tuesday night, the AP reports. A video shown on Sky TG24 shows the escalator accelerating suddenly, and the people riding down on it collapsing one onto another. The dramatic footage shows people on the parallel escalator trying to pull others to safety. The cause was not immediately known. The metropolitan station at Piazza Repubblica near the main Termine train station was closed by investigators. The scene that we found was people piled up at the bottom of the escalator, said Rome provincial fire chief Giampietro Boscaino. People one on the top of the other looking for help. They had various injuries caused by the escalator that was twisted, therefore serious injuries.

(May 13, 2012 6:16 PM CDT) JPMorgan's disastrous $2 billion trading loss has officially claimed its first casualty. Chief Investment Officer Ina R. Drew, a 30-year veteran of JPMorgan and one of Wall Street's most prominent women, retired today, the AP reports. Drew was responsible for overseeing the disastrous trades. Executives say she ordered them to protect the bank from turmoil in Europe, but didn't foresee a sudden market shift that turned a huge bet into a $2 billion loss, the New York Times reports. She'll be replaced by Matt Zames, the bank's current co-chief of global fixed income. Also expected to resign are Achilles Macris, who led the London-based desk that made the trades, and Javier Martin-Artajo, a leader on Macris' team. Trader Bruno Iksil, known as the whale for the large positions he took in credit derivative markets, will probably step down too, the Wall Street Journal notes. CEO Jamie Dimon, who yesterday called the bank's behavior sloppy and stupid, will keep his job.

(Jun 7, 2010 12:48 PM CDT) Rush Limbaugh got married over the weekend, and though Gawker wasn't invited to the Palm Beach nuptials, it decided to crash the party anyway. The site paid for a flying banner that read Rush: Congrats On Your 4th Marriage XO Gawker (click here to see it)--a subtly snarky reminder, for Rush and especially his new bride, of the radio host's frequent marriages and divorces, PopEater reports. The message was the result of a contest Gawker held. Though it got even snarkier suggestions ( May this be the 4th happiest day of your life and Prescribing you many happy years together, for instance), it opted for the straightforward one because the pilot wanted to avoid anything too controversial, and because we'll leave staging protests at weddings to the Westboro Baptist Church.

(Nov 1, 2013 3:26 PM CDT) Talk about a touching touchdown: Sheridan Hedrick was about to hit the end zone at a Olivet Middle School football game in Michigan on Oct. 5 when he stopped at the one-yard line. Unbeknownst to anyone, the 8th-grade team was about to perform the Keith Special --a play that can only be completed by Keith Orr, a student with behavioral and learning disabilities. He always tries his hardest, Sheridan told WILX. We thought it would be cool to do something and have him get a touchdown. Keith ran the ball across the goal line and the stadium erupted, said the team's coach. The kids have never celebrated a touchdown as enthusiastically as Keith's touchdown. It was a play Keith's teammates had come up with on their own, and one that was weeks in the making. The coaches didn't know anything about it, one player tells CBS News. If you do something nice to people, then probably it could change someone's life forever, and I think we changed Keith's life, Sheridan said. That's what gets to me, said Keith's mom. Not that my kid made a touchdown, but that these kids planned it. ... They made it happen for him. As for Keith, he said the touchdown was awesome, adding, before I started playing football I barely had any friends. Now I have a bunch. (Click for another heart-warming sports story.)

(Mar 5, 2010 9:12 AM) Washington State's Death with Dignity medical suicide law was enacted a year ago today, and in the first 9 months 63 terminally ill patients were prescribed fatal medication and 36 used it to end their lives. Three people attempted to use the drugs but failed; one vomited them back up, and two reawakened after ingesting the powerful barbiturates. To be eligible, a doctor must determine a patient has no more than 6 months to live. A government report on the use of the law covers only 2009, but the Seattle Post-Intelligencer estimates that 82 people have obtained the drugs--a process that can take a month or more--since its inception, and 52 of them have died either from the medication or natural causes. Proponents note the disconnect. A significant number of people are using the law for peace of mind and control, sort of like insurance, says one. One doesn't run out and burn one's home down just because you get fire insurance.

(Jun 30, 2017 5:00 AM CDT) The youngest members of the Kardashian-Jenner dynasty are learning the hard way not to mess with beloved rock and rap icons. On Wednesday, sisters Kylie and Kendall Jenner debuted $125 T-shirts on their online store featuring images of themselves superimposed over shots of artists like Tupac Shakur, Metallica, and Led Zeppelin. Cue the backlash. USA Today reports that Voletta Wallace, the mother of Christopher Notorious BIG Wallace, tore into the Jenner sisters on Instagram for printing unauthorized images of her son. I have no idea why they feel they can exploit the deaths of 2pac and my Son Christopher to sell a t-shirt, she wrote alongside an image of one of the shirts. One Tupac shirt featured their initials on top of the late rapper. Sharon Osbourne also took issue with the shirts, one of which involved Ozzy Osbourne (see it here), the Independent reports. Stick to what you know ... lip gloss, she tweeted. Despite the controversy, the LA Times reported mid-day Thursday that shirts featuring Metallica, Doors lead singer Jim Morrison, and the cover of Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon album were running low on the site. On Thursday afternoon Kylie and Kendall tweeted that the shirts had been pulled from their Kendall + Kylie site and issued an apology for their designs, which they say were not well thought out. ... We are huge fans of their music and it was not our intention to disrespect these cultural icons in any way, they wrote. Biggie's estate was not placated, telling People it appreciates the move but this matter has yet to be resolved. (This isn't Kendall's first product-related controversy.)

(Apr 15, 2012 1:38 PM CDT) Brazen attacks on government buildings in Kabul and various locations in eastern Afghanistan claimed at least 35 lives today, the Los Angeles Times reports. Five civilians, 11 police officers, and 19 insurgents are reported dead after attacks on buildings in Kabul, including US, British, and German embassies, the parliament building, and NATO headquarters. Perpetrators of the lunchtime assault also struck airfields and police headquarters in the eastern provinces, according to Afghan officials. The Taliban has claimed responsibility, but US Ambassador Ryan Crocker figures it was probably the Haqqani network: Frankly, I don't think the Taliban is good enough, he said. The Afghan government says security forces have cornered the attackers in Kabul, where explosions, plumes of smoke, and crisp gunfire have echoed all afternoon. The attack on parliament is an attack on Afghanistan and all its people, said one official perched on a rooftop. They are the enemies of peace.

(May 25, 2020 7:21 AM CDT) If starting your Monday off giving an interview in the middle of a pandemic seemed too easy for Jacinda Ardern, fate decided to throw in a little natural disaster: As Mashable reports, the New Zealand PM was speaking live from the parliament building in Wellington when a 5.9-magnitude earthquake hit--and she didn't miss a beat. Quite a decent shake here, but if you see things moving behind me, the Beehive moves more than most, Ardern said, referring to the parliament building. After the shaking stopped, she assured her interviewer we're fine. I'm not under any hanging lights, I look like I'm in a structurally sound place. Per the Guardian, she later told reporters her first thought was, are you serious?

(May 5, 2014 7:03 AM CDT) The SS Central America's watery grave 160 miles off the South Carolina coast is indeed a golden one. Odyssey Marine Exploration last month explored the wreck of the ship, which went down in 1857 laden with so much gold that its sinking triggered a national financial panic, and the New York Times reports that the robot it sent to plumb the depths surfaced with quite the load: five gold bars clocking in at 66 pounds--or about $1.2 million. As for what remains, Odyssey thinks there could be as much as $85 million in riches underwater. But in this case, what's come before is just as notable, and intriguing, as Odyssey has an unexpected partner in its search: a court-appointed receiver. The wreck was first explored in 1988 by a team backed by investors and led by Ohioan Thomas Thompson, who recovered what would today be worth $76 million in gold, about two tons all told. A wild legal battle followed after a range of claimants emerged from the woodwork, among them insurance companies who had paid out claims related to the gold more than 100 years prior. In 2000, Thompson was finally able to sell the portion of the gold he was left with, for a reported $52 million--and gave none of the windfall to his 251 investors. In 2012, Thompson skipped out on a court hearing; he and his female assistant vanished from their Florida mansion (leaving behind, among other things, a book on how to adopt a fresh identity) before he could be arrested. In May, Columbus lawyer Ira Kane was named receiver and instructed to recover what gold he could on the investors' behalf; he selected Odyssey to help him do so. Its Odyssey Explorer is now surveying the wreckage, and the Columbus Dispatch reports the entire operation could take as long as 150 days, with rotating crews working 24 hours a day during the recovery. (Odyssey managed to make a major discovery in 2013 involving silver.)

(Jul 11, 2017 6:47 AM CDT) Another person has died as a result of an exploding Takata airbag, though in this case the car involved wasn't even in a crash. Honda says it recently learned about an incident on June 18, 2016, in which a man was using a hammer to make repairs on a 2001 Honda Accord when the airbag inflator activated and ruptured, sending metal fragments flying. Ramon V. Kuffo, 88, who did not own the vehicle but had taken apart the center console with the ignition switch on, died of head trauma a day after a neighbor found him bleeding from the face in the passenger seat of the car parked in his yard near Miami, Fla., reports the Detroit News. The airbag had deployed and the rupture most likely contributed to his death, says a Honda rep. Kuffo's death is the 12th in the US and 17th worldwide to be blamed on the faulty inflators, which have injured 180 in the US. Honda--which only learned of the incident with a legal claim in March, per the New York Times--notes the Accord had one of Takata's most dangerous inflators with a reported 50% chance of it rupturing in a crash. But though owners of the car were sent 12 recall notices over seven years, our records indicate that the recall repair was never completed, Honda says. Almost 70 million airbags in 42 million vehicles have now been recalled due to the faulty inflators. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says it's essential to safety that high-risk inflators are replaced immediately. (Takata has filed for bankruptcy.)

