EXCLUSIVE: Fox News confirms seven House Dems who supported reform last year will oppose Senate bill because it lifts ban on federal funding for abortions
• Dems Who Could Pull the Plug on Health Reform
• Tea Partiers Health Scramble | YOU DECIDE

Independent scientific panel to review U.N. climate change panel's 'procedures and practices' — and management — in apparent slap at its embattled chief | FULL COVERAGE
• Forecasters Predict Active 2010 Hurricane Season

LIVESHOTS: Shannon Bream on how debates of religious bias play a big role in how textbook fight plays out
• Textbook Tug-Of-War: Taking It to the Street
• Full Coverage of Texas Textbook Battle

A cell phone application that will help illegal immigrants find water and key landmarks as they cross into the United States is an inappropriate use of taxpayer funds and an irresponsible use of technology, critics say.

Dr. Frank Minyard said Wednesday that the autopsy of 54-year-old Douglas Schantz found a lesion on his forehead as well as evidence of drowning.

A 33-year-old Burbank middle school teacher accused of having sex with a teenage male student over a six-month period last year was charged on Tuesday with unlawful sex with a minor, MyFoxLA.com reported.

The self-described "Jihad Jane" who thought her blond hair and blue eyes would let her blend in as she sought to kill an artist in Sweden is a rare case of an American woman aiding in foreign terrorism and shows the evolution of the global threat.

A British father who repeatedly raped his two daughters and fathered nine babies with them during a 35-year orgy of physical and sexual abuse was never detected due to a litany of failures by health care professionals, a report reveals.

Sex abuse scandals in the Roman Catholic Church are proof that that "the Devil is at work inside the Vatican", according to the Holy See's chief exorcist.

A terrified 7-year-old boy begged emergency dispatchers to send police to his Southern California home where three armed robbers threatened his parents, according to a recording of the call released Tuesday.

POP TARTS EXCLUSIVE: Pal says Haim may have traded illegal drugs for legal ones | CHILD STAR TRAGEDIES

SLIDESHOW: Some lawmakers are pushing for a national biometric ID card. Check out YOUR creative designs and ideas

SLIDESHOW: Corey Haim fought addictions to several different drugs for most of his life. These stars have also battled addictions, with varied success

SCENE & HERD: 'L.A. Ink' star shows the tats that made her famous, Britney takes mom shopping, Kate Moss hits Paris, and more stars out and about...

Former teen heartthrob and star of 'Lost Boys' had a history of drug abuse, may have overdosed | COREY HAIM: 1971-2010 | CELEBS MOURN VIA TWITTER

THEN/NOW: Anthony Edwards went on to win a Golden Globe for his role in 'ER,' but what about the rest of America's favorite nerds and their frat boy nemeses?

SLIDESHOW: The star is suing E-Trade for $100 mil over their baby commercial? A look back at her extreme highs and lows | LOHAN NO 'MILKAHOLIC'

FOX411: The Tiger Woods mistress beauty pageant has a "winner"! Pancake waitress? VIP club hostess? Find out! | WOMEN LINKED TO WOODS

SLIDESHOW: Science labs churn out startling images -- synapses firing, molecules, DNA works of art. We round up the latest science news, as told in pictures

By land or by sea, New England's only National Park is 30,000 acres of fun

President Obama is turning up the heat on private health insurers again, taking his increasingly populist health care overhaul pitch on the road to Missouri.

Former 1980s teen movie actor and heartthrob Corey Haim died early Wednesday, authorities said.

Colleen LaRose, the Pennsylvania woman indicted for allegedly conspiring to support terrorists and kill a person in a foreign country, attempted to commit suicide in 2005, according to a police report filed at the time.

As much as 16 percent of the U.S. population between the ages of 14 and 49 has genital herpes, according to a government study released Tuesday.

Flying in and out of New York -- which is usually no picnic -- is likely to get worse this spring and summer. A new nationwide rule on tarmac delays, possible exemptions to that rule and a runway closure may create a perfect storm for air travelers when bad weather is added to the mix.

American Rachel Corrie was crushed by an Israeli bulldozer in 2003 as it razed homes in a Palestinian camp. On Wednesday, her parents seek answers in an Israeli court.

Simmering tension between the White House and U.S. Supreme Court spilled into public this week when Chief Justice John Roberts labeled the political atmosphere at this year's State of the Union address "very troubling."

New York state's top police official announced Wednesday he was quitting, the second acting superintendent to step down in as many weeks.

Wayne Rooney (right) scores twice as Manchester United crush AC Milan 4-0 to reach the quarterfinals of the Champions League and ruin David Beckham's return to Old Trafford.

With tears in her eyes and her voice shaking at times, Marie Osmond donned her bravest face Tuesday night as she took to the stage for the first time since the death of her son for a show that she dedicated to him.

