Investors seeking reason for optimism after the worst stock-market sell-off since the 2008 financial crisis probably won't find it in Friday's July jobs report.Economists forecast that employers added only 90,000 jobs last month and that the unemployment rate was unchanged at 9.2 percent, according

With the deadline for raising the nation's debt limit and prospects for financial-market panic now a week away, an impatient, frustrated President Barack Obama warned the nation Monday night that the partisan impasse risks "sparking a deep economic crisis, this one caused almost entirely

A protester splattered Rupert Murdoch with white foam in a foil pie dish on Tuesday, interrupting a dramatic hearing in which the media baron told British lawmakers he was not responsible for a phone hacking scandal that has rocked his global empire.Murdoch appeared by turns vague, truculent, sharp and concise as he spoke alongside his son and deputy, James, calling the parliamentary inquisition "...

Western states hit hardest by the housing crisis are feeling the greatest economic stress two years after the recession ended, according to The Associated Press's monthly analysis.Depressed home prices and high rates of foreclosures have limited job growth in Arizona, California and Nevada

Thursday - and the arrest of another former editor of a Murdoch tabloid - deepened the crisis for New...

Rupert Murdoch touched down in London on Sunday to take charge of his media empire's phone-hacking crisis as his best-selling Sunday tabloid, the News of the World, published its last. The scandal lives on despite his sacrifice of the 168-year-old paper at the heart of it.The scrapping of the News

Sumter County has a new rape crisis agency, Sexual Trauma Services of the Midlands."We intervene at an early stage so that the victim gets help now instead of nine or 10 years down the road. If we can keep that from happening, the impact of the trauma is lessened," Executive Director Ginny Waller

Greece's lawmakers approved a key austerity bill Wednesday needed to avert default next month, despite a second day of rioting on the streets of Athens that left dozens of police and protesters injured.The passage of the bill was a decisive step for the country to get the next batch of bailout loans from international creditors and was met with a huge sigh of relief in markets and by Greece's part...

A nationwide debate about circumcisions for newborn boys, combined with cash-strapped public health budgets, has Colorado taking sides with 17 other states that no longer fund Medicaid coverage of the once widely accepted procedure.For years, Colorado lawmakers considered doing away with funding for circumcisions under Medicaid - a move that would save the state $186,500 a year. Now facing a seism...

Phoebe Prince was a recently arrived Irish immigrant, 15 and emotionally fragile, when high school bullying over two boys she dated apparently drove her to hang herself with a scarf in her Massachusetts home.Tyler Clementi was an 18-year-old violinist with a bright future. He jumped off the George Washington Bridge into the Hudson River after his roommate at Rutgers University allegedly used a web...

The Cooperative Ministry is tapping into the social network to help raise funds for its ongoing charitable efforts.The agency, which provides crisis assistance to the working poor, is competing with charities across the country for donations ranging from $20,000 to $500,000 through the Chase

A bipartisan group of six senators is closing in on what could represent the best chance for tackling a deficit crisis that has forced the government to borrow more than 40 cents of every dollar it spends.Their plan, still a work in progress, would reduce borrowing by up to $4 trillion

The Supreme Court rejected a call Monday from Virginia's attorney general to depart from its usual practice and put review of the health care law on a fast track. Instead, judicial review of President Barack Obama's signature legislation will continue in federal appeals courts.The justices turned down a request by Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, a leading opponent of the law, to resolve ...

South Carolina's system of public defenders has attorneys saddled with caseloads that eclipse recommended levels, increasingly relies on students instead of paid workers and owes money to private lawyers whose bills can't be paid.The crunch stems from a recession that has made more and more people eligible for free legal help while at the same time sapping state budget money that helps ensure poor...

Japan raised the assessment of its nuclear crisis to the most severe rating Tuesday, on the same level as the Chernobyl disaster, the world's worst to date. Some answers to questions about the assessment and health and safety concerns:Q. Has the situation at the Japanese nuclear power plant

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the closest to a front-runner in a wide-open Republican field, took a major step toward a second White House candidacy Monday, formally announcing a campaign exploratory committee.Romney declared that "with able leadership, America's best days are still ahead," vigorously asserting that President Barack Obama had failed to provide it.The Republican, who has b...

