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Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati features on the cover of Newsweek's latest edition, with the US weekly drawing parallels between her and US President Barack Obama - in their rise to political heights though belonging to the bottom of the social ladder. However, the weekly with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief's photo on its cover design, says Mayawati is a "bigger underdog" and a "bigger threat" to the "established order than Obama was". While commenting her "suspiciously ostentatious fortune" and her "limited accomplishments" on behalf of the socially oppressed Dalits, whose cause she champions, the weekly has said her...

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Who would have thought 55 days into this administration we would be asking the question, what did he know and when did he know it? Word that a provision in the stimulus bill gave the green light for AIG to hand out bonuses using taxpayer money sent the media bloodhounds hot on the trail of whoever is the culprit. For a time, it looked like Senate Banking chairman Chris Dodd would take the fall, but after 24 hours of twisting in the wind, Dodd said the change that exempted past agreements to pay bonuses was made at the request of...

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Dow Jones Industrial Average(DJI: ^DJI) Index Value: 6,873.37 Trade Time: 4:00pm ET Change: 147.35 (2.19%) Prev Close: 6,898.63 Open: 6,726.50 Day's Range: 6,726.42 - 6,979.22 52wk Range: 6,661.74 - 13,191.50 Quotes delayed, except where indicated otherwise. For consolidated real-time quotes (incl. pre/post market data), sign up for a free trial of Real-time Quotes.

With the mega-pork, er, stimulus bill done, Democrats will now turn to regulating political speech they don't like. That is, they're revving up to resurrect the so-called Fairness Doctrine. Created in 1949, the doctrine required broadcast radio and TV outlets (then relatively few in number) to present balanced viewpoints on issues. The FCC repealed it in 1987, noting the dramatically expanded media landscape of the intervening four decades allowed sufficient competition of ideas.

In a stunning admission, National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Ensign (Nev.) on Friday morning blasted his GOP colleagues for not doing enough to help the committee financially, and he said he would have to scale back the NRSC’s independent expenditure budget as a result.

I don't want to alarm anybody, but maybe it's time for Americans to start stockpiling food. No, this is not a drill. You've seen the TV footage of food riots in parts of the developing world. Yes, they're a long way away from the U.S. But most foodstuffs operate in a global market. When the cost of wheat soars in Asia, it will do the same here. Reality: Food prices are already rising here much faster than the returns you are likely to get from keeping your money in a bank or money-market fund. And there are very good reasons...

PITTSBURGH - John McCain called Tuesday for the federal government to free people from paying gasoline taxes this summer and ensure that college students can secure loans this fall, proposals aimed at stemming the public's pain now from the troubled economy. In the longer-term, the certain Republican presidential nominee said he would double the tax exemption for dependent children and offer people the option of choosing a simpler tax system. "We know from experience that no serious reform of the current tax code will come out of Congress, so now it is time to turn the decision over to the...

POLK COUNTY -- Smoke and fog formed a deadly combination this morning along Interstate 4 near Haines City. Near-zero visibility caused a massive, deadly pile-up involving at least 50 vehicles, many of them tractor-trailers. A number of vehicles caught fire. Three people are reported dead and dozens injured. The accidents occured in the area of County Road 557. I-4, the main traffic artery between Tampa and Orlando is now shut down in both directions between the Polk County Parkway (Hwy 570) and Highway 27 in Haines City. It will likely remain closed for much of the day.

U.S. retail sales surged during November, making a surprisingly strong, broad-based climb that suggests the economy might not be as weak as feared. Meanwhile, U.S. wholesale prices soared last month at their fastest pace since the Nixon Administration, spurred by record gains in energy prices. In a worrisome sign for Federal Reserve officials, price pressures appeared to seep beyond just energy and risk becoming embedded deeper in the production pipeline. Retail sales increased by 1.2%, the Commerce Department said Thursday. Sales went up an unrevised 0.2% in October. The median estimate of 10 economists surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires was...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 26, 2007 – Recent strides in Iraq’s economic development, including the reopening of a flour mill last week, are occurring as Iraqi and coalition forces disrupt al Qaeda and other terrorist elements, a senior military spokesman in Iraq said today. “Local production of flour in a previously dormant mill is a small but meaningful step in Baqubah that demonstrates that as al Qaeda in Iraq is driven out, economic growth emerges,” Navy Rear Adm. Mark I. Fox, deputy spokesman for Multinational Force Iraq, said at a news conference. The flour mill in Baqubah, closed for nearly a year,...

