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Monday, May 21, 2012

National News

Thousands march in Chicago to NATO summit (05/21/12)
CHICAGO -- Thousands of protesters marched through downtown Chicago on Sunday in one of the city's largest demonstrations in years, airing grievances about war, climate change and a wide range of other complaints as world leaders assembled for a NATO summit...
Facebook's Zuckerberg marries sweetheart (05/21/12)
PALO ALTO, Calif. -- Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg updated his status to "married" on Saturday. Zuckerberg and 27-year-old Priscilla Chan tied the knot at a small ceremony at his Palo Alto, Calif., home, capping a busy week for the couple...
Rhode Island's big bet on Curt Schilling raises a lot of questions (05/21/12)
PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- In 2010, the man who'd helped Boston win its first World Series in more than 80 years came to Rhode Island promising the job-starved state something even better: hundreds of good jobs, millions of dollars in tax revenue and a foothold in the booming business of video games...
Party leaders refuse to budge on debt stance (05/21/12)
WASHINGTON -- Republicans and Democrats are refusing to budge when it comes to their already hardened positions on spending cuts versus tax increases to deal with the nation's debt. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., both said Sunday that when Congress is asked to raise the nation's borrowing cap after the election, they'll insist on spending cuts to offset the increase. ...
Former British PM heckled in Maine during college speech (05/21/12)
WATERVILLE, Maine -- A handful of protesters briefly interrupted a Maine college graduation speech by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair calling for world unity. Blair addressed more than 400 Colby College graduates and their guests Sunday morning at the school's 191st commencement in Waterville...
Four people dead after boat crash in Iowa river (05/21/12)
The bodies of four people missing after a boat crash on the Mississippi River in Iowa were found Sunday within 100 yards of the crash site, according to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. None was wearing a life vest. DNR officer Paul Kay said three men and a woman, all believed to be in their 20s, were killed. Their names have not been released, pending notification of their families...
Former Israeli PM: Jerusalem must be partitioned (05/21/12)
JERUSALEM -- Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Sunday urged Israeli leaders to relinquish the idea of a unified Jerusalem if they truly want peace, contending in a pair of interviews that years of government neglect have kept the Jewish and Arab sectors irreparably divided...
Strong quake kills four in Italy cheese region (05/21/12)
SANT'AGOSTINO DI FERRARA, Italy -- A magnitude-6.0 earthquake shook several small towns in northeast Italy on Sunday, killing four people, knocking down a clock tower and other centuries-old buildings and causing millions in losses to the region known for making Parmesan cheese...
Haiti: Two Americans in jail charged with conspiracy (05/21/12)
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Two Americans jailed in Haiti were charged with conspiracy for participating in a street march that pressed for the return of the country's disbanded army, a Haitian government official said Sunday. Reginald Delva, Haiti's Secretary of State for Public Security, said Jason William Petrie and Steven Parker Shaw were charged Saturday night because of their involvement in last week's march. Petrie, 39, is from Barberton, Ohio; and Shaw, 57, is from Dighton, Mass...
Today in History (05/21/12)
Today is Monday, May 21, the 142nd day of 2012. There are 224 days left in the year. Today's Highlight in History: On May 21, 1932, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean as she landed in Northern Ireland, about 15 hours after leaving Newfoundland; Earhart's achievement came on the fifth anniversary of Charles Lindbergh's solo flight to France...
U.S. expands once again - digitally, this time (05/20/12)
NEW YORK -- The metaphor is an easy one, overused and perhaps even a bit overwrought. We are forging forward into a digital frontier, leaving convention behind, traveling without guides into an uncharted virtual land where progress and profits are forever around the next bend...
South Asia rising force in global meth trade (05/20/12)
ISLAMABAD -- Iran, Pakistan and other South Asian countries are a fast-rising force in the global methamphetamine market, with drug cartels thriving off the weak governance and law enforcement that have long fueled the region's heroin trade. The environment has allowed criminals to tap into the countries' relatively advanced pharmaceutical industries to get their hands on meth's two main ingredients: ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. ...
Bomb kills one student and wounds seven in Italy (05/20/12)
ROME -- A bomb exploded Saturday outside an Italian high school named after the wife of an assassinated anti-Mafia prosecutor, killing one student and wounding at least seven others, officials said. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, and police were trying to determine who had planted the bomb. ...
Seven charged in crackdown on Real IRA (05/20/12)
DUBLIN -- Seven Irish republicans, including three relatives of a senior reputed Real IRA member and four others allegedly operating a forest rifle range, were arraigned Saturday on terror charges following a security sweep against militants plotting to sabotage Northern Ireland's peace process...
World leaders confront Afghan war (05/20/12)
KABUL, Afghanistan -- It was what President Barack Obama called a "war of necessity," a conflict thrust upon America by the 9/11 attacks. As NATO's mission here winds down nearly 11 years later, the insurgents remain undefeated, corruption runs rife and the peace process is stuck in the sand...
Car bomb in eastern Syria kills 9 (05/20/12)
BEIRUT -- A car bomb in the parking lot of a Syrian military compound killed at least nine people Saturday, the latest in increasingly frequent bombings in the country's major cities to target the regime's security services. In Damascus, top United Nations' peacekeeping and military officials met with Syrian officials to try to salvage that peace plan, which has been marred by daily violence and dismissed by the opposition as unrealistic. ...