ST. CHARLES, Mo. (AP) -- President Barack Obama denounced waste, inefficiency and downright fraud in the government's health care system on Wednesday as he sought to rally public support for his revamped overhaul plan. "Improper payments cost taxpayers almost $100 billion last year alone," Obama said at a rally in this St. Louis suburb....

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) -- An open diplomatic row during the visit of Vice President Joe Biden has shined a spotlight on the U.S. failure to rein in Israeli settlement ambitions and deepened Palestinian suspicions that the United States is too weak to broker a deal....

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Corey Haim, a 1980s teen heartthrob whose career was blighted by drug abuse, has died. He was 38. Haim died early Wednesday at Providence St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, Los Angeles County coroner's Lt. Cheryl MacWillie said....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- They flew planes during World War II but weren't considered "real" military pilots. No flags were draped over their coffins when they died on duty. And when their service ended, they had to pay their own bus fare home....

VATICAN CITY (AP) -- Church abuse scandals in Germany have reached the older brother of Pope Benedict XVI and are creeping ever closer to the pontiff himself....

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- Colleen LaRose spent long days caring for her boyfriend's father in a second-floor apartment in Pennsburg, a small town north of Philadelphia. But online, federal authorities say, the devoted caretaker developed a daring alter ego, refashioning herself as "Jihad Jane" while helping recruit and finance Muslim terrorists - and eventually moving overseas to try to kill an artist she perceived as an enemy to Islam....

DETROIT (AP) -- A former Detroit city councilwoman was sentenced to more than three years in prison Wednesday for bribery after a federal judge refused to set aside her guilty plea during a stormy court hearing dominated by a dispute over evidence of other payoffs....

NEW YORK (AP) -- A troublingly high number of U.S. patients who are given angiograms to check for heart disease turn out not to have a significant problem, according to the latest study to suggest Americans get an excess of medical tests....

AMES, Iowa (AP) -- Second-degree burglary charges have been filed against an Ames man who broke into a church where he allegedly used the institution's electronic equipment to watch pornography. Police allege the 55-year-old man broke into the First Christian Church on Thursday. After gathering items from around the building, he is believed to have gone to the basement to spend the night....

FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) -- Nomar Garciaparra rejoined the Red Sox for one day and then retired, ending a 14-year career in which he won two batting titles with Boston and was once a beloved player in the city....

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius ratcheted up the pressure on health insurance companies on Wednesday, urging them to forgo short-term profits to make coverage more affordable and to stop fighting the Obama administration's reform effort.

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Vice President Joe Biden publicly scolded Israel on Wednesday over a Jewish settlement plan, saying it was undermining peace efforts after Palestinians agreed to U.S.-mediated talks.

NEW YORK (Reuters) - With Governor David Paterson enveloped in scandal, New York's lieutenant governor is leading the notoriously difficult budget process and freeing up his boss to fight for his political life, experts say.

DETROIT (Reuters) - Federal regulators said they were looking into a report of another runaway Toyota Prius, this one in Westchester County, New York, where police said a woman pulling out of a driveway zoomed across a busy street and into a stone wall.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The leader of the House of Representatives -- a persuasive arm twister and deal maker -- faces her toughest challenge yet: getting 216 votes to pass final legislation revamping the U.S. healthcare system.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Initial results from Iraq's national election are likely to be released by Thursday, Iraqi and U.N. officials said on Wednesday, as further signs emerged of a strong showing for Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

LONDON (Reuters) - Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Wednesday he believed Britain would maintain its coveted top credit rating and announced a pay freeze for senior civil servants and military officers to help tame a record deficit.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Three American detained in Iran last year and accused of spying have been allowed to telephone their families, although formal consular access has not been granted, the U.S. State Department said on Wednesday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A Pennsylvania woman has been charged with plotting to kill a Swedish man and trying to recruit fighters via the Internet to commit violent attacks overseas, the U.S. Justice Department said on Tuesday.

JOS, Nigeria (Reuters) - Sporadic shooting rang out overnight in the central Nigerian city of Jos and witnesses said at least one person was killed by soldiers enforcing a curfew days after attacks on three nearby Christian villages.

Lice in children has been treated for years with lotions, creams and shampoos. But the little critters are becoming more and more resistant. Now an oral drug already used to treat certain parasites in people appears to kill lice as well. Researchers say it could be an alternative when standard treatments fail.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told health insurers they risked losing consumers if they didn't work with the White House on a health care overhaul. But Karen Ignagni, the head of the insurance trade organization, said her group was eager to support an overhaul, just not this one.

President Obama's criticism of a recent high court decision on campaign spending, delivered during his State of the Union address, has drawn a rebuke from the chief justice. Speaking to a group of law students, Roberts said officials are entitled to criticize the court's decisions, but he questioned the setting Obama chose, and the "decorum" of the House and Senate.

The relationship between the House and the Senate is becoming heated, affecting Democratic efforts to get health care and other legislation passed. Norman Ornstein, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, offers his insight.

