On the surface, it seems like a fine idea; reproductive rights groups certainly think so. In July, the Ugandan government announced that, using cash from the U.N. Population Fund, it would distribute 100,000 female condoms in a bid to stop a resurgence of HIV/AIDS. Advocates cheered the initiative, saying it would give women more control over their own bodies. But in the weeks since, major funders of anti-HIV/AIDS programs have shown far less enthusiasm, with many deciding not to ...

In the days following Senator Edward Kennedy's death, his story will be told by friends and admirers, fellow politicians, family members, pundits and critics. But when Kennedy's mammoth memoir, True Compass, is published on Sept. 14, readers will be able to experience his life story as told by the Senator himself. Kennedy was acutely aware of the historical importance of his words and memories. He kept a personal journal for almost 50 years, beginning with his ...

They are some of the biggest names in Hollywood, but even Susan Sarandon, Ethan Hawke and Dustin Hoffman have had their fair share of casting calamities they would rather forget. CNN's The Screening Room has managed to persuade the cream of Hollywood to confess their tales of audition woe. The stars shudder at the memory of waiting in line, frantically trying to memorize lines handed to them moments before, all the while being assessed by critical strangers. Benicio ...

A former Bush administration official said she thinks former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge's recent charges that politics were behind raising the terror level in 2004 were "personally motivated." In a new book, Ridge says top Bush administration officials may have tried to raise the nation's terror alert for political reasons in the days before the 2004 presidential vote. In response, Frances Townsend, a former Homeland Security adviser to President George W. Bush and now a CNN contributor, told ...

It's the world's longest poem — over 1.8 million words, containing over one hundred thousand verses and approximately ten times the length of the Iliad and Odyssey combined. And now India's celebrated epic the Mahabharata, the writing of which began around 300 B. C. by the venerated Hindu figure Vyasa, is being written again — one 140-character tweet at a time. Chindu Sreedharan, 36, lecturer in Journalism and Communication at the Media School ...

The Australian cruiser met the disguised German vessel in the waters off western Australia two years after the two became enemies in World War II. The Australian ship approached, trying to determine whether the vessel was friendly. It wasn't. What resulted was Australia's worst naval disaster: the sinking of the Australian ship and the loss of its entire crew of 645. The wreckage wasn't found until last year, leading to decades of conspiracy theories about what actually happened. On Wednesday ...

Rowaida Abdelaziz doesn't want your pity. She doesn't want your frosty public stares; the whispers behind her back; the lament that she's been degraded by her father. What the Muslim high school senior wants you to understand is that she doesn't wear the hijab, the head scarf worn by Muslim women, because she is submissive. "It represents beauty to me," says Abdelaziz, the 17-year-old daughter of two Egyptian parents living in Old Bridge, New Jersey. "My mom says a girl ...

The man who shot three women dead in a Pennsylvania gym before killing himself this week posted at least two videos on YouTube last year, apparently referring to a desire for a girlfriend in both. George Sodini, 48, gave a tour of his house in one clip, his camera briefly panning across a book called "Date Young Women" in his living room. "The couch and chairs, they match. The woman will really be impressed," he says just before showing the ...

In his first public appearance since the "Beer Summit" at the White House, Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates joked about his controversial arrest last month in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and said he likes police Sgt. James Crowley. "I offered to get his kids into Harvard if he doesn't arrest me anymore," Gates said. Gates was speaking Sunday at the Martha's Vineyard Book Festival where he signed copies of his book, "In Search of our Roots." The professor ...

It may have been a case of hitting the target but missing the opportunity. Reports last week said Saad bin Laden, Osama bin Laden's fourth son and a mid-ranking al-Qaeda operative, was killed by a recent CIA Predator strike. But six years ago, the U.S. had an opportunity to get him alive, but lost it when the Bush administration decided to pull away from cooperation with Iran. Saad's death has not yet been confirmed, but U.S. officials believe he ...