(Aug 16, 2011 11:17 AM CDT) Victoria Hill walked into an Idaho store, allegedly slipped one 24-ounce can of $1.50 Steel Reserve beer into her purse, and walked out ... and now she faces up to 10 years in jail. Hill, 35, was taken into custody Thursday and charged with felony burglary because, officers say, she entered the store with the intent to commit the theft, Reuters reports. The charge, which is punishable with a minimum prison sentence of one year and a max of 10, is usually used in thefts of clothing or other goods, but officers decided it was appropriate for Hill because of her criminal history--she pleaded guilty to grand theft in 2004. She did stick the beer in her purse, which kind of says intent right there, and she walked past several open registers before exiting the establishment, says a police spokesperson.

(Dec 24, 2010 8:24 AM) Some 150 Islamist militants attacked five security posts today in an unusually large and coordinated assault close to the Afghan border, sparking hours of fighting that killed 11 soldiers and wounded 12, officials said; 24 insurgents died. Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants often stage attacks in northwest Pakistan, but the overnight assaults were notable for their size and the level of planning needed. The attacks underlined that insurgents in the tribal areas along the frontier retain significant capabilities despite multiple military offensives in the region since 2008. It is also rare for authorities to sustain--or admit to sustaining--such heavy casualties in a single day. Also today, a remote-controlled bomb rigged to a bike exploded on the outskirts of Quetta city in southwestern Pakistan, killing a police officer and wounding five more.

(Jan 6, 2009 8:58 PM) Alcoa, the world's third-largest aluminum maker, said today it will cut 13,500 jobs--13% of its work force--and slash spending and output to cope with the global economic slowdown. The reductions expand on cost-cutting measures announced in October, when the Pittsburgh-based company reported a 52% decline in third-quarter profit because of lower aluminum prices and weak demand for fabricated goods. Alcoa also will cut 1,700 contractor positions and sell four business units. These are extraordinary times, requiring speed, and decisiveness to address the economic downturn, said the company's chief executive. We will continue to monitor the dynamic market situation to ensure that we adjust capacity to meet any future changes in demand and seize new opportunities that emerge.

(Apr 6, 2018 1:52 AM CDT) This is what a trade war looks like, and what we have warned against from the start, said National Retail Federation President Matthew Shay after President Trump threatened tariffs on another $100 billion in Chinese goods on Thursday. The White House says Trump has directed trade officials to identify products to be slapped with tariffs in light of China's unfair retaliation to his earlier round of proposed tariffs, the AP reports. Rather than remedy its misconduct, China has chosen to harm our farmers and manufacturers, Trump said in a statement, referring to Beijing's proposed tariffs on $50 billion on US imports. Shay warned that we are on a dangerous downward spiral that will hurt American families and urged Trump to stop playing a game of chicken with the US economy, reports Reuters. China warned that it would respond with more tariffs of its own, the Telegraph reports. China will follow suit to the end, not hesitate to pay any price, resolutely counterattack, and take new comprehensive measures in response, the country's Commerce Ministry said in a statement. The Wall Street Journal notes that if China slaps tariffs on another $100 billion in US goods, it will bring an end to the tit-for-tat tariff threats: The tariffs would cover $150 billion in goods but US exports to China only totalled $130 billion last year, compared to more than $500 billion in Chinese exports to the US. In his statement, Trump--who is being heavily criticized by some of his fellow Republicans over the confrontation with Beijing--left the door open to talks aimed at achieving free, fair, and reciprocal trade.

(Jul 19, 2012 9:44 AM CDT) Older Americans are increasingly feeling the hovering specter of foreclosure, after years of not suffering as acutely from the housing crisis, according to a new AARP report. While younger Americans still have a higher rate of serious delinquency, older Americans are now falling behind at a much faster rate, the AP explains. In the past five years, the proportion of loans held by people over age 50 that are seriously delinquent has jumped more than 450%. More than 1.5 million older Americans have already lost their homes, about 600,000 are in foreclosure, and roughly 3.5 million--about 16% of all older homeowners--are underwater on their mortgage. The very old are being hit particularly hard: About one in 30 homeowners over the age of 75 are in foreclosure. What's more, many of the 50-plus crowd have no way to recover, having already spent their retirement savings. The Great Recession has been brutal for many older Americans, says the AARP's policy chief. This shows that homeownership doesn't guarantee financial security later in life.

(May 17, 2016 11:26 AM CDT) Nearly half of all heart attacks go undetected by the person having them, according to new research from the American Heart Association. Even more worrisome: These so-called silent heart attacks are as bad as any other heart attack. NBC News reports people having silent heart attacks often think it's the flu, a strained muscle, or indigestion. They can also write one off as a sore jaw, according to CNN. These symptoms are far more subtle than the chest pain or shortness of breath more commonly seen as signs of a heart attack. But people who have a silent heart attack are still more likely--by about three times--to die from heart disease, according to the new research. In the study published Monday in Circulation, researchers looked at the records of nearly 9,500 people over 26 years. They found that silent heart attacks account for 45% of all heart attacks while often going unnoticed or ignored. They are found later by EKGs. Men are more likely to suffer silent heart attacks, but they're more often fatal in women. That's because women are more likely to minimize their symptoms or have them mistaken for something else, such as diabetes. Researchers say silent heart attacks need to be treated with the same seriousness as other heart attacks. People who have one likely need to take actions like lowering their blood pressure and cholesterol, exercising more, and quitting smoking. (Loneliness and social isolation can be bad for our hearts.)

(Sep 19, 2012 11:55 AM CDT) It was a good year for America's 400 richest people, who saw their net worth jump 13% to $1.7 trillion, according to Forbes' latest Forbes 400 list. For a little context, Reuters notes that that means their combined net worth represents roughly one-eighth of the entire US economy. The top five names on the list didn't change this year--it's still Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Larry Ellison, and the Koch brothers, in that order. Perhaps the most notable change: Mark Zuckerberg plummeted from No. 14 to No. 36, thanks to Facebook's less-than-stellar NASDAQ debut.

(Mar 7, 2017 10:22 AM) Not surprising: a 10-year-old boy proclaiming, This is fun! as he zips around town behind the wheel of his mom's Jeep Grand Cherokee. Even less surprising: the mom getting arrested for allegedly letting him do so. Per the Connecticut Post and Hartford Courant, that's what police say recently happened in Monroe, where locals called in to report a video on Facebook in which the boy was seen at the wheel of 38-year-old Lisa Nussbaum's car, cruising around the neighborhood while his mother apparently live-streamed from the passenger seat. Cops say the underage driver, who didn't seem to be sporting a seatbelt in the video, appeared to drive at a reasonable speed as his mother was heard offering directions. The Monroe PD says Nussbaum was arrested and charged with risk of injury or impairing morals of a minor and subsequently released, per WTNH; she's set to appear in court on Friday.

(Jun 3, 2014 1:41 AM CDT) With elections 15 months away at a minimum and the ruling military junta cracking down hard on dissent, Thais opposed to the military coup are getting creative. Public gatherings of more than five people are banned and protesting the military takeover is now a crime, but flash mobs of dozens of people have been springing up around Bangkok, flashing a three-fingered salute inspired by the Hunger Games series before melting into crowds, Global Post finds. But even this form of protest has its risks: One woman who gave the salute was seen being hauled screaming into a taxi by people presumed to be plainclothes undercover police, and the AP reports the country's military leaders say they will arrest those in large groups who ignore warnings to lower their arms. Asked what the symbol meant, protesters have given varying explanations. Some say it stands for the French Revolution's trinity of values: liberty, equality, fraternity. Others say it means freedom, election, and democracy. Meanwhile, dissidents have also started gathering in small groups to read 1984 and other dystopian novels in public. My friends told me when they read 1984 for the first time they could never imagine there would be a country like that, but it's happening now in Thailand, one activist tells the Christian Science Monitor. People are really watching you, your computers are being monitored ... and many people have been detained in undisclosed locations. McDonald's, meanwhile, isn't happy about how activists have started using its golden arches logo to form the m in democracy on protest signs, Time reports. The company says protesters must cease and refrain using its logo or face appropriate measures.

(Feb 28, 2016 7:45 AM) A man in western India fatally stabbed 14 members of his family, including seven children, early Sunday before hanging himself, police said. Hasnain Warekar, 35, went on his overnight killing spree following a Saturday evening family gathering at his home, said Gajanan Laxman Kabdule, a police rep in the city of Thane, located outside of Mumbai. Warekar's extended family--three sisters, their children, and his parents--were among those who apparently had gotten together for dinner, Kabdule said. Warekar's wife and two young daughters--the youngest was three months old, notes the BBC--were also among those killed. The only survivor of the attack was a wounded sister, the officer said, adding that she was in a hospital and in a state of shock. He used a big knife. He killed his parents, his sisters and his sisters' children. He slit their throats, Kabdule told the BBC. Kabdule said that it appeared that Warekar began his stabbing spree between 1am and 2am, after everyone had gone to bed; some reports indicate that he laced the dinner with sedatives. The victims' bodies were discovered early Sunday. Kabdule said the reason for the killings was not immediately clear. The Press Trust of India news agency reported that a family dispute over property was behind the attacks. The bodies were sent to a Thane hospital for autopsies.