Of the 16 countries that use the euro, some have stable economies, while others are in bad shape. But in recent weeks, there has been speculation that Greece might default on its debt, putting other European countries at risk. Just over a decade after the euro was introduced, the unified currency is having something of an existential crisis.

Schools took another big step toward an elusive goal: establishing basic education standards that could apply to nearly every student in the US. The draft proposal released Wednesday tries to unify what students need to know about English and math at each grade level. But supporters of the effort still face skepticism.

Bank of America says it will do away with overdraft charges on debit card purchases. When customers try to buy something but don't have enough in their account, the transaction will be be rejected. The move is in reaction to a new regulation that will require banks to get customers to "opt in" to automatic overdraft protection.

Some urban school systems are turning to the tough tactics businesses and law enforcement use to improve employee performance. The sometimes-contentious approach, known as performance management, has yielded promising results in Houston, New York and some other districts. In Chicago, it's forcing city educators to embrace a cultural revolution in how they go about their work.

The NASDAQ composite index hit an all-time a decade ago today — but now the index is still less than half what it was. The stock exchange, home to many of the tech stocks that benefited from the dot-com boom, is still feeling the effects of the bust that left scars on the economy.

Actor Corey Haim died in California at the age of 38. The Canadian-born actor rose to fame in the 1980s with the movies Lucas and the Lost Boys. He often starred alongside his friend Corey Feldman and the two became teen idols known as "the Two Coreys." Later, Haim struggled with drugs and never had an acting comeback.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad paid a visit to Kabul Wednesday and denounced the U.S. for "playing a double game" in Afghanistan. He was responding to remarks by Defense Secretary Robert Gates who left the city earlier in the day.

Vice President Joe Biden met with Palestinian leaders in Ramallah as the U.S. prepares to mediate talks between the Palestinians and Israel. Biden and the Palestinians condemned a newly announced Israeli plan to build more housing in East Jerusalem.

The U.S.-led offensive in Marjah, Afghanistan, is taking place in a major opium-production center. Seth Jones, a political scientist with the Rand Corp. who was recently in Afghanistan, discusses what's going on with poppy producers and traffickers.

A Pennsylvania woman who called herself Jihad Jane faces federal terrorism charges. Colleen LaRose did not fit the profile of an international terrorist. Authorities are alarmed because she apparently seemed to understand that her ability to blend in made her a valuable to terrorist groups.

Ohio Democratic Rep. Dennis Kucinich brought up a resolution Wednesday to pull U.S. troops out of Afghanistan by the end of this year at the latest. Although the measure did not pass, lawmakers agreed on one thing: The debate itself was important for the Congress to have.

The British oil giant is the leading candidate to buy a big swath of oil assets from U.S. independent oil and gas producer Devon Energy in a $5 billion-plus deal.

Eric Schmidt said his company expects to soon conclude talks with the Chinese government over the fate of its search engine and business in China.

Psychiatric Solutions, a for-profit operator of mental-health hospitals and clinics, is in talks to be acquired by Bain Capital.

Tropicana is shrinking the size of its Pure Premium orange juice jug and raising by 5%-8% the price of its gallon containers, due to the freeze that hurt Florida's orange crop.

The Anglo-Dutch oil major said it is no longer selling gasoline to Iran, the latest company to make such a move during threats of tougher sanctions against the Islamic republic.

The U.S. Senate voted 62-36 Wednesday to approve a roughly $150 billion bill that extends a series of tax credits targeted at businesses and individuals.

The U.S. government ran its largest ever monthly budget deficit in February as the country's fiscal year-to-date deficit ballooned more than 10% to a record of $651.60 billion.

Beleaguered music company EMI said the chief executive of its recorded-music division, Elio Leoni-Sceti, is leaving the firm after less than two years.

The Illinois Liquor Control Commission blocked a bid by Anheuser-Busch Inbev's U.S. division to buy a controlling stake in its largest Chicago-area beer distributor. The brewer said it is preparing a lawsuit to challenge the ruling.

Former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan will be the star witness at a hearing of the congressional panel looking into causes of the financial crisis.

Citigroup plans to roughly double the size of its private banker force in North America over the next several years.

Domestic ticket sales to 2-D theaters last year edged up just 0.8%, to $9.47 billion, according to a numbers-heavy report released Wednesday by the MPAA. Meanwhile, 3-D admissions for the year were up nearly fivefold, to $1.14 billion, compared with just $240 million in 2008.

China Mobile said it agreed to buy a 20% stake in Shanghai Pudong Development Bank for $5.83 billion as the mobile operator seeks to expand into mobile payment services.

Crop biotechnology giant Monsanto goes under microscope Friday at a Justice Department-sponsored hearing on concentration in U.S. agriculture.

Crude settled at an eight-week high after the Energy Information Administration reported larger-than-expected drops in fuel inventories, along with a slight increase in demand for oil products.

