| World News  | German bank rescued, S.Korea reassures lenders
The Boston Globe
BEIJING (Reuters) - Germany offered a blanket bank deposit guarantee as it clinched a deal to rescue lender Hypo Real Estate, while regulators from Washington to Seoul took their own steps to ensure the stability of financial firms. Officials across the globe are scrambling to contain the fallout from the deepest financial crisis since the 1930s amid continued debate about whether a fragmented European response could keep pace with a fear-driven...
photo: AP / Christof Stache
|  | Morales announces general elections for 2009
The Times of India
6 Oct 2008, 0720 hrs IST,AFP Text: LA PAZ: Bolivian president Evo Morales announced on Sunday that general elections would be moved up a year-and-a-half to June 2009, a change decried by the opposition as a ploy to keep the ruling socialist government in power. "I would estimate -- and I'll say it up front without the least fear -- that (the elections) will be...
photo: ABr / Valter Campanato
|  | Military: Suicide bomber kills 22 in Sri Lanka
Philadelphia Daily News
The Associated Press COLOMBO, Sri Lanka - A suspected Tamil Tiger suicide bomber blew up an opposition party office Monday in a town in northern Sri Lanka killing about 20 people, including a former army officer, the military said. Military spokesman Brig. Udaya Nanayakkara said retired Maj. Gen. Janaka Perera and his wife were among nearly 22 people killed in Monday's blast in Anuradhapura town. Another 69 people were wounded, he said. Perera,...
photo: AP / Gemunu Amarasinghe
|  | Shanghai highrises could worsen threat of rising seas
The Boston Globe
SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Shanghai, China's most populous city and an aspiring global financial center, is also among the world's most vulnerable urban areas to a rise in sea levels as global warming melts polar ice. Its location on a low-lying alluvial plain near the mouth of Asia's longest river, the Yangtze, had already left it prone, but researchers warn that forests of skyscrapers sprouting across the ambitious...
photo: WN
| Business News  | Airports stall on high-tech
The Boston Globe
Self-destructing DVDs that you can take on a plane, watch on your laptop, then throw away. Antimicrobial disposable floor mats that prevent the spread of foot fungi at airport security checkpoints. Futuristic, driverless cars that transport travelers between terminals. These are among the amenities and technologies companies hawked at the Airports Council International's annual conference at the John B. Hynes Veterans Memorial Convention Center...
photo: WN / Dalia
|  | U.S. corn, soy slide over 4 pct on economic worries
The Guardian
* Global economic uncertainty hits commodities * Weaker oil leads broader grain market decline * Corn falls 4 pct to 10-month low (Updates prices, adds Chinese trade) SEOUL, Oct 6 (Reuters) - U.S. corn futures tumbled more than 4 percent to a 10-month low and soy slid 5 percent to an 11-month trough on Monday as financial markets and oil prices slumped, raising concerns that a weak global economy may further erode commodities demand. Bumper...
photo: WN / Aruna Mirasdar
|  | World economies
Dawn
Europe The European Commission (EC) forecast gross domestic product growth of 1.3 for this year in the Euro Zone, down from 1.7 per cent previously when the EC saw no risk of recession in Europe. The EC forecast growth of 1.4 per cent for the broader EU, which includes Britain, Sweden, Denmark and several countries in the formerly communist eastern Europe, down from two per cent projected earlier. Inflation is expected to average 3.8 in the EU...
photo: Creative Commons / Andrea Guerra
|  | High-tech help for an ancient lake
Star Tribune
Russia's Lake Baikal in southern Siberia holds a fifth of the world's unfrozen freshwater. It is home to thousands of species of plants and animals that are found nowhere else. Its northern shores -- as anyone using the Integrated Biodiversity Assessment Tool or IBAT (), an online database, can easily discover -- form part of a World Heritage site. There are also several Russian national parks and reserves in the area. Four species of birds...
photo: Public Domain / InvictaHOG
|  | Security camera small but menacing
The Boston Globe
HOME SAFETY I forget sometimes that security cameras (real or fake) are meant to look mean, like those that point down at drivers all over Boston these days. But hanging off of one of the saltbox houses in my Milton neighborhood, a gray CCTV-type camera looks trashy. The Swann ADW-300 is disappointing for this reason, and one other: It doesn't do Macs. The 2.4GHz ADW-300 (ADW stands for "Advanced Digital Wireless") transmits a wireless signal to...
photo: Public Domain /
|  | Airline pricing structure to serve a la carte fares
Omaha World-Herald
FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) - The idea of paying a single, simple fare to fly on an airliner is becoming as quaint as stewardesses in short skirts. American Airlines is about to accelerate the trend of breaking the cost of a trip into an airfare plus many smaller fees. Starting next year, American, which led a stampede by U.S. carriers to charge customers for checking even a single suitcase, plans to imitate the a la carte pricing structure pioneered...
photo: GFDL / Raghu9
|  | Re-opening ancient trade route
Dawn
By Sabihuddin Ghausi Following an agreement in principle between the two top leaders of Pakistan and India for allowing Indians an overland trade access to Afghanistan via Pakistan, businessmen are eagerly waiting to see the historic Grand Trunk Road re-emerge as a busy trade corridor between South and Central Asia. The road built by the famous Pathan king, Sher Shah Suri in the 16th century linked Peshawar with Calcutta. For centuries, it served...
photo: WN / Geeta
| Entertainment News  | Book Review: Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman
The Examiner
BlogCritics - 1 hr 15 mins ago Superheroes jump off the comics page and into prose in this entertaining first novel.If you had superpowers, what would you be -- the good guy, or the bad guy? Most of us like to hope we'd be the hero, but there's a heck of a lot of us who'd be the villain, really. Now in paperback, Austin Grossman's first...