(Aug 3, 2019 4:45 PM CDT) A North Carolina man was arrested Friday for allegedly raping and murdering a teenage girl nearly 40 years ago, the Winston-Salem Journal reports. Robert James Adkins, 62, was charged with first-degree forcible rape and first-degree murder of Ronda Mechelle Blaylock, whose partly-clothed body was found in a wooded area in 1980. The 14-year-old was stabbed to death, a medical examiner said, but the rape was only officially revealed after Adkins' arrest, per the Mount Airy News. A multi-agency task force was established in 2015 to break the case using DNA testing and evidence that a former sheriff said was in excellent condition. Blaylock was in ninth grade when she vanished on Aug. 26, 1980. A man in a blue pickup apparently gave her and a friend a lift after school, then dropped off the friend first. Witnesses recalled the driver as being in his early 20s or late teens, smoking cigarettes, and listening to rock on the radio; Adkins was 23 at the time. But the investigation stalled, leaving the girl's mother, Rebecca, wanting the killer to spend his life in prison for the death of her only child: I've been in prison, so to speak, for 35 years, she said in 2015. I want them to know how it feels not to have your freedom, you know. Rebecca died a year to the day before Adkins' arrest. The sheriff plans to reveal more at a press conference on Wednesday.

(Jan 30, 2009 11:41 AM) The 24-year-old who ran the call-girl ring that brought down Eliot Spitzer will serve 6 months in prison, the New York Daily News reports. Cecil Suwal of New York, who has pleaded guilty to money laundering and conspiring to promote prostitution, wept as she asked the judge for mercy. It is my aim to prevent others, especially young girls, from making the kind of mistakes that I have made, she said. It seems her pleas might have helped. Prosecutors wanted Suwal to spend at least 21 months in prison, but the judge decided to go easy on her because of the apparent sway that her Emperors Club VIP boss had over her. Proof: Suwal has a tattoo that reads Property of Mark Brener.

(Dec 17, 2018 5:35 PM) That $120 million? Don't bank on it, Les. CBS says an internal sexual-misconduct probe has tanked any hope of ex-CEO Les Moonves getting his ginormous severance, CNBC reports. We have determined that there are grounds to terminate for cause, including his willful and material misfeasance ... as well as his willful failure to cooperate fully with the Company's investigation, per the company board. CBS says its investigation into the news division, Moonves, and company culture didn't reveal widespread harassment but did uncover some improper and unprofessional conduct. It also found a lack of support for the human resources department and dignity, transparency, respect and inclusion in the workplace--which CBS vows to improve. The investigation, conducted by two law firms, follows a shakeup of the CBS board that saw five veteran directors pushed out and six new faces placed on the 11-member panel, per Variety. The AP notes that CBS has also promised $20 million to 18 women's rights groups. Moonves resigned in September after a bombshell New Yorker report uncovered misconduct allegations from six women and a corporate culture that ignored sexual harassment and worse. A later report accused Moonves of keeping a female employee on call to perform oral sex. He has denied most of the accusations. (CBS paid one star $9.5 million in a sexual harassment case, while another star says rejecting Moonves cost her a TV show.)

(Jan 8, 2013 4:39 PM) Before we start feeling too special about our home planet, scientists have a message: There are at least 17 billion planets the size of Earth in the Milky Way alone, Space.com reports. About 17% of our galaxy's stars have Earth-size exoplanets closely orbiting them--so 100 billion stars in the galaxy means 17 billion such planets. And half those stars have tightly-orbiting planets that are Earth-size or larger. That's just the beginning: Further from the stars, there are probably planets that could actually support life. These kind of rocky objects are everywhere, says an astronomer. Indeed, the Kepler Space Telescope, which finds planets by noting stars' dimming as planets pass, found 2,700 planetary candidates in 22 months of searching--and simulations suggest that 90% of the candidates the telescope finds are in fact planets. Overall, there are likely 100 billion alien planets in our galaxy.

(Sep 17, 2009 9:16 AM CDT) Twitter soared to $1 billion in valuation in its most recent round of venture capital funding, TechCrunch reports--up from $250 million in a round earlier this year. CEO Evan Williams shared the results with Twitter employees during a recent meeting. Sources say the company will raise about $50 million; it raised $35 million in the last round. This time, Insight Venture Partners is reported to be the primary investor in the startup.

(Jul 26, 2015 8:16 PM CDT) No miracle recoveries: Bobbi Kristina Brown is dead at age 22, about six months after being found unresponsive in a bathtub in her home. The circumstances of her death are similar to that of her mother, Whitney Houston, in 2012. Bobbi Kristina Brown passed away July 26, 2015, surrounded by her family, says a family statement. She is finally at peace in the arms of God. Bobbi Kristina never completely regained consciousness since being found at home in Roswell, Ga., on Jan. 31 and had been on life support following what People calls her near-drowning. Her family, including dad Bobby Brown, put her in hospice care last month and withdrew medications. TMZ reports that her death could lead to murder charges because police found bruises on Brown's face and body, and it says that boyfriend Nick Gordon would the first person of interest. He and friend Max Lomas reportedly found her submerged in the tub, and authorities think she was underwater for up to five minutes. Given her parents' fame, Brown had been in the tabloid spotlight for virtually all of her life, notes Entertainment Tonight.

(Apr 12, 2017 12:33 AM CDT) A Nepalese man who was once the oldest climber to scale Mount Everest is attempting to regain that title, at age 85, with hopes that the feat will help him spread a message of peace. Min Bahadur Sherchan plans to climb the 29,035-foot peak next month during a window of favorable weather on the summit, the AP reports. I want to be the oldest person to scale Everest again to be an inspiration for humankind, a boost for the elderly people and an encouragement for youths, Sherchan says. It will be a message for everyone that age is no obstacle to achieving their dreams. He first scaled Everest in May 2008, when he was 76, but his record was broken by then 80-year-old Japanese climber Yuichiro Miura in 2013. Sherchan's attempt to climb Everest in 2013 was cut short because of financial problems and delays in getting the climbing permit. Another try in 2015 was canceled because an avalanche swept the base camp, killing 19 people just a day before he reached the site. I am confident that I will succeed this time. I have no problems that could stop me from climbing Everest and the only problem could be weather, says Sherchan, whose love of mountaineering began when the government assigned him as a liaison officer to a Swiss climbing team. He added that he has no respiratory problems and his blood pressure is normal. He says that if he regains his record, he plans to campaign for world peace by traveling to conflict areas like Syria.

(Jul 15, 2017 6:00 AM CDT) A grisly and bizarre animal cruelty case has come to a close in San Jose, with a serial cat killer sentenced to 16 years in jail. Police say Robert Farmer killed at least 16 cats after stealing and torturing them in 2015. Prosecutors also alleged that he sexually abused at least one of the cats, but the 26-year-old avoided having to register as a sex offender, reports the San Francisco Chronicle. He had pleaded guilty to 21 counts of animal cruelty prior to sentencing. Pet owners celebrated the maximum sentence, though Farmer's attorney says he could be released in about 4 years. It's so hard to grasp I did this, Farmer wrote in a letter read by his attorney in court, per the Mercury News. It feels like another man committed these crimes, but I know it was me. Neighbors in the Cambrian Park community began sharing stories when their cats started disappearing without a trace. Most of the time, the bodies would turn up discarded in dumpsters or elsewhere. Farmer was arrested after being captured on a pet owner's surveillance camera snatching the family's 17-year-old pet from the property.

(Jun 23, 2011 7:57 AM CDT) Political leaders in Afghanistan are concerned that President Obama's decision to start withdrawing US forces could lead to a repeat of the US withdrawal in 1989, when Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence was allowed to gain major influence. We don't want to go back 20 years when [ISI was] making the decisions about Afghanistan, one mayor tells the Wall Street Journal. Adding to the concern is the fact that billions of dollars in aid cuts will likely accompany the withdrawal, Reuters reports. For his part, Afghan President Hamid Karzai appeared supportive of Obama's speech. The withdrawal announcement proves that a very important process of the liberty of Afghanistan, governance of Afghanistan, and the protection of Afghanistan by Afghans has begun, Karzai said in a statement. But he must now make sure his government is stable enough to fight off both Pakistani interference and the Taliban. Though the Taliban dismissed the announcement as simply a symbolic step, some leaders believe the move could actually facilitate peace talks including the Taliban. Others, however, worry the Taliban will see any US withdrawal as a victory.

(Dec 6, 2010 6:32 PM) The Republican National Committee is deep in the hole--the organizing body will enter the 2012 election cycle between $20 million and $25 million dollars in debt, the Washington Times reports. That's possibly the biggest running deficit a national committee has had going into a major election, says one operative. And while Republican fundraising may be somewhat limp--about 25% off its targets for the year--financial documents reveal mismanagement to be at the heart of the RNC's woes. Between January and September, the RNC received $82 million in donations, but spent $51 million raising that money. Through September of this year, the RNC spent only $12.1 million on political operations, the RNC treasurer said. An additional $20 million would have gone a long ways in winning more races in 2010. Steele has blamed a Democratic administration and lessened GOP enthusiasm for fundraising that totaled $179 million this year--a far cry from the $408 million raised by the GOP in 2008.

(Sep 3, 2010 3:00 AM CDT) Remote parts of Peru have been left high and dry by a dramatic drop in the Amazon river, dealing a devastating blow to local economies. The river is at its lowest level in at least 40 years in the northeastern part of the country because of a prolonged dry spell, the BBC reports. Several large boats have been stranded near the city of Iquitos, which relies on the river for transportation to the rest of the country. Food and other supplies are being brought in by smaller boats that can navigate the shallow river, doubling the length of journeys that usually take 12 to 15 days.

(Jun 29, 2011 6:47 AM CDT) Bank of America has, as expected, reached an agreement for an $8.5 billion settlement with a group of disgruntled investors who lost truckloads of money buying mortgage-backed securities from Countrywide Financial, the bank announced today. It's the largest payoff yet from a financial services firm, the Wall Street Journal reports, and it may embolden other financial crisis victims to file suits of their own. The Bank said that the payment would resolve nearly all of its Countrywide obligations--BofA bought Countrywide in 2008 for $4 billion. It will hand over the money to Bank of New York Mellon Corp., which will then distribute it to other investors. The move makes the bank more likely to report a loss next quarter.