U.S. wholesalers' inventories unexpectedly fell 0.2% in January, as surging demand pulled goods off shelves in the first month of the year.

China's exports expanded strongly for the third straight month in February, though they slipped slightly from January, showing a tentative recovery.

A group of Chinese consumers claim that Hewlett-Packard discriminated against them in its handling of faulty graphics components in some PCs.

Industrial data show that the economic recovery in the euro zone remains feeble and prone to setbacks, despite an industrial pickup in France and Italy.

Teen and young adult clothing retailer American Eagle Outfitters reported earnings surged 81% on higher sales and margin gains due to less discounting.

BA said talks with a cabin crew union aimed at averting a strike have broken down with no agreement.

Turkey won't conduct further talks with the IMF on a potential new standby loan until at least May, ending more than a year of on-and-off talks on a loan facility favored by economists but resisted by the government.

Barclays plans to start trading operations in Switzerland and is hiring Swiss franc currency traders, people familiar with the situation said Wednesday.

Connecticut's attorney general sued Moody's and S&P, alleging they knowingly assigned "tainted ratings" for "risky investments" backed by subprime loans.

The first U.S. IPO to price within its expected range in two months closed down four cents in its debut on the NYSE.

Google struck a deal with the Italian government to digitize up to one million books held in the National Libraries in Rome and Florence.

Shares in U.K. interdealer broker Tullett Prebon jumped after the company said it is in early talks that could lead to a takeover bid.

Madonna entered a joint venture with Iconix Brand Group to use the entertainer's name and personality in connection with apparel, footwear and other products.

One day after the Browns released Derek Anderson, there is mounting evidence around the league that Brady Quinn could be next.

Longtime Boston Red Sox shortstop Nomar Garciaparra announced his retirement Wednesday.

Pittsburgh Penguins winger Matt Cooke has escaped suspension for a hit that knocked out center Marc Savard of the Boston Bruins.

Wide receiver Antonio Bryant has agreed to four-year deal with Cincinnati Bengals, his agent, Patrick Brougham, told ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter on Wednesday.

Angels outfielder Torii Hunter said that black Latin players are impostors when it comes to the number of African-American players.

Former sprinter Marion Jones has signed on to play with the WNBA's Tulsa Shock, hoping to launch a new career after losing five Olympic medals for using performance-enhancing drugs.

NHL general managers have developed the framework for a new rule that punishes hits to the head.

Chicago Cubs respond to Milton Bradley's remarks.

LeBron James will return to the Cavaliers lineup on Friday, while Antawn Jamison is a game-time decision.

Dodgers hitting coach Don Mattingly confirmed that there have been talks about him succeeding Joe Torre.

Chris Chelios has been called up by the Atlanta Thrashers, general manager Don Waddell told ESPN.com Wednesday.

The Pistons say three doctors have cleared Rodney Stuckey for exercise after a heart evaluation.

The Washington Redskins market search for a veteran running back has brought them to Larry Johnson, a league source told ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter.

Kobe Bryant hit a 17-foot fallaway jumper with 1.9 seconds left, and the Lakers rallied in the fourth quarter to snap their three-game losing streak.

Terrell Owens is headed to Cincinnati to see if the Bengals are interested in adding him to their stalled-out passing game.

The actress gives a man a $100 gift certificate after he saved her from a parking ticket

The couple tell PEOPLE what they have decided to call their newborn daughter

Mark Heaslip says Haim had been working with a doctor and "was doing so well"

The Real Housewives of Atlanta star asks for privacy after her son, Bryson, was arrested for marijuana possession

The Playboy publisher says seeing his former girlfriend with her son is "the stuff that dreams are made of"

Supermodel Crawford is super grateful that would-be extortionist Edis Kayalar is in jail

The pop star is launching her own style empire, MG Icon

"My eyes weren't even open all the way when the tears started streaming down my face," says Feldman

From Lucas to Lost Boys, take a look back at the life and times of the once-promising child star

The Diff'rent Strokes star is saddened by Haim's death - and thinks he died too young

The Israeli-Palestinian peace process resumes, after a fashion

IT WAS a wretched beginning to what had been hailed as the hopeful resumption of peace talks, albeit indirect ones, between the Israelis and Palestinians under the aegis of an American mediator. Barely had America’s vice-president, Joe Biden, begun a visit to Israel to herald a new era of compromise and goodwill than it was announced, as if deliberately to poison the mood, that 1,600 new houses would be built for Jewish settlers in a big Jewish suburb in the Israeli-annexed eastern part of Jerusalem that Palestinians see as their fledgling state’s future capital. Palestinian politicians were united in fury. Arabs and other peacemaking outsiders viewed the action as the illest of omens. Mr Biden sharply “condemned” the action as “precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need right now.”

A sheepish-looking Binyamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, let his aides claim implausibly that he had been unaware of the building decision. The next day his minister of interior dismissed it as a “routine, technical” step, while conceding that the timing was unfortunate, and apologised. Unsurprisingly, the incident increased scepticism towards the promised new round of talks. ...