Japan was rattled by a strong aftershock and tsunami warning Thursday night nearly a month after a devastating earthquake and tsunami flattened the northeastern coast.Announcers on Japan's public broadcaster NHK told coastal residents to run to higher ground and away from the shore.The Japan meteorological agency issued a tsunami warning for a wave of up to 6 feet (two meters) after the magnitude-...

An envoy of Moammar Gadhafi told Greece's prime minister Sunday that the Libyan leader was seeking a way out of his country's crisis two weeks after his government's attacks to put down a rebellion drew international airstrikes, Greek officials said.Abdul-Ati al-Obeidi, a former Libyan prime

A Libyan opposition leader says the rebels will accept a U.N.-demanded cease-fire if Moammar Gadhafi pulls his forces from all cities and allows peaceful protests.Mustafa Abdul-Jalil spoke Friday during a joint press conference with U.N. envoy Abdelilah Al-Khatib. Al-Khatib is visiting the rebels' de-facto stronghold of Benghazi in hopes of reaching a cease-fire and political solution to the crisi...

Setbacks mounted Wednesday in the crisis over Japan's tsunami-damaged nuclear facility, with nearby seawater testing at its highest radiation levels yet and the president of the plant operator checking into a hospital with hypertension.Nearly three weeks after a March 11 tsunami engulfed

Vigorously defending American attacks in Libya, President Barack Obama declared Monday night that the United States intervened to prevent a slaughter of civilians that would have stained the world's conscience and "been a betrayal of who we are" as Americans. Yet he ruled out targeting Moammar Gadhafi, warning that trying to oust him militarily would be a mistake as costly as the war in Iraq.Obama...

The utility behind Japan’s biggest nuclear plant disaster can’t seem to get much right.The obviously harried officials from Tokyo Electric Power Co. have repeatedly announced botched radiation readings, corrected themselves over and over and indulged in seemingly endless rounds of apologies.Every few days, Japan’s nuclear safety industry scolds them to “to take steps to...

Workers discovered new pools of radioactive water leaking from Japan’s crippled nuclear complex, officials said Monday, as emergency crews struggled to pump out hundreds of tons of contaminated water and bring the plant back under control.Officials believe the contaminated water has sent radioactivity levels soaring at the coastal complex and caused more radiation to seep into soil and seaw...

- UTILITY APOLOGIZES FOR ERROR IN RADIATION DATA. The operator of Japan's stricken nuclear plant reports that radioactivity in water in the Unit 2 reactor tested 10 million times higher than normal, forcing the evacuation of workers and delaying efforts to bring the complex under control. But hours later it says the number is inaccurate and apologizes. Tokyo Electric Power Co. says it is unsure wh...

A suspected breach in the reactor core at one unit of a stricken Fukushima nuclear plant could mean more serious radioactive contamination,Japanese officials said Friday, revealing what may prove a major setback in the mission to bring the leaking plant under control.The uncertain situation halted work at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear complex, where dozens had been working feverishly to stop the ...

The blowout preventer that should have stopped the BP oil spill cold failed because of faulty design and a bent piece of pipe, a testing firm hired by the government said Wednesday in a report that appears to shift some blame for the disaster away from the oil giant and toward those who built and maintained the 300-ton safety device.At least one outside expert said the findings cast serious doubt ...

Officials raced Monday to restore electricity to Japan’s leaking nuclear plant, but getting the power flowing will hardly be the end of their battle: With its mangled machinery and partly melted reactor cores, bringing the complex under control is a monstrous job.Restoring the power to all six units at the tsunami-damaged complex is key, because it will, in theory, power up the maze of moto...

The punishing air and missile strikes against Libya’s armed forces in recent days may have halted their advance against rebels in Benghazi, but the larger goal of the U.S.-led operation — preventing attacks on civilians throughout the country — is a much tougher military challenge, according to current and former military officers.As the U.S. and its allies have discovered in...

Japan's nuclear safety agency raised the severity rating of the country's nuclear crisis Friday from Level 4 to Level 5 on a seven-level international scale, putting it on par with the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania in 1979.Ryohei Shiomi, a spokesman for the nuclear safety agency

The Japanese government acknowledged Friday that it was overwhelmed by the scale of last week's twin natural disasters, slowing the response to the nuclear crisis that was triggered by the earthquake and tsunami that left at least 10,000 people dead.The admission came as Japan welcomed U.S. help