Senators Impatient Over Biden Group’s Debt Plan

It’s crunch time for a deal to raise the debt ceiling. Congressional negotiators, led by Vice President Joe Biden, say they want to reach agreement by the end of next week, and they’re meeting daily behind closed doors to get there. But serious differences clearly remain over the austerity package Republicans have demanded in exchange [...]

N.C. Considers Paying Forced Sterilization Victims

Barely 40 years ago, it wasn’t uncommon for a single mother on welfare, or a patient in a mental hospital in North Carolina, to be sterilized against her will. But North Carolina wasn’t alone: More than half of states in the U.S. had eugenics laws, some of which persisted into the 1970s. North Carolina is [...]

Food Industry And Health Experts Face Off Over Package Labeling

For some of us, the regular trudge to the grocery store is a trial all by itself. But consumers trying to make healthier choices are often left scratching their heads in wonder at the sheer volume of food products with claims about less fat and more whole grain. When first mom and food maven Michelle [...]

Marine Reserve Eyed In 2010 Gunfire At Pentagon

Ballistics evidence may tie a man arrested at Arlington National Cemetery last week to a mysterious series of shootings at military buildings in the Washington, D.C., area, in 2010, federal authorities say. Yonathan Melaku, 22, a member of the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves, has been in custody since police found him wandering the cemetery after [...]

‘Catching Hell’ And Blaming Steve Bartman

In Game 6 of the National League Championship series in 2003, one Chicago Cubs fan reached for glory … and caught hell. Steve Bartman — along with half a dozen other fans — stuck his hands out for a fly ball hit by the Florida Marlins’ Luis Castillo that shot toward the stands. Cubs outfielder [...]

Love, Betrayal, Humiliation: A Coming Of Age Affair

“The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.” That is the famous first line of the Go-Between by L.P. Hartley. The first time I read it, it cleared a haunting little spot in my memory, sort of like an embassy to my own foreign country. The book was published in 1953, though [...]

Bahrain Sentences 8 Activists To Life In Prison

A military court in Bahrain handed down life in prison sentences for eight activists. Bahrain’s state news agency said the Lower National Safety court said the activists were charged with “plotting to topple the leadership of the Kingdom of Bahrain, and exchanging intelligence information with a terrorist organization working for a foreign country.” Bahrain’s government [...]

Syria Faces Pressure From A Reliable Ally

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem lashed out Wednesday at new economic sanctions from Europe, but promised democracy in Syria within months. In a television address, Moallem accused Europe of playing with fire for imposing a new round of economic sanctions. We will forget that Europe is on the map, he said. But Moallem also called [...]

Chinese Reopen Debate Over Chairman Mao’s Legacy

As China prepares to mark the 90th anniversary of its Communist Party on July 1, there are signs of a new ideological struggle over former leader Mao Zedong’s legacy. The conflict is being played out online amid a backdrop of heightened nostalgia for the revolutionary days, as a young leftist takes on an elderly economist [...]

Schools Blend Computers With Classroom Learning

Part 1 of a two-part report. Many school districts are reluctantly cutting staff and dropping courses in a desperate effort to respond to tighter budgets. But some educators are looking at ways to save money and improve instruction at the same time. The answer for some schools: blended learning, which is part computer lesson, part [...]