Art dealers are slow to catch on to the value of branding

VIPs criss-crossed Manhattan last week to attend museum shows, conference panels, champagne brunches, curator tours and the stands of nearly 500 galleries exhibiting in 11 fairs. The week was vibrant but confusing due to poor co-operation between event organisers and some amateur branding.

The first problem was an illogical association of name and place. Every March the Armory Show sets up shop in New York. This year, the Art Dealers' Association of America (ADAA) decided to hold its smaller but more prestigious fair in the same week. While the ADAA's exhibition took place in the historic Armory building on Park Avenue, the Armory Show was held in two piers on the Hudson River. “It must drive them as crazy as it drives us,” admitted Giovanni Garcia-Fenech, the Armory Show's communications director. ...

Living costs in big cities

PARIS is the most expensive city to live in according to the latest survey from Economist Intelligence Unit, a sister company to The Economist. The survey assesses the cost of living by comparing housing, food, clothing, transport and utility bills and the like in 132 cities around the world. Tokyo comes second, up from sixth place a year ago. The fall in Russia's currency against the dollar has made Moscow cheaper than it once was.

...

AIG reluctantly hands its crown as America’s global life insurer to MetLife

ANOTHER week, another opportunity for AIG’s rivals to expand at the American insurer’s expense. Days after sealing a $35.5 billion deal for its Asian life-insurance operations with Britain’s Prudential, the firm, which is being dismembered to recoup bail-out costs, agreed on March 8th to sell another crown jewel, Alico. The acquisition propels New York-based MetLife, which is paying $15.5 billion, into the industry’s global elite. Though it is the biggest life insurer in America, where its Snoopy logo is ubiquitous, it has been tentative abroad. Alico will give it a presence in 64 countries, up from 17 now, taking its non-American revenue from 15% of the total to 40%.

The biggest leap will be in Japan, the world’s second-largest life market, in which Alico is a top-tier competitor. But MetLife’s boss, Robert Henrikson (who took over in 2006 from Robert Benmosche, now AIG’s chief executive), also has his eye on the faster-growing markets in Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Latin America that make up almost a quarter of Alico’s business. Another attraction is its distribution network: 60,000 agents, brokers and other local middlemen. ...

Did protectionism force EADS to scrap a $35 billion bid to supply the American air force?

THE announcement on Monday March 8th that Northrop Grumman and its European partner EADS were pulling out of a bid for a $35 billion contract to build air-refuelling tankers for the United States Air Force was no surprise. Northrop had said that it would not contest the terms of the latest contract proposal, even though it thought they had been drawn up to favour the rival Boeing bid. The British and German governments, along with the European Commission, expressed concern at what they see as the Pentagon rejecting open competition in order to bolster Boeing. Lord Mandelson, the British business secretary, said it was “very disappointing” that the Ameircan-European bidders felt the procurement process was so biased against them that it was not even worth making a bid.

The outcome is a blow to EADS, which on Tuesday announced a loss for 2009 caused by the need to post a €1.8 billion ($2.5 billion) charge because of cost over-runs on another military project, the A400M military troop carrier, and further charges caused by delays to its A380 super-jumbo passenger aircraft. ...

Industry’s move from the rich to the poor world is confusing the carbon accounts

ON MARCH 4th The Economist ran a story about the challenges facing scientists who are trying to find out which greenhouse gases come from where. On March 8th a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by Steve Davis and Ken Caldeira of the Carnegie Institution’s campus at Stanford University brought to the fore a further problem in trying to figure out who emits what—one that turns not on how carbon flows through the atmosphere and biosphere, but on how it flows through the world economy. Who should be held responsible for the greenhouse-gas emissions involved in making, say, a flat-screen television? The country where the television is made? Or the country where it ends up being used?

Looking at the carbon emissions associated with a country’s consumption, rather than its production, does not change the general outline of what is going on in the world: rich people still emit more carbon dioxide than poor people do. But it does heighten the contrast. Rich countries which import manufactured goods from poorer ones end up with even higher emissions; poor countries that export a lot of manufactured goods with lower ones. Using figures from 2004, the most up to date that have the sort of industry-specific data they need, Dr Davis and Dr Caldeira reveal the striking scale of this effect. They find that roughly a quarter of the world’s emissions end up being consumed somewhere other than where they are produced. For a few small and reasonably post-industrial countries, such as Switzerland, the emissions associated with total consumption (emissions produced in Switzerland minus those associated with goods produced there and subsequently exported plus those associated with goods imported) are more than twice the emissions actually produced on Swiss territory. ...

Some innovations help women more than others

TWO recent innovations have garnered a lot of attention for the way they empower women. One is microcredit, a system of lending to very poor people, the majority of whom are female microentrepreneurs who are thus helped to climb out of poverty. The other is the mobile phone, which among other things has led to the emergence of an army of “telephone ladies” in countries such as Bangladesh, who earn a decent living by buying a phone and renting it out to other villagers.