(Sep 8, 2009 5:49 PM CDT) Second-ranked Andy Murray was surprisingly ousted from the US Open today by 16th-seeded Croatian Marin Cilic, a lopsided 7-5, 6-2, 6-2 match in the fourth round. Cilic overcame two set points in the first set, then pounded Murray over the last two to make his first career Grand Slam quarterfinal. Murray, who lost to Roger Federer in the final at Flushing Meadows last year, will finish 2009 without making a major final. The match ended in late afternoon in New York, and before newspaper deadlines back in Murray's native England, where the sports sections follow Murray's every move. Certainly, those headlines won't be nice tomorrow morning. Today, I could've been better in pretty much every part of my game, whether it was mental, forehand, backhand, return, said Murray, who conceded that, yes, this was the most disappointing loss of his career.

(Aug 8, 2011 12:55 PM CDT) As top US officials warn that hundreds of thousands of children could die in Somalia's famine, Washington is preparing to send $100 million in new aid, two officials tell the AP. To raise awareness of the crisis, Jill Biden traveled to a refugee camp to ask Americans and people worldwide, the global community, the human family, if they could just reach a little deeper into their pockets and give money to help these poor people, these poor mothers and children, she says. Biden met with two Somali mothers and their children as well as the Kenyan president and prime minister. It is difficult for aid to reach militant-controlled regions of Somalia, forcing tens of thousands to cross the border to refugee camps; a top humanitarian official says aid is only reaching around 20% of the 2.6 million who require it. More than 29,000 Somali children under 5 years old have died so far in the famine, and 640,000 more are acutely malnourished.

(Oct 3, 2020 7:30 AM CDT) On Friday afternoon, Trump campaign chief Bill Stepien put out a statement announcing, in response to the president being diagnosed with COVID-19, any near-future campaign events that would have involved Trump or members of the first family have been moved online, per Politico. Now, Stepien has his own announcement: He has COVID-19, too. The Hill reports the 42-year-old, who's said to have received his diagnosis the same day Trump did, has mild flulike symptoms and is now in self-isolation. He's expected to keep doing his campaign work from home. The Hill calls Stepien's illness a further blow to Trump's struggling campaign and notes that it reflects just how quickly and how far the highly contagious virus spread among the president's top aides and others. Meanwhile, the White House outbreak has spread to the reporters there. Per a White House Correspondents' Association memo, three journalists tested positive Friday; a White House staffer who works with the media has also been infected. One of the reporters, Michael Shear of the New York Times, tells the Washington Post he was at the White House on Saturday (though not at the ceremony announcing Amy Coney Barrett as Trump's Supreme Court nominee) and part of the press pool at Trump's Pennsylvania rally that night. Shear says he traveled to and from the rally on Air Force One, and that Trump didn't wear a mask while speaking to reporters. The two other journalists haven't been IDed. Meanwhile, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who'd helped Trump prep for last Tuesday's debate, says he was tested Friday morning and is awaiting his own results Saturday. I feel fine and have no symptoms, he tweeted.

(Jul 27, 2010 10:58 AM CDT) It's every garage sale shopper's dream: Find two boxes of old negatives for $70, bargain the price to $45, and discover 10 years later that they're worth at least $200 million. That's what happened to Rick Norsigian, who spent the past decade proving the negatives he found in Fresno, Calif., were pictures taken by Ansel Adams in the 1920s, before the photographer became well known. Photography, handwriting, and art experts, art appraisers, and even meteorologists helped authenticate the photos. The 65 glass negatives, originally thought destroyed in a 1937 darkroom fire, are a missing link of Ansel Adams and his career, one appraiser tells CNN. The person selling them 10 years ago bought them in the 1940s in Los Angeles, and one expert says Adams brought the negatives--some of which have fire damage--to a class he was teaching to show students how to not let their negatives be engulfed in a fire.

(Dec 12, 2014 5:00 AM) The command investigation into the Navy's submarine shower scandal doesn't just concern the one man believed to have made the videos of females aboard the sub. According to an investigative report, 11 sailors are alleged to have seen the videos. There are seven videos in total; likely shot with a cellphone camera, they recorded three or four female shipmates undressing in a shower aboard the USS Wyoming during two four-month periods in 2013 and 2014, the Navy Times reports. All 11 are petty officers and none reported the videos to their superiors, an official says, adding a second-class petty officer is suspected of recording and distributing the files. This was not 11 guys, each with different cameras, the official says. The Navy Times notes that a ballistic missile sub like the Wyoming offers only unisex showers in officer country. When using the shower, a female officer must hang a sign to show it's occupied by a woman; male officers then have to wait until the sign is removed in order to enter. The report will need approval from the sub's chain of command before any punishment is doled out; the Naval Criminal Investigative Service is still looking at the case.

(Apr 28, 2016 10:44 AM CDT) In animating news for DreamWorks, Comcast's NBCUniversal will scoop up the studio, behind such films as Kung Fu Panda and Shrek, in a deal worth $3.8 billion, the AP reports. The acquisition, which the Los Angeles Times says came together with breathtaking speed, will result in DreamWorks Animation being absorbed into the Universal Filmed Entertainment group, with DreamWorks CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg taking on the role of chairman of DreamWorks New Media, as well as serving as a consultant to NBCUniversal. DreamWorks Animation is a great addition to NBCUniversal, Steve Burke, NBCUniversal's CEO, says. [Katzenberg] and the DreamWorks organization have created a dynamic film brand and a deep library of intellectual property ... [and] will help us grow our film, television, theme parks, and consumer products businesses for years to come. CNNMoney notes the deal, though smaller, is akin to Disney's ambitions when it bought Pixar for $7.4 billion in 2006, with theme park and merchandising elements being key to the buy. Although Comcast has put out successful animated films, including Despicable Me and Minions, joining forces with DW could help it compete with Disney, the Wall Street Journal notes. Katzenberg launched DreamWorks with Steven Spielberg and David Geffen in 1994, per USA Today, and the animation studio branched off as a public company in 2004. I am proud to say that NBCUniversal is the perfect home for our company; a home that will embrace the legacy of our storytelling and grow our businesses to their fullest potential, Katzenberg said. The deal, which will pay DreamWorks investors $41 per share, is to close by year's end. (Katzenberg was so addicted to Breaking Bad he once offered to pay $75 million for three extra episodes.)

(Jan 22, 2018 7:41 AM) Last year was another bumper year for the very richest people in the world and another step backward for billions of others, according to Oxfam's annual report on inequality ahead of the World Economic Forum in Davos. The report estimates that the lowest-income 50% of the world, or around 3.7 billion people, saw no increase at all in their wealth, while some 82% of the wealth generated worldwide went to the 1%, CNN reports. The billionaire boom is not a sign of a thriving economy but a symptom of a failing economic system, warned Winnie Byanyima, executive director of Oxfam International. Oxfam blames the continuing rise in inequality on tax evasion, erosion of workers' rights, and corporate influence on government policy, among other things, the BBC reports. The group says just 42 people in the world have as much wealth as the poorest 50%--though it has revised last year's estimate from eight people to 61, based on what it says was improved data. However you look at it, this is an unacceptable level of inequality, Oxfam chief executive Mark Goldring says. He says that business and political leaders often start out the annual meeting by making promises to address inequality, but tough talk fades away at the first resistance.

(Jul 23, 2014 8:35 AM CDT) Celaida Lissabet, 15, was participating in what was supposed to be a fun event at her Miami-area charter school last October, wrestling with a classmate while wearing an inflatable sumo suit during Spirit Day --but things went terribly awry, leaving the girl with severe brain damage, according to a new lawsuit. The 9th-grader fell off the protective mat and hit her head on the ground three times; after being sent back to class, she complained of blurred vision, dizziness, nausea, and headaches, and was taken to the hospital. Her mom says the teen now acts like a child, has trouble communicating, and is plagued by anxiety, the Miami Herald reports. The second time [she fell] she told the gentleman that her head was hurting and she was seeing blurry and she didn't want to do it anymore and he told her that she had to do it three times, says Celaida's mom, Raquel Lissabet, according to CBS Miami. The third time she was finally knocked down and they stood her up and sent her to class. Now Raquel Lissabet is suing the school, Mater Academy, and Mega Party Events, the company that provided the suits. The lawsuit claims that both failed to provide adequately trained personnel and adequately fitting helmets, reports NBC 6 South Florida. It's not my daughter, Raquel Lissabet says. It's a completely different person. In 2007, a woman in Colorado won $2 million in damages after falling in an inflatable sumo wrestling suit at a company retreat and suffering severe brain damage. (In another freak accident last month, a 2-year-old was killed by a statue.)

(Mar 3, 2016 3:48 PM) NASA will be studying how Scott Kelly's body reacted to almost a year in space, using his twin brother Mark Kelly, who stayed on Earth, as a control. One big difference to note right away: The brothers will no longer be the same height, as they were before Scott went into space, because he grew 2 inches while aboard the International Space Station, CNN reports. Astronauts get taller in space as the spine elongates, NASA's Jeff Williams explains. That's because without the full strength of gravity pressing down on gel-filled discs between the vertebrae, they expand and lengthen the spine, the Washington Post explains. But Scott won't be able to lord it over Mark for too long: Astronauts return to preflight height after a short time back on Earth, Williams says.

(Aug 3, 2010 1:26 PM CDT) Thanks to a plasma eruption that roiled the surface of the sun, residents of the northern US and Canada may be able to enjoy a spectacular show tonight--the Northern Lights. This eruption is directed right at us, and is expected to get here early in the day on August 4th, an astrophysicist in Cambridge, Mass., tells CNN. It's the first major Earth-directed eruption in quite some time. The Northern Lights, or aurora borealis, are normally visible only in the Arctic. But the weekend solar storms that initiated the event were so strong that the plasma's collision with Earth's magnetic field, which triggers the phenomenon, will be a big one. We got a beautiful view of this eruption,'' the astrophysicist tells the Boston Globe. And there might be more beautiful views to come, if it triggers aurorae.

