AP - McDonald's affordable food drew even more customers in its fourth quarter, but the burger chain said it may raise prices this year as its own food tab rises.

[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 18:56:10 GMT]
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The Christian Science Monitor - US generosity, and its network of charitable giving, comes with baffling inefficiencies.
[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 20:03:45 GMT]
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AP - A shootout in front of a Walmart in Washington state left two people dead and two sheriff's deputies wounded Sunday afternoon, a sheriff's spokesman said.

[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 06:34:47 GMT]
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AP - Zsa Zsa Gabor's publicist says the actress is going home from the hospital, a week after doctors amputated most of her right leg.

[Sun, 23 Jan 2011 00:52:39 GMT]
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AFP - Egypt's interior minister said on Tuesday that 19 people thought to have links to Al-Qaeda had been arrested in Egypt last month.

[Tue, 25 Jan 2011 12:18:45 GMT]
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AP - For people who just can't enough of the Internal Revenue Service, the federal tax collection agency is coming out with a new phone app.
[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 19:10:46 GMT]
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The Atlantic Wire - The legitimacy of the death penalty in the U.S. is regularly debated. But now, at least 35 states that already administer capital punishment may no longer be able to do so. Hospira, the only American manufacturer of the drug sodium thiopental, has decided to halt production of the anaesthetic commonly used in lethal injections. The decision comes after Hospira's attempt to produce the drug at its facility outside Milan was thwarted by Italian officials who demanded the drug not be used for executions.
[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 19:27:36 GMT]
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Reuters - A man killed in a shootout with police outside a Washington state Wal-Mart was facing a kidnapping charge in Utah, and the teen girl shot dead with him is believed to be a Salt Lake City-area runaway, authorities said on Tuesday.
[Tue, 25 Jan 2011 23:30:49 GMT]
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Time.com - Washington's influence on events is slipping fast in the region that has been the dominant focus of U.S. foreign policy over the past decade
[Tue, 25 Jan 2011 22:45:00 GMT]
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Reuters - Oilfield service company Halliburton Co posted higher-than-expected profits, boosted by oil projects in North America, and forecast steady growth elsewhere, but said pricing competition could be tough.
[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 18:27:34 GMT]
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The Atlantic Wire - The Wire recently highlighted evolutionary psychologist Jesse Bering's explanation at Slate of a claim that women have evolved to defend themselves against rape, given the disastrous toll rape pregnancies can take on genetic success. Since then, the piece has generated a host of impassioned responses, a number from fellow Slate writers. The debate delves into the studies Bering cites and raises broader questions about the science of evolutionary psychology.
[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 20:57:47 GMT]
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AP - The Air Force Academy superintendent's choice of speaker for a prayer luncheon in February has come under fire from a frequent foe of religious practices at the school.
[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 04:38:50 GMT]
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Time.com - Having lost the battle for power in parliament, supporters of ousted Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri have taken their campaign to the streets
[Tue, 25 Jan 2011 23:10:00 GMT]
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U.S. News & World Report - Last year, TurboTax produced an infographic on filing your taxes that really drove home the importance of filing your taxes online. The most amazing statistic was that 46 million returns in 2008 were still filed on paper. Forty six million. When e-filing is so cheap, sometimes even free, it's amazing that so many people introduce more hassle into their lives by filling out a paper return, driving to the post office, and paying for registered mail to get the tome in on time.
[Mon, 24 Jan 2011 19:41:05 GMT]
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The Atlantic Wire - Federal law known as the Hatch Act prohibits staffers with salaries paid by taxpayers from engaging in partisan political activity on the public's dime. White House aides to George W. Bush broke these laws, Politicos's Josh Gerstein reports. Not only was the entire White House Office of Political Affairs staffed engaged in helping Republican candidates during the 2006 midterm elections, the Office of Special Counsel finds, but the OPA staffers actually thought the electioneering was part of their official duties.The aides tracked how much cash came in at fundraisers for national and local GOP events. Seven Cabinet secretaries claimed to be traveling on official business when they were actually taking trips for political work.
[Tue, 25 Jan 2011 15:43:01 GMT]
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AP - President Hugo Chavez is using Venezuela's judiciary to persecute his political opponents, crack down on media critics and curtail the power of labor unions, a prominent human rights organization reported Monday.

[Tue, 25 Jan 2011 04:28:59 GMT]
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The Atlantic Wire - Last week, former Haitian President Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier returned to Haiti, ending his 25-year exile after a 1986 popular uprising had ousted the notoriously corrupt ruler. As the still deeply troubled Haiti lurches toward a presidential election, Duvalier is seeking a return to power, which everyone agrees is the last thing that Haiti needs. Within two days of arriving in Port-au-Prince, he was officially charged with embezzlement and corruption. Here's what reporters and Haiti-watchers are saying about Duvalier's return, his ambitions, and what it means.
[Fri, 21 Jan 2011 14:45:11 GMT]
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AP - Despite continuing jitters in Europe over new terror plots, Britain's government is rolling back unpopular security laws — widely considered the toughest among Western democracies — for the first time since 9/11.
[Tue, 25 Jan 2011 13:15:34 GMT]
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The Christian Science Monitor - They’re calling it the tea party Congress, and the new leadership is busy snipping earmarks, targeting Obamacare, and quoting the Constitution. But can they succeed where similar conservative backlashes have failed? Whatever your opinion of the whole tea party movement – and mine stops far short of blanket approval – you have to admit it has some interesting qualities that set it apart from conservative approaches of decades past.
[Fri, 21 Jan 2011 14:04:00 GMT]
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Reuters - Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach surprised voters on Tuesday by saying he will resign, just three years after winning the largest parliamentary majority in the oil-rich province's history.
[Tue, 25 Jan 2011 19:32:41 GMT]
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