That said, some innovations have been harmful to women, especially in the developing world. As the cover story of the latest issue of The Economist points out, at least 100m female lives have been lost in recent decades due to “gendercide” in countries such as China, where the number of live male births recorded enormously exceeds the number of live female births. One factor in this has been new technology that allows parents to determine their embryo’s sex early in a pregnancy—and thus to abort females in countries where male offspring are valued more highly. Other innovations also bring more benefits to men than women. For example, women are estimated to be only 25% of internet users in Africa, 22% in Asia, 38% in Latin America and just 6% in the Middle East. ...

Brazil fires another salvo in its dispute with America over cotton subsidies

HOW serious is the decision by Brazil’s government, announced on Tuesday March 8th, to raise duties on a number of American-made imports? The increases are sizeable for goods such as cosmetics (tariffs will double, to 36%) and many household wares (tariffs will also double, to 40%). And the timing is significant: the news came as America's commerce secretary, Gary Locke, was due to arrive in Brasilia to promote an export-promotion initiative in America's 10th-largest export market.

Yet the decision is not entirely surprising, as it relates to a long-running trade dispute. Asked about the dispute at a press conference last week Hillary Clinton, the secretary of state, said “I feel like I have walked into a movie that has been going on for years”. Brazil complained to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) nearly eight years ago about America's counter-cyclical subsidies to its cotton growers, which are designed to cushion them against fluctuations in the cotton price, and a programme guaranteeing loans for international buyers of American cotton. ...

Where America's gay couples enjoy legal equality

GAY couples in Washington, DC, have been enthusiastically lining up for marriage licences since March 3rd, when a state court overturned an attempt to ban same-sex weddings. The first ceremonies are set to take place on Tuesday March 9th. The District of Columbia joins five states where gay men and women have equal marriage rights. There may be many more nuptials to come: Washington, DC, is home to a higher concentration of same-sex couples than anywhere else in America. Newlyweds will also have their relationship recognised in neighbouring Maryland, after an advisory ruling last month. But prospective couples may want to set a date quickly. California struck down its gay-marriage law in a ballot in 2008, just six months after it was passed.

...

Sectarian violence kills hundreds in Nigeria

THE number plates in Nigeria’s Plateau State declare it to be the “Home of Peace and Tourism”. This has seemed ever more optimistic in recent years, as the state capital, Jos, has been battered by brutal violence, with fresh attacks over the weekend reportedly leaving hundreds dead.

In the early hours of the morning of Sunday March 7th gangs attacked villages near Jos, according to the Red Cross. Houses were razed and many women and children killed. Locals say the gang members belonged to the mainly Muslim Fulani tribe while the villages were populated by the mostly Christian Berom group. The death toll is hard to verify, with estimates ranging from 200 to 500. ...

American dominance of the Oscars is declining

AMERICANS did well at the Academy Awards on Sunday March 7th. Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman to win the Oscar for best director and Sandra Bullock got a statuette as best actress (she had received the less-coveted “Razzie” award as worst actress the night before). But American dominance, though still evident, appears to be waning. In the past decade six of the ten best-director Oscars went to Americans and five of the best-actress Oscars, a decline from the 1970s-90s when Americans won almost everything. This recent bout of globalisation resembles the awards' earliest years. Between 1930 and 1969, only half of the 40 winning directors, and only 55% of the actresses, were American-born.

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Counting begins after Iraq's modestly hopeful general election

DESPITE a wave of violent attacks, millions of voters took part on Sunday March 7th in the second full parliamentary election in Iraq since the 2003 invasion. In a country slowly emerging from years of bloody fighting, voters faced a choice between a Shia-dominated government and a non-sectarian one. Neither option offers an obvious path to full peace and prosperity.

Much of the effect of the election depends on the horse-trading and coalition building that is to follow. But the election result will give an indication of who is to lead the oil-rich nation. The prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, should do well in the main Shia population centres of Baghdad and Basra. His rivals from the Iraqi National Alliance, comprising a number of Shia religious parties, expect to win most of their votes along the lower stretches of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, the Shia heartland. Non-sectarian alliances are expected to do well in Baghdad and Anbar province, once one of the most restive parts of the country. ...

Renewed diplomatic efforts over Iran's nuclear activities

• AFTER Iran announced that its long-delayed Bushehr civilian nuclear plant will be operational within a few months, American diplomats will renew efforts to obtain further sanctions against the Islamic republic over its suspected efforts to build a nuclear bomb. Hillary Clinton, the American secretary of state, has been trying to persuade members of the UN Security Council, including Russia, which has been helping to build the Bushehr plant since 1995, to accept to a new round of sanctions against Iran. The country's government refused to agree to a compromise plan for its uranium to be enriched in Russia.

