Lines at polling places spilled out into Tokyo streets Sunday as Japanese citizens showed up in droves to vote in a parliamentary election that is expected to yield a historic shift in political power. With fours hours left until polls closed, 41 percent of eligible voters had cast ballots. While the number is slightly lower than the last elections in 2005, absentee ballots were 162 percent higher this time round, officials said. Combined, the overall turnout could reach near-record numbers. ...

How exactly does it feel to hit a serve at 150 m.p.h.? Gerardo Valero, MEXICO CITY It's better hitting it than having someone hit it against you. But I'll take a slow one that wins me the point as opposed to a faster one that doesn't. You definitely had your chances of winning against Roger Federer at this year's Wimbledon final. What do you think are the things that cost you the match Andrea Kim NORTHBROOK, ILL. I ...

The early returns from Afghanistan's presidential election had the smell of a decorous massage job. With 10% of districts reporting, the incumbent, Hamid Karzai, and his main challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, the former Foreign Minister, were tied, with about 40% each. But few of those votes came from Karzai's Pashtun strongholds in the south, where turnout was light — owing to Taliban threats — but heavily managed. "It's not exactly one man, one vote out in the rural areas," a ...

The recession's latest victim in Japan may not be corporate earnings but the political careers of the ruling party in the country's parliament. This Sunday in Japan, voters go to the ballot box in what poll after poll shows will be a historic shift in political power, booting out the ruling party. The Liberal Democratic Party, or the LDP, has been in nearly continuous control of Japan's parliament for more than five decades. But the country's worst recession ...

Lloyd Blankfein, the 54-year-old chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs, is powerfully perplexed. In the past six months, his investment-banking and securities-trading firm has roared ahead in profitability by taking risks — that other firms would not — for itself and its clients in an edgy market. It has paid back the billions of dollars, and then some, of taxpayer money the government forced it to take last October; raised billions of dollars in capital from private investors, including ...

The last thing the CIA needs right now is another scandal, let alone two. Allegations that the CIA chief in Algiers drugged and raped two women is going to hurt badly. The accusations that Harold Nicholson, a former CIA operative in federal prison convicted of spying for the KGB, continued his work from behind bars isn't nearly as serious, but it won't exactly help the agency's reputation. Nicholson, who allegedly enlisted his Nathaniel son to collect his ...

Author Kurt Andersen's new book, Reset: How This Crisis Can Restore Our Values and Renew America, examines the economic, political cultural opportunities to be found in the wake of the financial crises. In this excerpt, the first of five on TIME.com, he glances back through history to see how national destinies can change. It was fitting that as I was writing my previous book, an historical novel called Heyday published in 2007, I turned 50. Once your life has ...

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has defended the UK's involvement in the war in Afghanistan following the British Army's bloodiest day of the near eight-year conflict. Addressing lawmakers on Monday, Brown said the security of Afghanistan was crucial to preventing terrorist attacks elsewhere in the world. "In 2009 the case for our continued involvement is the same: to prevent terrorist attacks in Britain and across the world by dealing with the terrorist threat at its source -- that crucible of ...

If North Korea is really behind the cyberattacks on U.S. and South Korean websites over the past few days, as South Korea has claimed, why hasn't it taken responsibility? The Kim Jong Il regime has never been shy of owning up to its mischief: if anything, it tends to exaggerate its ability to do farflung damage. And yet, there's been no chest-thumping from Pyongyang about the "glorious destruction of the powerful computer systems of the evil enemies of our ...

Angelina Jolie has been a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations High Commission on Refugees since 2001. The actress-humanitarian paid tribute at a ceremony Thursday to the 10.5 million refugees now recognized by the Commission. The ceremony was part of several events leading up to World Refugee Day on Saturday. The UNHCR announced Thursday that she and her partner, Brad Pitt, have donated $1 million to help Pakistanis displaced by fighting between troops and Taliban militants. She talked with ...