photo: Creative Commons / Stanmar
|  | Video Games: Experience the difference
Canada Dot Com
As webmaster for the popular site TVShowsOn DVD.com, Edmonton's Gord Lacey says there's only one entertainment medium more exciting than television: video games. "You get to be an active part of the story in a video game," he explains. "And the experience can be different for each person. Everyone in a movie theatre experiences the same movie at the same time." Lacey, is a fan of action-adventure hybrids, such as Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed and...
photo: GNU Free Documentation License/ Benjamin.nagel
|  | 'The Boss': Bush presidency a 'disaster'
Inquirer
PHILADELPHIA -- Bruce Springsteen called the Bush presidency "a disaster" and said many Americans have "justifiably lost faith" in the American dream. The legendary rocker interrupted a seven-song acoustic set at a voter-registration rally in Philadelphia on Saturday to praise Democrat Barack Obama and bemoan the crises facing the next...
photo: White House file/Eric Draper
|  | Tilda Swinton
The Guardian
Tilda Swinton is a film star now - and other film stars should beware, because she could blow the concept to smithereens With Tilda Swinton, nothing should be ruled out. A few years ago, at the San Francisco film festival, she turned up to deliver the "State of Cinema" address in bright red, stiletto-heeled shoes (her tribute to Michael Powell, as well as a way of putting her over 6ft tall), and she offered an inspiring hymn to brave, new...
photo: AP /
|  | Santana wants to start a church
News24
Los Angeles - Carlos Santana is on tour and has an album coming out, but in an interview with Rolling Stone posted online on Friday, the rocker said he sees himself one day heading up a church in Hawaii. Santana also told the magazine about the pain of recently going through a divorce from his wife of 34 years, Deborah. The 61-year-old rocker described in the interview how his faith has helped him get through low points in his life, and that he...
photo: WN / aruna
|  | The House Bunny girl Anna Faris booked for the top
The Times
At first sight, Anna Faris is an unlikely candidate for comedy greatness. Despite parts in rom-coms such as 2005's Just Friends,the 31-year-old actress was best known for her role as Cindy in the often tiresome Scary Movie spoof-horror franchise. Until this month, that is. Her new comedy, The House Bunny, has spent more than a month in the US top ten, grossing $45 million and counting. Such is her newfound prominence that Faris has been invited...
photo: OTRS / Rob Pizzica
|  | Putting on the ditz
The Guardian
Is Anna Faris Hollywood's successor to Jean Harlow, Marilyn Monroe and Goldie Hawn? John Patterson hails the new queen of ditz The future is pink ... Anna Faris in The House Bunny Whoever says women aren't funny has never encountered Anna Faris, the distilled essence of postmodern ditzy blondeness who, if the stars are aligned and if there's any justice in a cruel and arbitrary universe, may soon become a star after nearly a decade of trying....
photo: AP Photo / Jan Bauer
|  | Morrow: Former 'Will & Grace' actress achieves 'Starter' status
Knox News
BEVERLY HILLS - Old comedic habits die hard for "Starter Wife" star Debra Messing. "I am a performer, and I do have my own ideas about what is funny," says Messing, best known as the whacky Grace Alder on NBC's "Will & Grace" for eight seasons. "So, perhaps, I might handle some comic moments in a way that seem compatible to Grace." Make no mistake, though. Messing intends to go into the weekly series version of "The Starter Wife" (9 p.m. Friday,...
photo: APphoto
| Health News  | Obesity linked to prostate cancer deaths
Globe and Mail
Men battling prostate cancer are more than twice as likely to die from the disease if they are obese, according to a new study that suggests soaring insulin levels related to excess weight are to blame. "If we were detectives, we'd say we have a very serious suspect," said Michael Pollak, an oncology expert at McGill University who co-authored the study with Harvard University researchers. The study found that obese men with prostate cancer are...
photo: WN / Sweet Radoc
|  | That critter might be cute, but also a danger to kids
Star Tribune
DRUG SAMPLES MAY PUT KIDS AT RISK A study suggests that free drug samples, a marketing tool for the drug industry, do little to help the poor and may put children's health at risk. The study analyzed a survey conducted in 2004 by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that asked people how they got health care. As part of the survey, respondents were asked whether they received free drug samples. It found that children in the lowest...
photo: WN
|  | Many reject birth control bill--Church
Inquirer
ILOILO CITY -- A survey of a Catholic Church-owned radio station shows majority of congressmen are opposed to the proposed reproductive health bill, which would promote artificial contraceptives. Jaro Archbishop Angel Lagdameo, the president of the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP), said a recent phone survey of the Church-owned Radio Veritas on congressmen showed most of them were against the "Reproductive Health and...
photo: Creative commons / Ceridwen
|  | Traders told: Sell China milk, lose your license
Sun Star
DAVAO CITY -- Mayor Rodrigo Duterte repeated his warning to Dabawenyo traders not to sell China milk products until these are cleared by authorities of melamine contamination. And he's not talking about two "smuggled" milk products from China that tested positive of the industrial substance. What's your take on the Mindanao crisis? Discuss views with other readers After the 24-hour ultimatum for traders to pull out China milk products from their...
photo: public domain photo /
|  | Unlocking the secrets of memory
MSNBC
Researchers are closing in on potential therapies for dementiaGetty Images stockA 2006 survey by the MetLife Foundation reveals that U.S. adults fear Alzheimer's and its accompanying memory loss more than heart disease, stroke, or diabetes. Among adults over 55, Alzheimer's tops the list of most dreaded diseases.By Bryan SmithMens Health The words on the pink post-it note, thumbtacked to a wall in his home, can't be any clearer: "This house, in...
photo: WN / fa0
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