• AMERICA’S vice-president, Joe Biden, tries again to untangle the knot that is Middle Eastern politics. He travels to the region on Monday March 8th and will meet the leaders of Israel, the Palestinian territories, Egypt and Jordan in an attempt to encourage the resumption of peace talks. George Mitchell, Barack Obama’s envoy, is adding his weight to efforts reopen negotiations. A recent row over historical holy sites has not helped to warm relations, as Israeli archaeologists in East Jerusalem, which the Palestinians see as their future capital, are intent on uncovering evidence of Jewish ties that could be used to undermine the Arab presence there. ...

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• How China bucked the trend

Tumbling corporate-tax rates

CORPORATE-TAX rates in OECD countries have fallen remorselessly over the past 30 years. A survey by Robert Carroll of American University in Washington, DC, found that the top rate in OECD countries (excluding America) had dropped from 51% in the early 1980s to 32% by 2009. Competition among countries to attract business and with it bring employment was fierce in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Ireland reduced its corporate-tax rate to just 12.5% and chose not to raise it last year during an emergency budget. Such differentials may not last long. High-tax European governments have complained in the past about competition from countries such as Ireland and the current economic crisis may lead to more calls for co-ordination of tax policies.

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Congress reconsiders America’s official position on the Armenian genocide

TWO questions faced an American congressional panel on Thursday March 5th as it considered the mass killings of Armenians during and after the first world war by forces of the Ottoman Empire. First, was it genocide? The historical debate is as hot, and unsettled, as ever. Armenians continue to insist that it was the first genocide of the twentieth century, while Turks call the killings merely part of the chaos of the break-up of empire.

But the second question on the minds of congressmen in the Foreign Affairs Committee of the House of Representatives was more urgent. What is more important, fidelity to history or concern for the present? The vote took place as warming relations between Turkey and Armenia have cooled again and those between Turkey and America are under increasing strain over Iran, Israel and other affairs in the region. Turkish diplomats and politicians gave warning before the vote that the consequences would be felt across the range of issues of shared concern to the two countries. In the end the panel narrowly decided against pragmatism and chose to set straight the historical records. A resolution recognising the killings as genocide was sent to the House by a vote of 23 to 22. ...

Few companies are ready to accept cloud computing

THE hype surrounding “cloud computing” has become deafening of late. Your correspondent suspects the evangelists, promoters and others hoping to cash in on the computing-services-in-the-sky movement are getting nervous about the way corporate customers, big and small, have not exactly rushed to embrace the new data-processing paradigm.

Perhaps that is because they have heard it all before. A couple of years ago, the fashionable term for it was “software as a service”. Before that, it was part and parcel of “grid computing”. Sure, each of the previous approaches brought a somewhat different set of technologies to bear, but the objective was broadly the same: to make it possible to buy data processing and storage from a service provider like electricity. Being flexible, extensible and virtual, customers would use as much or as little of the utility as they needed—and pay only for what they consumed. Despite the promise of cheaper processing, though, the vast majority of information-technology departments have continued to buy and maintain their own servers, data-storage units and network gear—preferring to keep their data on the premises rather than have it processed elsewhere. ...

China's prime minister, Wen Jiabao, offers some gestures of conciliation

AT THE opening of the annual session of China’s parliament, the National People’s Congress (NPC), the prime minister, Wen Jiabao, could not resist a bit of boasting. China’s economy, he said, in a two-hour speech, had been the first in the world to make a turnaround. With an implied sneer at the West’s continuing malaise, he spoke of socialism’s “advantages”: quick decision-making, effective organisation and an ability to “concentrate resources to accomplish large undertakings”.

Yet despite China’s swagger at having achieved 8.7% GDP growth last year (under the “firm leadership” of the Communists, Mr Wen reminded the nearly 3,000 party-picked delegates in the Great Hall of the People), its government has used the launch of the ten-day NPC session to make an unusual gesture of conciliation. The budget submitted to the legislature calls for the lowest rate of growth in defence spending since 1988, a period in which almost every budget has called for double-digit increases. This year it proposes a mere 7.5%, quite a plunge from last year’s growth of 17.8%. ...

Eastern Europeans should strive to present a more modern face to visitors

IMAGINE that you are attending a conference (call it Agenda 2010) in the capital city (call it Klow) of a generic ex-communist country (call it Ruritania). The discussion will be mostly about the present and the future. After a night-owl session on “the impact of the economic crisis on regional security”, you will stagger to a red-eye breakfast on “Engaging Russia: how, when and where?” But the cultural programme in the afternoon is resolutely backward-looking. An excursion to admire the beautiful historic buildings includes a chance to goggle at the horrible Stalinist ones. A mandatory stop is something on the lines of “The Museum of Ruritanian Struggles and Suffering”, which shows the country’s heroic and horrible past from the dawn of recorded history to NATO membership, via occupation, obliteration and a lot of historical myths.