(Oct 13, 2013 6:31 AM CDT) You might think that the nation's food stamps program finds its biggest threat in the House of Representatives, but yesterday it was an innocent test of a backup system that felled the system in 17 states, including Ohio and Michigan. The system failure that began yesterday morning took out the EBT debit-card system, leaving shoppers unable to pay for groceries. Emergency vouchers were available in some areas, reports the AP, but many who use the benefits were simply out of luck. You don't want children going hungry tonight because of stupidity, said one woman affected by the outage. It's been terrible, said one cashier in Mississippi. It's just been some angry folks. That's what a lot of folks depend on. Xerox Corp., the vendor who was running the routine tests, said it had restored service by last night. Affected states were: Alabama, California, Georgia, Iowa, Illinois, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Jersey, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Virginia.

(Nov 9, 2008 10:56 AM) China announced a $586 billion stimulus package today in its biggest move to stop the global financial crisis from hitting the world's fourth-largest economy. A statement on the government's website said China's Cabinet had approved a plan to invest the money in infrastructure and social welfare by the end of 2010. Spending will focus on 10 areas, including increased spending on low-cost housing and rural infrastructure. Money will also be poured into new railways, roads, airports, health, education, environmental protection, and high technology. The government has already cut key interest rates three times in less than 2 months in a bid to spur economic expansion.

(Feb 15, 2017 1:04 PM) Two 13-year-old Indiana girls had Monday off from school and were dropped off at a popular hiking spot in Delphi, but didn't show up when it was time for them to be picked up--and on Tuesday, their bodies were found. On Wednesday, police officially identified the bodies as Liberty German and Abigail Williams, the AP reports. Police say that foul play is suspected, the Indianapolis Star reports; their deaths are being investigated as homicides. The girls were dropped off around 1pm Monday and were supposed to be picked up later by family members, who searched the area when the girls didn't meet them as planned. They were reported missing at 5:30pm, and search parties set out; the bodies were found around 12:15pm the next day near Deer Creek, a half-mile or so upstream from Monon High Bridge, an abandoned railroad truss that spans the creek, where the girls had been dropped off. The bridge is a popular hiking spot-- a lot of people go out there for a little hiking, a nice day in the woods, get a little exercise, a local tells the Lafayette Journal & Courier--and Heavy notes that, even before her daughter went missing, Abigail's mother had a picture of it as her Facebook cover photo. The last known photo of the girls is a picture of Abigail walking along the bridge, which has no guard rails, that Liberty posted to her Snapchat account around 2:07pm Monday, the Indy Channel reports. Per the Logansport Pharos-Tribune, police say they suspect foul play because of the nature of the bodies. The public information officer for the Indiana State Police says autopsies will be done Wednesday; authorities have not commented publicly on cause of death. The school district sent letters home with students Tuesday saying that counseling will be available.

(Mar 9, 2011 12:34 PM) Longtime Washington Post political columnist David Broder is dead at age 81 from complications of diabetes. The Post offers a lengthy obit for him here and his final column here. Broder covered every presidential election since 1956 and won a Pulitzer in 1973 for his Watergate coverage. The newspaper's Ben Bradlee called him the best political correspondent in America because he knew the system from the back room up and not just at the highest levels in DC.

(May 10, 2013 8:18 AM CDT) Malcolm X's grandson is dead in Mexico, according to reports. Malcolm Shabazz is rumored to have been killed, according to the New York Amsterdam News, but details are uncertain. A family friend tells the New York Times US authorities confirmed the 28-year-old's death. Shabazz was a troubled figure from childhood, the Times notes; he pleaded guilty at age 12 to having set a fire that resulted in his grandmother's death, though he later told the Amsterdam News he was innocent. He spent four years in jail; following his release, he was jailed again for attempted robbery. A witness at the arson trial called him a schizophrenic boy of a paranoid type. In 2003, he told the Times he was in a gang--though he also spent time encouraging teens to stay away from gangs and drugs.

(Jun 16, 2016 6:03 AM CDT) Police responding to a call early Tuesday found 2003's Miss North Dakota USA dead in a Minneapolis home. Samantha Sami Edwards' cause of death has not been revealed, but KARE11 reports a police report did not cite any visible signs of trauma. A friend reportedly found Edwards, 37, with the Bismarck Tribune noting she was found dead around 7:37am. A GoFundMe campaign started by the 2004 Miss Minnesota has raised more than $17,000 as of this writing to help cover funeral expenses. Writes Jessica Dereschuk, She was a spitfire and with Sami you never knew what she'd throw your way--but you ALWAYS knew she would be there for you. She was awesome like that. The New York Daily News has this from the Miss USA organization: Edwards was one of the most vibrant, energetic and full-loving titleholders we have had the honor to meet from our state pageants.

(Jan 21, 2009 6:15 AM) Aussie authorities are probing the story of a pair of Burmese fishermen found floating in an industrial-sized cooler, the Independent reports. The men were rescued after a customs aircraft spotting them waving frantically. They told officials they had been adrift for 25 days after their fishing boat sunk in heavy seas, with the loss of 18 other crew members. The pair, who were treated for dehydration, said they had managed to survive on rainwater and fish. Some experts think the tale sounds a bit fishy, noting that the cooler seems too unstable to have stayed upright for 25 days and that the men show few of the ravages caused by long-term exposure at sea. But officials say that so far they have no reason to doubt the men's story.

(Jun 19, 2014 2:13 PM CDT) Someone combing through old boxes belonging to Nobel laureate Pablo Neruda made an amazing discovery: 20 unpublished poems from his prime years of productivity, reports the Guardian. His publisher says they are of extraordinary quality, and one academic says they are full of the imaginative power, the overflowing expressive fullness, and the same gift, the erotic or loving passion as Neruda's best stuff. The poems, found among his manuscripts in his native Chile, will be published beginning later this year, reports the LA Times. Sample line, translated to English: Your pure hip rests and the bow of wet arrows / stretches in the night the petals that form your shape. Even those who aren't poetry fans might be familiar with Neruda given the intrigue surrounding his death in 1973. He had prostate cancer, but supporters think he got poisoned by the new regime of Augusto Pinochet over fears he would become a voice of opposition. Tests on his remains last year found no trace of poison, but the AP reports that a Chilean judge ordered new tests this month.

(Dec 22, 2015 12:18 PM) You'd think that getting convicted of kidnapping and burglary would get you fired from your teaching job. But in the case of 43-year-old New Yorker Goran Logan, he wasn't officially fired from his position at Palisade Preparatory School until 11 months into his 22-year prison sentence for the aforementioned crimes, the Journal News reports. In May 2013, Logan went to a Manhattan apartment, armed with a loaded gun and knives, and held a man and two females hostage there for eight hours. He eventually ordered one of the females to leave the apartment with him, at gunpoint; she was later found outside his own home. He was eventually convicted of three felonies: second-degree kidnapping and first- and second-degree burglary; he was sentenced in January and has been serving time at the Clinton Correctional Facility. Yet a Yonkers schools rep failed to respond to repeated questions about his employment status, and the city's Board of Education just fired him last week. The district had filed disciplinary charges against Logan on Nov. 23, which Logan never contested. The president of the Yonkers Federation of Teachers explains that teachers automatically lose their license if they're convicted of serious crimes, meaning they'd be unable to actually teach in any New York district. So being unlicensed, I'm not sure why it's necessary to terminate [Logan]. I would say it's to clean up the records, he says.

(May 10, 2011 5:02 AM CDT) It's official: Microsoft will buy popular online telephone service Skype for $8.5 billion in cash, reports the Wall Street Journal. The deal is the largest in Microsoft history, besting the company's 2007 acquisition of online ad service aQuantive for $6 billion. Though Microsoft produces the world's most common consumer operating system, it has struggled to create a significant online presence, something Skype's 663 million user could help with. EBay bought Skype for $2.6 billion in 2005, but the experiment failed and Skype was sold to other investors in 2009. Last year Skype lost $7 million on $860 million in revenues.

(Feb 6, 2010 2:05 PM) A 16-year-old Spanish matador killed six bulls in one afternoon today, pulling off a feat normally attempted only by seasoned veterans and winning trophies for his skill--ears from animals he had just slain. Jairo Miguel Sanchez Alonso, the son of a bullfighter who nearly died from a horrific goring in Mexico in 2007, smiled broadly and waved to a friendly hometown crowd after a pageant that took about two and a half hours. Jairo Miguel, who says he first locked horns at age 6 with a young cow, has spent some four years fighting in Latin America to escape Spain's age limit--16. Ever since I was very small I have had this in my genes, he said. I have practically grown up with bulls. His mother said she would prefer he do anything but this-- football, computers, whatever. But he has chosen this and I have to support him. All I know is what his eyes say when he struts out into the ring.

(Dec 22, 2008 5:58 PM) Billie Jean is still calling Michael Jackson the one, Access Hollywood reports. A woman who says she is Billie Jean Jackson--and refers to Jackson as her husband --is suing him for $1 billion in Los Angeles, seeking joint custody of his 6-year-old boy, Blanket. She has pursued him before, filing a $150 million paternity suit in 1987 and getting arrested on his Neverland Ranch earlier this year.