G-8: Recovery takes both growth and cutting (05/20/12)
CAMP DAVID, Md. -- Confronting an economic crisis that threatens them all, President Barack Obama and leaders of other world powers Saturday declared that their governments must both spark growth and cut the debt that has crippled the European continent and put investors worldwide on edge...
Google gets approval from China for Motorola deal (05/20/12)
NEW YORK -- Authorities in China have approved Google Inc.'s bid to buy phone maker Motorola Mobility, clearing the way for the $12.5 billion deal to close early this week. But Chinese regulators attached a big condition: that Google's Android operating system for mobile devices remain available to all at no cost for the next five years...
Facebook closes flat first day on market (05/20/12)
NEW YORK -- In the hours before Facebook's stock began trading on the Nasdaq for the first time, CEO Mark Zuckerberg reminded the company's 3,500 employees not to get caught up in the hoopla surrounding its long-awaited initial public offering...
Commercial rocket launch aborted in last half-second (05/20/12)
Workers, bottom, check out the engines on the Falcon 9 SpaceX rocket Saturday on space launch complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Fla. An early morning launch was aborted with a half-second remaining before liftoff, when the onboard computers automatically shut everything down...
Blind Chinese activist who fled house arrest lands at airport in New Jersey (05/20/12)
NEWARK, N.J. -- A blind Chinese legal activist who was suddenly allowed to leave the country arrived in the U.S. on Saturday, ending a nearly monthlong diplomatic tussle that had tested U.S.-China relations. Chen Guangcheng had been hurriedly taken from a hospital hours earlier and put on a plane for the United States after Chinese authorities suddenly told him to pack and prepare to leave. He arrived Saturday evening at Newark Liberty International Airport, outside New York City...
Presence of dead cardinal being felt at Pa. abuse trial (05/20/12)
PHILADELPHIA -- Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua died just weeks before his longtime aide went on trial in the alleged cover-up of sexual assaults by priests within the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia. Yet Bevilacqua is very much the ghost inside courtroom 304 at the Philadelphia Criminal Justice Center. Rarely an hour goes by that his name is not invoked...
N.Y. girl, 4, calls 911 to help save choking brother (05/20/12)
AMITYVILLE, N.Y. -- They talked about calling 911 in Grace Varley's prekindergarten class. She must have been listening. The 4-year-old New York girl calmly dialed for help Wednesday after her younger brother choked on a piece of chicken and passed out...
Today in History (05/20/12)
Today is Sunday, May 20, the 141st day of 2012. There are 225 days left in the year. Today's Highlight in History: On May 20, 1712, the first version of Alexander Pope's satirical mock-heroic poem "The Rape of the Lock" was published anonymously in Lintot's Miscellany. (Pope later revised and expanded the poem.)...
Today in History (05/19/12)
Today is Saturday, May 19, the 140th day of 2012. There are 226 days left in the year. Today's Highlight in History: On May 19, 1962, actress Marilyn Monroe sang a sultry rendition of "Happy Birthday to You" to guest-of-honor President John F. Kennedy during a star-studded Democratic fundraiser at New York's Madison Square Garden (the third of four arenas to bear that name)...
Latest headlines
  • Study: 2,000 convicted then exonerated in 23 years
    WASHINGTON (AP) -- More than 2,000 people who were falsely convicted of serious crimes have been exonerated in the United States in the past 23 years, according to a new archive compiled at two universities.
  • Tropical Storm Alberto weakens off SC coast
    COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- Tropical Storm Alberto hovered off the South Carolina and Georgia coasts on Sunday, canceling tourist cruises, producing showers and serving as a reminder that the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season is just around the corner.
  • Millions look skyward as eclipse crosses Asia, US
    ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) -- Skywatchers from Mount Fuji to the Grand Canyon enjoyed a treat: the moon nearly blotting out the sun to create a dramatic "ring of fire" over a narrow strip of eastern Asia and the western United States.
  • AP Photos: Millions view 'ring of fire' eclipse
    Millions of early risers in Asia turned their attention skyward to view a rare "ring of fire" eclipse as it crossed their skies Monday morning.
  • Protesters march through Chicago to NATO summit
    CHICAGO (AP) -- Thousands of protesters marched through downtown Chicago on Sunday in one of the city's largest demonstrations in years, airing grievances about war, climate change and a wide range of other complaints as world leaders assembled for a NATO summit.
  • Miss. prison riot leaves guard dead, 8 hurt
    BRANDON, Miss. (AP) -- A prison guard was killed Sunday during a riot that also injured five other correctional officers and hurt three inmates at a privately run facility in Mississippi that holds illegal immigrants, authorities said.
  • CDC: Half of overweight teens have heart risk
    ATLANTA (AP) -- Half the nation's overweight teens have unhealthy blood pressure, cholesterol or blood sugar levels that put them at risk for future heart attacks and other cardiac problems, new federal research says.
  • 3 charged in carjacking of pastor Marvin Winans
    DETROIT (AP) -- Three young men were arraigned Sunday in the assault and carjacking of popular Detroit pastor and gospel singing icon Marvin Winans.
  • Police: 45 arrested, 4 officers hurt in protests
    CHICAGO (AP) -- Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy says the protests of the NATO Summit resulted in 45 people being arrested and four officers suffering injuries -- one from a stab wound in the leg.
  • 4 people found dead after boat crash on Iowa river
    The bodies of four people missing after a boat crash on the Mississippi River in Iowa were found Sunday within 100 yards of the crash site, according to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources. None was wearing a life vest.