Obama takes health care overhaul push to Missouri
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The nation's top health official challenged insurers on Wednesday to join President Barack Obama's push to overhaul the medical system, arguing that if the effort fails it will hurt them as well as other Americans....
US-Israel row highlights quandary over settlements
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) -- An open diplomatic row during the visit of Vice President Joe Biden has shined a spotlight on the U.S. failure to rein in Israeli settlement ambitions and deepened Palestinian suspicions that the United States is too weak to broker a deal....
'Lost Boys' actor Corey Haim dead in Calif. at 38
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Corey Haim, a 1980s teen heartthrob whose career was blighted by drug abuse, has died. He was 38. Haim died early Wednesday at Providence St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, Los Angeles County coroner's Lt. Cheryl MacWillie said....
Female WWII aviators honored with gold medal
WASHINGTON (AP) -- They flew planes during World War II but weren't considered "real" military pilots. No flags were draped over their coffins when they died on duty. And when their service ended, they had to pay their own bus fare home....
Church abuse scandal reaches pope's brother
VATICAN CITY (AP) -- Church abuse scandals in Germany have reached the older brother of Pope Benedict XVI and are creeping ever closer to the pontiff himself....
Boyfriend: 'Jihad Jane' suspect wasn't religious
PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- The self-dubbed "Jihad Jane" who thought her blond, all-American profile would help mask her plan to kill a Swedish cartoonist is a rare case of a U.S. woman inciting foreign terrorism and shows the latest evolution of the global threat, authorities say....
Senate passes jobless aid, business tax breaks
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Senate voted Wednesday to extend a host of soon-to-expire elements of last year's economic stimulus measure, including help for the jobless and money to help financially strapped states pay for health care for the poor....
Swedish artist has no regrets over prophet drawing
STOCKHOLM (AP) -- The point of a caricature depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a dog was to show that artistic freedom allows mockery of all religions, including the most sacred symbols of Islam, the Swedish artist who created it said Wednesday....
Midnight knitter pulls the wool over NJ shore town
WEST CAPE MAY, N.J. (AP) -- Someone is spinning quite a yarn over one New Jersey shore town. An unknown person dubbed The Midnight Knitter by West Cape May residents is covering tree branches and lamp poles with little sweaters under cover of darkness....
Garciaparra rejoins Red Sox for day, then retires
FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) -- Nomar Garciaparra rejoined the Red Sox for one day and then retired, ending a 14-year career in which he won two batting titles with Boston and was once a beloved player in the city....