(May 30, 2019 10:05 AM CDT) Tears flowing down her cheeks, Emma Semler turned to the family of a deceased friend and mouthed the words, I'm sorry. The mother of Jennifer Werstler--who died of a heroin overdose on the floor of a KFC bathroom on her 20th birthday in 2014--wasn't moved. You're only sorry for yourself, Margaret Werstler replied before addressing a federal courtroom in Philadelphia on Wednesday, per the Philadelphia Inquirer. Why did you ... leave my child alone ... when she needed help the most? Why didn't you help save her life? Semler, 23 or 24--who arranged for Werstler to buy heroin, provided the syringe, and used with the friend she'd met in rehab before abandoning her as she overdosed, per the Delco Times--said she would go back and change anything if she could. She was then sentenced to 21 years in prison for causing Werstler's death. While perhaps bringing closure to Werstler's family, the decision runs afoul of addiction recovery advocates, who say addicts are being unfairly punished in an effort to combat an opioid epidemic that has killed more than 3,000 in Philadelphia in three years. Users who share drugs in deadly cases have been prosecuted under a Pennsylvania law originally intended to punish drug dealers, with critics arguing users may fail to call for help as a result. Semler, who faces six years of probation following her release, was convicted under a federal statute that carries a 20-year mandatory minimum, which the judge suggested she'd earned. But her lawyer described a woman who once used 10 bags of heroin a day transforming into a sponsor for other addicts after Werstler's death. I don't know why I'm still here and not Jenny, Semler told the court. As Werstler's mom later noted, There is no winning family.

(May 3, 2012 10:43 AM CDT) The five days Daniel Chong spent, forgotten and with no access to food or water, in a DEA cell constitute torture, his lawyers say in a claim filed yesterday. Chong seeks up to $20 million in compensation for the incident, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports. The deprivation of food and water for four and one-half days while the person is handcuffed the entire time constitutes torture under both international and domestic law, the claim reads. The DEA has acknowledged Chong was accidentally left in the cell, and the acting special agent in charge of the DEA's San Diego Division apologized in a statement obtained by the Los Angeles Times. I am deeply troubled by the incident that occurred here last week, says William R. Sherman, who notes that he has ordered a review. I extend my deepest apologies [to] the young man and want to express that this event is not indicative of the high standards that I hold my employees to. Click for more on Chong's ordeal, in which he reportedly hallucinated, drank his own urine, and ate his own glasses.

(Feb 21, 2009 7:59 AM) Americans will see tangible results from the stimulus--more money in their wallets--by April 1, President Obama said today in his weekly radio address. Never before in our history has a tax cut taken effect faster or gone to so many hardworking Americans, he said. The Treasury department has begun ordering employers to withhold less from paychecks, and the average US family will take home $65 more per month, the AP reports. The cut will help 95% of American families, Obama said, thanking leaders across the country for their help in passing the stimulus bill. But it is only a first step on the road to economic recovery. He planned a bipartisan fiscal responsibility summit for Tuesday and said he would send a budget to Congress Thursday that's sober in its assessments and honest in its accounting.

(Aug 17, 2011 3:12 PM CDT) What's more important to you: saving about 15 minutes every day or three years later on? Exercising 92 minutes per week could substantially extend your life, according to a new study. Researchers in Taiwan studied more than 400,000 subjects between 1996 and 2008, and deduced that those who exercised even a little bit were 14% less likely to die during the next eight years and lived an average three years longer, reports the Washington Post. If the minimum amount of exercise we suggest is adhered to, mortality from heart disease, diabetes and cancer could be reduced, wrote the scientists. This low volume of physical activity could play a central part in the global war against non-communicable diseases, reducing medical costs and health disparities. Each additional 15 minutes of daily exercise cuts your chances of dying by another 4%, the study says.

(Nov 16, 2012 1:43 AM) The struggling US Postal Service has posted a record loss of $15.9 billion for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30. The agency defaulted this year on $11.1 billion in health benefits for retirees, and it's suffering as first-class mail, its top source of revenue, falls off, the Wall Street Journal reports. The USPS could run out of cash in a year if lawmakers don't do something, officials say. (But it thinks it will have enough cash to make it til next fall thanks to record volumes of election-theme material and an expected 20% revenue bump due to holiday shipping. If Congress fails to act, there could be postal slowdowns or shutdowns that would have catastrophic consequences --not just for the Postal Service itself, but for businesses that depend on it, says the head of an advocacy group.

(Aug 18, 2009 2:23 AM CDT) The US money supply is literally soaked in cocaine, the Guardian reports.Tests performed by the American Chemical Society found that an average of 85% of paper money circulating in big US cities tests positive for traces of the drug. While cross-contamination between bills bundled together is a factor, it cannot explain the increasing abundance of the drug on dollar bills. Tests performed only two years ago found that 67% of bills tested positive for cocaine. It could be related to the economic downturn, with stressed people turning to cocaine, one of the researchers told the New York Daily News. Of US cities, Washington DC had the highest occurrence of cocaine residue, with 95% of its bills testing positive. The researchers note that $1 and $100 are rarely used for cocaine consumption--$5, $10, $20 and $50 bills are America's preferred snorting tools.

(Apr 29, 2009 4:08 PM CDT) A 13-year-old Florida boy with autism was found in San Jose, Calif., last night after driving himself to the airport and, apparently without identification or a credit card, getting on a cross-country flight, the Palm Beach Post reports. Kenton Weaver--who had never before driven--has Asperger's Syndrome and is so obsessed with flying that he tried twice before to hitch rides to the airport. Weaver's parents were aware of his burning desire to fly; his father awoke yesterday at 6am to find the family Explorer gone. He'll do anything to go to an airport, Dean Weaver says. I was so afraid he was going to hit someone else with the car. The SUV was found, undamaged, at Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood International; Kenton Weaver is staying with relatives in the Bay Area--near where his mother lives--for now.

(Oct 7, 2013 12:44 PM CDT) A white diamond the size of a small egg sold for $30.6 million at a Hong Kong auction today, as two phone bidders competed for the 118-carat white diamond from Africa in six minutes of measured bidding in the Sotheby's jewelry auction. The flawless white oval diamond, mined and cut two years ago, was hammered down for $27.3 million, just under the low end of the $28 million to $35 million estimate range set by Sotheby's. Total price including commission came to $30.6 million. That was more than the previous record of $26.7 million for a white diamond set in May at Christie's in Geneva. The stone, which weighed 299 carats when it was found in the rough in 2011, is the largest and most significant such diamond graded by the Gemological Institute of America. Sotheby's says it was discovered in southern Africa but won't name the country because the seller wishes to remain anonymous. The auction's other highlight, a 7.6-carat flawless, round, vivid blue diamond which had an estimate of $19 million, failed to reach its reserve price. The world record price for a jewel at auction was set in 2010, when London jeweler Laurence Graff paid $46 million for a fancy intense pink diamond weighing 24.8 carats. That record could be blown away in November, when Sotheby's puts a pink 59.60-carat diamond on the block that's expected to fetch more than $60 million in Geneva.

(Aug 19, 2014 6:19 AM CDT) Do what you love--not just to enjoy yourself, but possibly even to live longer. So says Herman Hy Goldman, who yesterday celebrated his 101st birthday not in a nursing home but surrounded by coworkers at Capitol Lighting in East Hanover, NJ, where he has been working for 73 years. Aside from a stint in the Army during World War II, he has been with the company since 1941, reports CBS New York. These days he spends four days a week repairing light fixtures in a workshop in the back. Goldman even continued to work after losing his wife. He was very devoted to his wife, who was a wonderful lady who also worked for us, co-owner Max Lebersfeld tells News 12 New Jersey. She passed away, but he came back from that. Goldman, who in spite of his three-digit age still drives himself to work in his 1999 Ford Contour, says the work gives me a reason to get up in the morning and go. ... To sit down and watch television all day, that's not going to help you. As to whether it gets boring, he says, Each [repair job] is a challenge and that's it. (Check out what it feels like to be 100.)

(Aug 25, 2010 12:09 PM CDT) Alan Simpson is in some hot water today over a unique analogy he made about Social Security: It's like a milk cow with 310 million tits! the former Wyoming senator and newly anointed anatomy expert wrote to a critic in what Ben Smith of Politico describes as a hilariously ill-tempered email. Simpson is on the president's deficit commission, which is looking into potential Social Security cuts, and liberal critics now want him off the panel, notes the Huffington Post. The email proves him to be sexist with disdain for the very program he claims he is trying to protect--Social Security, says the co-director of Social Security Works. HuffPo has a PDF of Simpson's full letter here. If you have some better suggestions about how to stabilize Social Security instead of just babbling into the vapors, let me know, he writes at one point. Call when you get honest work!

(Oct 3, 2017 7:29 PM CDT) Some companies are better than others--much better--when it comes to cracking open the glass ceiling for women. Using data from research group LedBetter, 24/7 Wall St. has come up with the best and worst companies on this front among 237 global corporations. Factors include the number of women in executive leadership as well on the board, with the worst performers having goose eggs on both. Here are the five best: The worst: No need to number these, because seven companies tie for the worst with zero women on the board or in executive leadership positions. They are: investment firm Icahn Enterprises, the Nissan Motor Co., Nintendo, Kia Motors, oil and pipeline firms Energy Transfer Equities and Plains GP Holding, and Samsung Electronics. Click for the full lists.

(Dec 26, 2014 12:15 AM) Firefighters in Hawaii rescued more than 60 hikers on Christmas Eve, including some who were stranded for days, when heavy rain made streams too swollen to cross on the island of Kauai. After the local fire department was notified that some hikers were stranded in a valley for several days with dwindling supplies, a total of 62 people were airlifted by the end of the day. One male hiker suffered a non-life-threatening injury, officials say. Authorities posted closure signs at the trailhead Monday, and a worker warned hikers of the hazardous weather conditions. But some hikers ignored the warning and continued on, state officials say. In April, more than 120 hikers, including several children, had to be rescued in the same valley after being stranded by the rising stream.

(Jun 15, 2010 3:11 AM CDT) At least 29 inmates were killed yesterday as drug cartels clashed at a prison in Mexico's Sinaloa state. Three policeman guarding the prison were injured, and 20 inmates were shot to death when one gang forced its way into another cell block and opened fire on its rivals, AP reports. One wounded man died later in hospital and eight inmates were stabbed to death later in the day. The group attacked were members of the Zetas cartel, according to local media. In Michoacan state, headquarters of the La Familia cartel, ten federal police officers were killed in an ambush the same day. Police say the attackers blocked a highway with a truck and machine-gunned a police convoy when it stopped, the BBC reports. Several of the attackers were killed or wounded when police returned fire.

