The Conservative Political Action Conference ends Saturday with radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh delivering the keynote address and the naming of the winner of a poll for best 2012 GOP presidential candidate. In the absence of a clear GOP leader, a political ad airing Friday put out by supporters of President Obama implies the conservative radio host has himself become the de-facto head of the Republican Party. The ad argues that the Republican leadership in Congress is ...

If it feels like big companies are doing more than their fair share of letting employees go these days, that's not just because mass layoffs at blue chip firms are the ones that make headlines. New research suggests that in times of recession, large employers disproportionately lose workers, while small companies, as a group, fare better. "It's definitely the case that large firms are downsizing much faster in recessions," says Giuseppe Moscarini, an economist at Yale University who conducted ...

A contractor working for U.S.-led coalition forces died Saturday in the southern Afghan province of Uruzgan after a roadside bomb exploded during a combat reconnaissance patrol, U.S. forces in Afghanistan said. To complete a sorry afternoon for Rafael Benitez and his men, Chelsea grabbed a late winner at home to Wigan to leapfrog them on goal difference into second place in the English standings. Leaders Manchester United, who are playing in the League Cup final against Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday, ...

Liverpool's Premier League title hopes suffered another severe setback as they went down 2-0 to relegation strugglers Middlesbrough at the Riverside Stadium on Saturday. To complete a sorry afternoon for Rafael Benitez and his men, Chelsea grabbed a late winner at home to Wigan to leapfrog them on goal difference into second place in the English standings. Leaders Manchester United, who are playing in the League Cup final against Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday, are seven points clear of Chelsea and ...

A team of medical experts successfully separated Egyptian twin boys Hassan and Mahmoud on Saturday -- the 21st procedure of this type to be performed in the kingdom, the nation's leading surgeon said. "The twins, almost an hour ago, have been separated for the first time in their lives," said Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabeeah, who also is the Saudi minister of health. The boys are less than a year old and were brought to the kingdom on February 10. While the ...

India has called for a "pause" in the fighting between Sri Lankan forces and Tamil rebels to allow the evacuation of thousands of civilians trapped in the nation's northern war zone. In a statement issued Saturday, India's external affairs minister, Pranab Mukherjee, warned that the humanitarian crisis was "building up with every passing day" in Sri Lanka. Mukherjee referred to the recent rebel offer of a cease-fire as an "opportunity" for the Sri Lankan government to stave off the crisis. ...

Britain's prime minister Gordon Brown repeated his call Saturday for former bank chiefs to give up massive pension packages and demanded a clean-up of the banking system to eradicate "Indefensible" practices. In a speech to the ruling Labour Party's National Policy Forum in Bristol, south-west England, Britain's Press Association quoted him as saying: "Some of the practices now being discovered in our banks are not only unacceptable, they are indefensible and they have got to be cleaned up now. "Many ...

When Senator John Kerry visited Gaza last week, he made certain to emphasize that he had no contact with Hamas, and demanded that the militants stop firing rockets into Israel. Still, Kerry's visit — one of the first to the coastal strip by an American legislator since Hamas took power there in 2007 — wasn't exactly the kind of publicity that Israeli officials wanted. While being escorted into Gaza by an armed United Nations convoy, Kerry was disturbed ...

The ebbing stretch of Rio Grande that divides the Texas city of El Paso from the Mexican city of Juarez may soon become one of the world's most militarized borders. This week, as Texas Governor Rick Perry went to El Paso to announce that has asked Washington for 1,000 more "boots on the ground" to enforce the border, Mexico's government ordered 5,000 extra soldiers to Juarez. The armies massing on both sides of the border are marching against a ...

February 26, 2009 Marisella Molinar worked as a secretary for a top prosecutor in Juarez, Mexico, Jesus Huerta Yedra. She was employed in the office for more than 10 years and though she lived across the border in El Paso, Texas, with her husband, she drove about 20 minutes over the Juarez-El Paso border every day to the job she loved. The growing violence over rival drug cartels had concerned the couple, but Mexico was a part of their ...