OAKLAND, Calif. — Police said they recovered firearms linked to the slaying of an Oakland journalist during a series of early morning raids Friday targeting members of a Black Muslim splinter group that operates a chain of bakeries. Colleagues said Oakland Post editor Chauncey Bailey, 57, had been working on a story about Your Black Muslim Bakery before he was ambushed and slain Thursday morning.... Before dawn, officers raided the Muslim group's headquarters at the original bakery on San Pablo Avenue, as well as three houses in Oakland. They arrested seven people on charges including homicide, robbery and assault, including...

When conservation officer Steve Peterson got a call that a timber wolf was chasing vehicles on a country road near Brimson, he thought it was prank or a misidentified German shepherd. But then he saw it firsthand. "I couldn't believe it. It was like a dog chasing cars," Peterson said. "It looked like a big, healthy male wolf. No mange." Responding to the call last Friday, Peterson saw the animal hide in the ditch as a pickup approached and then come bounding out to chase it. The wolf did the same when Peterson drove to that spot, where he stopped...

RKBA is either a prime Republican issue, or, it ain't! I never have had to vote for a democrat yet, but there are some of them prettier than Rudy is, and I am sorely tempted!

During a class discussion on adolescence, a high school teacher recently asked her students whether they go on dates. We don't "date," the 12th graders reported. We "hook up." If you're in your 40s, "hooking up" might mean catching a friend downtown for lunch. But to people in their teens or 20s, the phrase often means a casual sexual encounter _ anything from kissing onwards _ with no strings attached. Now a new book on this not-so-new subject is drawing fire in some quarters for its conclusion: That hookups can be damaging to young women, denying their emotional needs, putting...

<p>Maybe I should just quit while I am ahead, just go shopping for another "politically incorrect assault rifle", while I can! Hell, I think I will, Rudy, and a whole mess of ammo, too! Y'all excuse my attitude, it is the only attitude I have, or, you can kiss my ass, Rudy! All NYC means to me is a cesspool to avoid! Rudy, if you had ever had to survive in the "real world", outside of NYC, sheeat, little Yankee buddy, you would be really starving your little urban ass off, long ago! Think you are smart enough to patronize my Redneck ass, and get away with it? Good luck, you will need it! My folks were what I am, before your folks ever got their European butts through Ellis freakin Island. My folks came here in search of FREEDOM, tell me, Rudy, why are you here? Hell, Rudy, you could have been the King of Italy, by now, maybe you just need to move your ass back home, where you belong, and take the whole damned State of NY with you! Last damn thing I will expect from your sorry little ass, Rudy, is honest debate, your momma told you that you are too smart to debate Rednecks, and you are dumb enough to buy that shit! I won't vote for your sorry liberal ass, Rudy!</p>

Al-Jazeera is reporting that Saddam Hussein, a former President of Iraq, has discovered “The Law of Gravity” according to The Grand Muff-Tea cleric of the Al Akbar Mosque. “Saddam Hussein is a great scientist. Yesterday, he made a great discovery, and has proven what we Muslims now call The Law of Gravity”, said the Grand Muff-Tea. According to the leader of the Al Akbar Mosque, “. . . all great achievements come from Islam, as we see in this great discovery from Islamic scientist Saddam Hussein . . . the West cannot defeat our genius . . .” Others in...

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- U.S. stocks finished the year with strong gains, with all three major stock averages booking their best performance since 2003. The Dow Jones At the unofficial 4 p.m. close on Friday, the final trading session of the year, marking a 16% gain for the year. This was the Dow's best performance since 2003. General Motors Corp. (

WASHINGTON, Oct 26 (Reuters) - Sales of new U.S. homes unexpectedly rose for a second straight month in September as builders slashed prices by the biggest annual margin in nearly 36 years and the supply of homes for sale shrank, a government report showed on Thursday. New single-family home sales increased 5.3 percent in September to an annualized rate of 1.075 million from a downwardly revised rate of 1.021 million in August, the Commerce Department said. Analysts polled by Reuters were expecting September sales to ease to a 1.045 million rate from an originally reported August rate of 1.050 million....