(Jun 25, 2020 12:10 AM CDT) Experts have lowered the forecast for coronavirus deaths in the US over the next few months, despite Wednesday seeing the highest-ever daily number of confirmed new infections. The latest model from the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation forecasts a total death toll of between 159,497 and 213,715 by Oct. 1, but researchers say much will depend on how many people wear masks, USA Today reports. The average between the best-case and worst-case scenarios is around 180,000, down from an earlier estimate of 200,000. The death toll currently stands at almost 122,000, and researchers say up to 33,000 lives could be saved between now and October if the US introduced a universal mask-wearing order that at least 95% of people complied with. People need to know that wearing masks can reduce transmission of the virus by as much as 50%, and those who refuse are putting their lives, their families, their friends and their communities at risk, IMHE Director Dr. Chris Murray said in a statement, per Reuters. The researchers noted that cases numbers have been steadily rising in several states but deaths are not yet rising at the same rate, a trend which could change in the coming weeks. According to a study in Health Affairs, 15 states, plus the District of Columbia, prevented around 450,000 new coronavirus infections with mask orders issued between April 8 and May 15.

(Mar 13, 2016 4:46 PM CDT) Apparent extremist attacks in the Ivory Coast and Turkey have left nearly 50 people dead. At least six armed men attacked beachgoers outside three hotels Sunday in Grand-Bassam, Ivory Coast, killing at least 14 civilians and two special forces, sending tourists fleeing through the historic Ivory Coast resort town, says Ivory Coast's President Alassane Ouattara. Bloody bodies were sprawled on the beach before being taken away by security forces and Ivorian Red Cross workers, the AP reports. Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb claimed responsibility for the attack, according to SITE Intelligence Group which monitors jihadist websites. The Islamic extremist group called three of the attackers heroes for the assault on the Grand Bassam beach resort. Meanwhile, an explosion in the Turkish capital of Ankara has killed at least 34 people and wounded 125, 19 of them seriously, officials in Turkey tell the AP. The explosion near Ankara's main square is believed to have been caused by a car bomb that went off close to bus stops. No one has claimed the attack, although Kurdish militants and the Islamic State group have carried out bombings in the city recently. Turkey's pro-Kurdish party--which is frequently linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK--has issued a statement condemning the attack. Interior Minister Efkan Ala says Sunday's attack won't deter the country from its fight against terrorism. He says authorities have obtained evidence but won't make an announcement on those responsible until the end of the investigation.

(Dec 7, 2015 9:10 AM) Holly Woodlawn, one of Andy Warhol's drag queen superstars who was also immortalized in Lou Reed's Walk on the Wild Side, died Sunday at age 69 after battling cancer, the AP reports. Born in Puerto Rico, her mother moved Holly--who was, at that point, Harold--to New York and then Miami Beach, the New York Times reports. Woodlawn hitchhiked back to New York at 16, where she was a go-go dancer, among other things: I was turning tricks, living off the streets and wondering when my next meal was coming, she wrote in her 1991 memoir. While performing in a friend's musical in 1969, Woodlawn told a journalist that she was one of Warhol's superstars, and though that wasn't actually true at that point, her comment got his attention and led to what the Times refers to as Woodlawn's underground stardom. Warhol's filmmaking partner Paul Morrissey cast her in the 1970 film Trash as the girlfriend of a heroin addict, and the performance got good reviews. She went on to star alongside two other transgender actresses in Morrissey's 1971 film Women in Revolt; both films were produced by Warhol. In 1972, Reed wrote the first lines of his now-classic song about Woodlawn at Warhol's suggestion, the Washington Post reports: Holly came from Miami F-L-A / Hitchhiked her way across the USA / Plucked her eyebrows on the way / Shaved her legs and then he was a she / She says, 'Hey babe, take a walk on the wild side.' She went on to do a few more films and perform as a cabaret artist, but by the end of the 1970s she was working at a Benihana in Miami. She moved to California in the 1990s, where she studied fashion design and had a few more roles, most recently in Amazon's Transparent. (Click to read about 24 transgender historical figures.)

(Jan 2, 2013 9:31 AM) Confirming your fears about dangerous post-NYE drivers: Shortly after 5am on New Year's Day, a 22-year-old woman drove the wrong way, at high speeds, on Interstate 81 North in Pennsylvania. For a total of 18 miles. And she had a passenger with her the entire time. They two were seemingly oblivious to police efforts to stop the car, which the Times Leader reports included the use of a spotlight and flashing lights from the southbound lane. When that didn't work, troopers resorted to a roadblock. Troopers called the fact that no one was injured or killed a miracle, due in part to minimal traffic thanks to the holiday. As for Paige Cicardo, she's been arrested for reckless endangerment and suspicion of DUI.

(Jan 22, 2008 1:18 PM) A 94-year-old Tennessee man was found dead with his hand cut off after a relative ran afoul of drug dealers who kidnapped him in retaliation, the Citizen Tribune of Morristown reports. No one deserved to die like he did, the sheriff said of Willie Morgan. This poor man was supposed to die peacefully on a front porch swing, not like this. Three suspects are being held, and detectives seeking two juveniles say they are being stonewalled by their parents, the sheriff said. They allegedly kidnapped Morgan to blackmail his family into paying a relative's $3,000 debt, then left his body in a field. The suspects had never met Morgan before, the sheriff said, adding, Small town USA is not so small anymore.

(May 10, 2014 1:01 PM CDT) China is in yet another territorial dispute with a neighbor, and this time things are already getting a little physical. After Beijing plunked down its first-ever deepwater drilling rig in disputed waters off Vietnam this week, the Vietnamese navy made clear its displeasure. China says Vietnam's vessels rammed its ships 171 times over the course of four days, reports the New York Times. The newspaper quotes a Vietnamese political analyst who sums things up thusly: Invasion is in their blood, and resistance is in our blood. While all that boat-ramming hasn't changed the fact that the oil platform is still in place, the Wall Street Journal reports that Beijing would be making a mistake if it thinks Vietnam will let the issue quietly go away. Hanoi has been building up its navy of late for just this sort of confrontation as China has gotten more aggressive in the South China Sea. And while its naval power will still be no match for China's, Vietnam wants to show it can at least give China a bloody nose, says an analyst at a Singapore think tank. The new tensions are sure to be a big topic at this weekend's meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, reports AP.

(Dec 5, 2016 5:37 PM) Torture: OK or not OK? According to a new Red Cross poll, 46% of Americans find it acceptable to torture enemy combatants, the Guardian reports. The same poll found that 33% of Americans consider torture a part of war. But, if you're surprised by those numbers, the poll also found that 54% of Americans consider torture wrong, though the Guardian notes that's a lower proportion than in any other country polled, save Israel (44%) and Palestine (35%).

(Aug 17, 2016 10:30 AM CDT) Gary Hardwick says he's always been attracted to older women. In fact, his new wife, Almeda Hardwick, 71--the same age as Gary's grandmother--isn't even the oldest woman he ever dated. Gary, 18, says he was unhappy in a relationship with a 77-year-old woman in June 2015 when he first met Almeda at a funeral for her son, who was also Gary's uncle through marriage. A few months later, when Gary was single, the pair met again and it was like an instant connection. [There was] so much chemistry there, Gary tells the Knoxville News Sentinel. I wasn't looking for a young man, but Gary just came along, adds Almeda, who lost her husband of 43 years in 2013, per Metro. I just knew straight away that he was the one. After a few weeks of dating, Gary proposed and arranged an October wedding in just six days. The couple married with Gary's mom's consent (he was 17 at the time, six days short of his 18th birthday). We just knew we were right for each other, so [age] really didn't matter, says Gary. He says the couple--who live in Sevierville, Tenn., with Almeda's daughter and two grandsons around Gary's age, per the Mirror--have been overwhelmed with support from most family and friends. And though they've received two or three thousand negative comments on YouTube, where they document their day-to-day life, it doesn't bother either one of us, says Gary. We're happy and in love, and that's all that matters. (The world's oddest animal couple recently split.)

(Mar 18, 2014 12:43 PM CDT) Moscow has officially signed a treaty making Crimea part of Russia, and the West is not happy. President Obama today called for an emergency meeting of the G7 to decide whether to kick Russia out of the G8, the AP reports. The G7, which consists of the US, Britain, Japan, France, Italy, and Canada, became the G8 when Russia joined in the 1990s. The original members will meet on the sidelines of next week's 53-nation nuclear meeting at the Hague--which Russia will also be attending. Russia has offered a variety of arguments to justify what is nothing more than a land grab, Joe Biden said today during a visit to Poland, which as a neighbor of both Russia and Ukraine, is a bit on edge. Ukraine's interim president offered an even stronger condemnation, saying Russia was mimicking the fascists of the last century, while the interim prime minister called it robbery on an international scale, CNN reports. But Crimea and Russia are working fast to cement the annexation, as Crimean officials announced plans today to switch to the ruble, and change their clocks to match Moscow's, the Globe and Mail reports.

(Sep 30, 2009 4:39 AM CDT) Tighty whities are turning 75 soon and Jockey International has launched a media blitz to rocket their briefs into the spotlight. The men's underwear, created after an exec was inspired by a postcard from France showing a man's bikini-style swimsuit, made its debut in Chicago in January 1935--a day that probably also saw the first wedgie, quips the Los Angeles Times. Briefs--considered daring back then--still make up a quarter of men's underwear sold today, says Jockey. The underwear may be pointing the way toward economic recovery, according to former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan's theory. He believes that men facing tough times first cut back on underwear purchases--meaning a recent 4.8% rise in the sale of male skivvies could be signaling a revival in consumer spending.