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Barack Obama unveils his final strategy for pushing health reform in America

“EVERYTHING there is to say about health care has been said and just about everyone has said it…now is the time to make a decision.” So declared President Barack Obama on March 3rd to an audience of doctors and nurses gathered at the White House. After a year of dithering, he is now leaping into action.

His speech contained no policy surprises, but is worth noting for three reasons. First, he instructed congressional Democrats to embrace several Republican proposals—for example, modest measures to reform malpractice laws and fight insurance fraud—that were put forward during last week’s bipartisan summit on reform. Second, he made it clear that he now wants Democrats to forge ahead with whatever procedural manoeuvres are necessary to pass his health bill. And finally, he declared that he wanted to see “an up-or-down vote” in the “next few weeks”. ...

Greece’s new austerity measures may prove to be enough—if they are fully implemented

GEORGE PAPACONSTANTINOU, the overworked Greek finance minister, likens the effort to steer Greece away from economic disaster to “changing the course of the Titanic.” Until this week it looked as if the country was headed for an iceberg labelled default. Two austerity packages had failed to convince Greece’s European partners—or the financial markets—that measures to cut the budget deficit this year from 12.7% of GDP to 8.7% would work.

Critics in Brussels said that Greece’s Socialist government was relying too heavily on pledges to cut tax evasion and soak the rich, rather than slash spending, especially on public-sector pay and pensions. The markets pushed spreads on Greek bonds over their German equivalents to record highs. Greece’s ten-year bonds were offering mouth-watering yields of some 6%, twice the German level. ...

Under pressure, GM is now putting up half the money needed to rescue Opel

THE mood at this week’s Geneva motor show, if not exactly upbeat, was in contrast to the fear that gripped the event last year. Europe’s car market is expected to fall in volume terms by around 10% in 2010 as the scrappage schemes that helped underpin demand for smaller cars last year are withdrawn. But slowly returning sales of larger, more profitable vehicles should underpin revenues. Moreover, the action carmakers have taken to strengthen their balance sheets is working: most are expecting to generate cash this year. The big exception is Opel/Vauxhall, the European unit of General Motors.

On Tuesday March 2nd, the first day of the show, GM staged a surprise by announcing it was tripling to €1.9 billion ($2.6 billion) in loans and equity the contribution it was ready to make to its original €3.3 billion plan for restructuring Opel. It was an admission both of how fragile Opel remains and how cross with the German government still is with GM. ...

What really happened in 2009

ONE of the common assumptions about the art market in 2009 was that the stunning success of the three-day Yves Saint Laurent/Pierre Berge sale in Paris—the highest grossing single-owner sale ever—would allow France to reclaim its position as the third-biggest art market in the world after America and Britain. It didn’t.

Clare McAndrew, a Dublin-based analyst of art-market statistics and the founder of Arts Economics, was the first to prove categorically that France’s century-long pre-eminence in the art world had been usurped by China. That was in 2007, and many presumed it was no more than a blip. But Ms McAndrew’s most recent report, the latest in a series commissioned by The European Fine Art Foundation (TEFAF) and published to coincide with the start of TEFAF’s Maastricht art fair on March 12th, proves categorically that China’s art market is getting bigger all the time. ...

Offshore oil platforms operate at ever-greater depths

BP, A big British oil company, announced a round of efficiency measures and cost cuts on Tuesday March 2nd aimed at increasing annual profits by $3 billion over the next few of years. But BP and the world's other big oil companies face similar problems when it comes to boosting profits. Few big new oil fields that are easy to reach and cheap to exploit have been discovered in recent years. This has driven firms to seek oil ever deeper below the sea. In 1947, Kerr-McGee built the world’s first offshore oil well that was completely out of sight of land, drilling 4.6 metres into the seabed off the coast of Louisiana. This year Shell's 22,000-tonne Perdido rig is set to begin operation. Standing nearly as tall as the Eiffel Tower, it is chained to the seabed 2.4km metres below and is capable of extracting oil at a maximum depth of 2.9km.

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A late, and philosophical, return to American political campaigning for Jerry Brown

THE dark, floppy hair has gone, and the face is a little rounder, but otherwise Jerry Brown, at 71, looks much as he did when he slept on a futon on the floor of his office and squired Linda Ronstadt round town. He was California’s Democratic governor then, from 1975 to 1983, and on Tuesday March 2nd he officially announced that he hopes to be governor again.

Apart from a spell studying Buddhism in the east—no surprise to anyone—Mr Brown has not disappeared in the interim from California politics. He has been mayor of Oakland and is now the state’s attorney-general. He has a Jesuit education, a prodigious intellect, a fine pedigree (his father, Pat Brown, was one of the state’s best governors) and a protean political identity that allows him to become almost any sort of candidate, as needed. “Action and contemplation joined together” he said in full Zen mode last June, “is what I would call the highest path that we can follow.” ...