Dubai's financial crisis may have calmed a bit now that the central bank of the United Arab Emirates has promised to stand behind the city state's banks with fresh liquidity. After all, the UAE, to which Dubai belongs, has perhaps $700 billion accumulated from petroleum riches — a resource that Dubai, which is apparently stuck with tens of billions of dollars in debt, does not enjoy. But the question remains, if the central bank in Abu Dhabi decides ...

Much of the world was shocked and titillated by news of alleged fat-stealing murderers in the Peruvian jungle. But the story may have a much more sinister underbelly. Could the allegation of homicidal liposuction possibly be a smokescreen to distract attention from other crimes, including, some local journalists say, the existence of a death squad that may be operating within the country's national police? The existence of marauding fat stealers was made public mid-November by General Felix Murga, head ...

It has taken President Obama three months to reach the decision on Afghanistan that he'll share with the nation Tuesday night, because there are no easy solutions. His chosen path will win applause from some quarters but boos from others. Here's a scorecard outlining the key questions the speech will address, to determine what proposals Obama has embraced and the risks he's willing to accept — and who's likely to be pleased or ticked off as ...

Tareq and Michaele Salahi were hoping for reality TV stardom when they strolled uninvited into a Nov. 24 White House state dinner. Legal experts say the party-crashing duo may have to settle for the reality of a courtroom fight instead — and possibly a prison cell. "There's no question the Secret Service is likely to push very hard for a criminal charge," says George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley. "They are famous for lacking a sense of ...

Italy's influential Northern League Party has stood out over the past decade for its particular knack in finding new ways of offending people based on country of origin and color of skin. In 2003, Umberto Bossi, founder of the party, which once espoused separatism, told an interviewer that police should open fire on the boatloads of undocumented Africans arriving on Italian shores, calling the would-be immigrants "bingo-bongos." Other Northern League pols have proposed everything from separate trains ...

Despite the way it feels, loneliness often has nothing to do with being alone. For some people, feelings of isolation are sharpest during times that are in fact defined by togetherness — celebrations or the holidays, for instance. Walk into a bustling shopping mall or a buzzing holiday party this time of year, and even within a crowd — or perhaps especially in a crowd — it's possible to feel unbearably alone. New research from experts in neuroscience and ...

After weeks of calls by the Japanese government to do something about deflation and the fast appreciating yen, the Bank of Japan held an emergency meeting Tuesday — and decided what the world's second largest economy needs is more money. Central bank governor Masaaki Shirakawa announced steps to step up monetary easing by injecting 10 trillion yen into Japan's financial system. Shirakawa told reporters that these steps could be considered "quantitative easing in a broad sense." The eight-member ...

Tareq and Michaele Salahi were hoping for reality-TV stardom when they strolled uninvited into a Nov. 24 White House state dinner. Legal experts say the party-crashing duo may have to settle for the reality of a courtroom fight instead — and possibly a prison cell. "There's no question the Secret Service is likely to push very hard for a criminal charge," says Jonathan Turley, law professor at George Washington University. "They are famous for lacking a sense of ...

If you haven't been listening to pop radio in the past few months, you've missed the rise of two seemingly opposing trends. In a medium in which mediocre singing has never been a bar to entry, a lot of pop vocals suddenly sound great. Better than great: note- and pitch-perfect, as if there's been an unspoken tightening of standards at record labels or an evolutionary leap in the development of vocal cords. At the other extreme are a few ...

There's baking soda and vinegar, gasoline and a match, acid and eyeballs and Oprah and James Frey. Or wait — should we scratch that last pair off the list? Has the notorious and telegenic feud between the two cooled? According to an article in Vanity Fair, which has been confirmed by Oprah's folks, the talk-show host recently reached out to the best-selling author she annihilated on live TV a few years ago for fibbing in his memoir. ...