(Oct 27, 2008 6:39 AM CDT) Bestselling author Tony Hillerman died yesterday at 83 of pulmonary failure, the AP reports. He was known for his mystery novels, which featured two Navajo policemen with distinct views on their people, constantly balancing the Navajo world with the Anglo one. A onetime journalist, he found success with Skinwalkers in 1987 and made bestseller lists with A Thief of Time. Born in 1925 in a tiny Oklahoma town, Hillerman was educated at a school for Indian girls, which inspired his respect for Indian society. Injured in World War II, he married and raised six children. He taught journalism at the University of New Mexico. He had such a wonderful, wonderful curiosity about the world, said his daughter. He could take little details and bring them to life.

(Jun 9, 2017 7:03 PM CDT) Glenne Headly, an early member of the acclaimed Steppenwolf Theatre Company who went on to star in films and on TV, died Thursday night, according to her agent. She was 62. No cause of death or location was immediately available, the AP reports. Headly was known from her performances in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, co-starring alongside Michael Caine and Steve Martin; Mr. Holland's Opus with Richard Dreyfuss; and Warren Beatty's Dick Tracy. On TV, she was in the miniseries Lonesome Dove and had recurring roles on ER and Monk. She played the daughter of Julie Andrews and Christopher Plummer in the 2001 live telecast of the play On Golden Pond. In 2015, Headly co-starred with Jason Alexander on Broadway in the Larry David comedy Fish in the Dark. On Friday, Alexander tweeted a remembrance of his sweet friend as a beautiful light taken too soon. Steve Martin tweeted, Our household mourns the sudden loss of beloved friend, actress and comic genius, Glenne Headly. Last summer, she was seen in HBO's drama miniseries The Night Of. She had been in production for the upcoming Hulu sitcom Future Man, from Seth Rogen. In 1979 Headly was recruited by Chicago's budding Steppenwolf Theatre, joining such fellow up-and-comers as Gary Sinise, Terry Kinney, and John Malkovich, who would become her first husband. They divorced in 1988.

(Jun 10, 2009 1:32 PM CDT) Two people on board crashed Air France Flight 447 were on a French list of radical Muslims seen as terror threats, London's Evening Standard reports. French security officials sent to Brazil discovered the passengers' status; a security insider called the terror link highly significant, though it could be a macabre coincidence. Computer problems were involved in the crash, but officials haven't ruled out terror.

(Jan 21, 2008 5:20 PM) A new political advocacy group pitching itself as a right-wing answer to MoveOn is mobilizing to spend $250 million to support candidates in 2008, more than twice the figure spent by the largest liberal group in 2004. Freedoms Watch's principals are two former Bush officials, Talking Points Memo reports, and the group's spokesman is former Bush press secretary Ari Fleischer. Freedoms Watch will take particular aim at vulnerable congressional seats; the group enjoyed its first major impact in December's special House election in Ohio, where an ad depicting Latinos scurrying under fences helped propel a Republican to Washington. MoveOn's founder rejected any parallel with the group, telling the Washington Post that his organization is independent of the party and funded by small donors, while Freedoms Watch is doing attack ads by Beltway operatives, financed by billionaires, at the request of the White House.

(Dec 26, 2012 5:02 PM) A fireworks factory exploded in the Nigerian city of Lagos today and sparked a fire that spread to at least nine other buildings, killing one and injuring 30, AFP reports. Crowds gathered to watch as people jumped from windows to save their lives and bystanders ran to fetch water. Shop owners tried to salvage items from stores in the crowded market area, but luckily many were already closed for a public holiday. Three fire-service tankers, operated partly by bystanders, ran out of water and received reinforcements later in the day. Eventually the fire began to die down, but the emergency operation was hampered by fireworks that continued to go off long after the initial blast, the BBC reports. It's very dangerous for the firemen to go in, because the government don't want any of these men to be injured, said a government official. An emergency source said a fire probably caused the explosion, but it was loud enough to start a rumor that a plane had crashed.

(Feb 20, 2018 3:08 PM) Stocks took a turn lower in afternoon trading, ending a six-day winning streak, the AP reports. Walmart plunged 10% Tuesday after reporting weak online sales and disappointing earnings. Other retailers and grocery store operators also fell. Target gave up 3% and Ross Stores lost 2.7%. A sell-off in the afternoon wiped out early gains, which were led by technology companies. NXP Semiconductor jumped 6% after Qualcomm raised its offer for the company. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 15 points, or 0.6%, to 2,716. The Dow Jones industrial average lost 254 points, or 1%, to 24,964. The Nasdaq composite slipped 5 points, or 0.1%, to 7,234. Bond prices fell. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 2.89%.

(Mar 2, 2012 3:32 PM) Industrial emissions are causing the oceans to acidify at a fast rate--the fastest in 300 million years, say researchers from Columbia University. That could spell danger for sea creatures. In the last century alone, the pH of the oceans dropped by 0.1 units. That's 10 times faster than the closest historical parallel, a drop that occurred 56 million years ago, reports Bloomberg. Factories release carbon dioxide into the air, which is absorbed by the oceans, creating carbonic acid that lowers pH and acidifies the water. Historical occurrences of ocean acidification have been linked to mass extinctions. If industrial carbon emissions continue at the current pace, we may lose organisms we care about--coral reefs, oysters, salmon, says one scientist.

(Apr 7, 2011 12:22 PM CDT) The rhetoric is sounding more and more dire about a government shutdown, and the Intrade markets had the odds in favor of it happening at 52%-48% about 1pm ET. That's up from 40% about noon. President Obama, Harry Reid, and John Boehner have another come-to-Jesus meeting today, following a morning of pessimistic comments, notes the Washington Post.

(Aug 20, 2018 12:00 PM CDT) Most toddlers celebrate turning 2 with cake and presents. Yoshiki Fujimoto spent his birthday lost on a Japanese mountain, the subject of a frantic three-day search after he disappeared while with his grandfather. The South China Morning Post reports on the miracle of a volunteer finding Yoshiki Wednesday, perched with no shoes on a rock in the middle of a stream on Yashiro Island, almost 72 hours after he was reported missing. The Asahi Shimbun notes the boy had been headed to the beach on Aug. 12 with his grandfather and 3-year-old brother when Yoshiki decided he wanted to turn around and return to his great-grandfather's home about 300 feet away, which his grandfather didn't stop him from doing. Shortly afterward, it was discovered he never made it back. Nearly 400 cops and other rescuers--as well as drones and search dogs, per Channel NewsAsia--were deployed to find Yoshiki, who doctors feared would succumb to dehydration and Japan's summer heat. Being credited with Yoshiki's discovery: 78-year-old volunteer Haruo Obata, who correctly guessed the boy was more likely to have climbed up the mountain rather than down it. Obata tells the Shimbun that as he called the boy's name around 6:30am Wednesday, he heard an I'm here and found the child, who snatched a bag of candy from Obata's hands as he held it out to him. Yoshiki was found to be dehydrated, with tick bites and scratches, but otherwise fine. I'm so grateful my son returned safely, Yoshiki's mother told local TV. The boy's grandfather tells the Morning Post, I apologize, as it was I who took my eyes off him.

(Sep 14, 2010 8:47 AM CDT) The good news: 96% of adults claim they always wash their hands in public restrooms, according to a phone survey. The bad news: only 85% of adults actually do, a new observational study finds. Despite the dirty people who are lying about their hygiene habits (and, perhaps, sharing a bread basket with you at dinner), the number of hand-washers is the highest it's been since 1996 when the study started, USA Today reports. And if you're sharing that bread basket with a woman, you can be even less worried: 93% of them washed their hands, compared to only 77% of men. For more hygiene-related news, click here. For another reason to wash those hands, click here.

(Jan 31, 2013 3:55 PM) One reason to ditch meat: A new study finds that vegetarians were 32% less likely to die of heart disease or be treated in the hospital for it, the BBC reports. University of Oxford scientists studied 44,500 people over a period of 11 years, and found that vegetarians also had lower blood pressure, lower bad cholesterol levels, and were at healthier weights. Says a researcher, Vegetarians probably have a lower intake of saturated fat so it makes senses there is a lower risk of heart disease.

(Dec 9, 2008 7:28 PM) A Led Zeppelin world tour? Sorry, that was a whole lotta hype. Madonna and Guy Ritchie's love story? Ditto. As the curtain comes down on 2008, the Los Angeles Times bids farewell to this year's departed cultural phenomena.

(Jan 28, 2014 8:19 AM) Yesterday marked the 69th anniversary of Auschwitz's liberation, and the New York Times marks the solemn occasion with a look at a less widely known fact about the Holocaust: At least 2 million of the 6 million Jews who were killed died not at Auschwitz or any other concentration camp. Instead, they perished in what some call a Holocaust by bullets --executions that occurred at thousands of Eastern European killing sites as mundane as forests, fields, and homes, the bodies deposited into unmarked mass graves. It's a side to the Holocaust that only started to emerge after the fall of the Soviet Union, as records and witness accounts slowly became available. The bulk of the killing--in places like Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia--began after the June 1941 Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. The further east the Wehrmacht went, the greater the killing, says an Austrian history professor who calls the executions in a sense, invisible. The rare survivors were terrorized and silenced and in many cases left behind the Iron Curtain, writes Alison Smale for the Times. To wit, a French priest who has spent a dozen years searching for witnesses, now with the help of 23 employees, says 90% of those interviewed have never discussed their experience before. In a 2009 interview with the AP, Rev. Patrick Desbois said his work had led him to more than 800 mass extermination sites, the bulk of which had been unidentified. He also uncovered horror upon horror: local children who were forced to bury the dead, and sadistic killings that went beyond firing squads, like throwing Jews alive onto bonfires or into wells. (Also in the news this week: a newly revealed Nazi trove of documents.)