Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Top

Most Recommended Top

• Massive wildfires threaten two California towns (Reuters)

  Reuters - California firefighters made a desperate stand as darkness fell on Thursday to save more than 4,000 homes and other structures from a pair of out-of-control wildfires burning about 170 miles apart along the California coast.

  
  


• Court order on YouTube user data fans privacy fears (Reuters)

  Reuters - A U.S. judge's order to Google Inc to turn over YouTube user data to Viacom Inc sparked an outcry on Thursday from privacy advocates in the midst of a legal showdown over video piracy.

  
  


• Midwest's postflood risk: toxic basements (The Christian Science Monitor)

  The Christian Science Monitor - The oil, gasoline, fertilizers, and herbicides swept away by floodwaters in June pose an environmental challenge to the rain-soaked Midwest. But some of the most serious pollution problems may not lie outdoors. Instead, they could well lurk indoors in waterlogged basements and first floors of homes and businesses, where everything from cleaning agents to toxic metals accumulate in silt and mold.

  
  


• Death stalked Betancourt's captivity in Colombia (Reuters)

  Reuters - Ingrid Betancourt began each day in captivity at 4 a.m. -- cold and depressed but awake in the dark waiting to hear her mother's words of encouragement over the radio.

  
  


• Freed American hostages in "good condition" (Reuters)

  Reuters - Three U.S. defense contractors freed after five years as rebel-held hostages in Colombia are in good health and could go home within a few days, U.S. Army doctors said Thursday.

  
  

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended U.S.

Most Recommended U.S.

• July 4th boaters: Steer clear of NJ dolphin family (AP)

  AP - Authorities protecting a dolphin family in a New Jersey river are stepping up enforcement over the July Fourth holiday.

  
  


• Marines to stay longer in southern Afghanistan (Reuters)

  Reuters - Some 2,200 U.S. Marines battling insurgents in southern Afghanistan have had their tour of duty extended by 30 days, U.S. officials said on Thursday.

  
  


• Texas man freed by DNA after 15 years in prison (AP)

  AP - A Texas man who spent more than 15 years in prison after being wrongly convicted of kidnapping and robbery raised both arms skyward and collapsed in his mother's embrace Thursday after being told he was a free man.

  
  


• Some psych patients wait days in hospital ERs (AP)

  AP - When staffers at a Brooklyn hospital spotted a middle-aged woman lying face-down on a waiting room floor last month, it hardly seemed like cause for alarm.

  
  


• Young offenders in SF illegally get no more break (AP)

  AP - Minors who commit crimes while in the United States illegally will be turned over to federal immigration officials, a reversal of a nearly 20-year-old San Francisco policy, Mayor Gavin Newsom said Thursday.

  
  

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended World

Most Recommended World

• Italy starts fingerprinting Gypsies (AP)
  AP - Italian authorities have started fingerprinting tens of thousands of Gypsies living in nomad camps across the country — adults and children alike — brushing aside accusations of racism by human rights advocates and international organizations.


• Gunmen kill 8 police in southern Afghanistan (AP)

  AP - Gunmen lobbed a grenade and sprayed a police checkpoint with gunfire in southern Afghanistan, killing eight officers, Kandahar's police chief said Friday.

  
  


• Slow, painful task: identifying Guatemalan dead (AP)
  AP - Guatemala's 36-year civil war cost some 200,000 lives, mostly of Mayan Indians caught between government forces and rebels. Twelve years after peace was signed, forensic anthropologists are still hunting for the missing.


• Colombian hostages say life grew more dire (AP)

  AP - A meal was rice and beans. Bed was the ground under a patched plastic tarp. They bathed in rivers, and when they weren't chained by the neck to trees, they were forced on long marches to new hideouts under the jungle canopy.

  
  


• Death stalked Betancourt's captivity in Colombia (Reuters)

  Reuters - Ingrid Betancourt began each day in captivity at 4 a.m. -- cold and depressed but awake in the dark waiting to hear her mother's words of encouragement over the radio.

  
  

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Business

Most Recommended Business

• The Next Victim of the Real Estate Crisis (BusinessWeek Online)
  BusinessWeek Online - State and local governments were flush with tax revenue during the five-year housing boom. They pulled from bulging pools of property, income, and sales tax to expand education, law enforcement, health care, and infrastructure programs without needing to burden residents and corporations with tax hikes.


• Former Refco CEO gets 16 years in prison (Reuters)

  Reuters - Phillip Bennett, the former chief executive of Refco, was sentenced to 16 years in prison on Thursday for fleecing investors of more than $2.4 billion in a fraud that destroyed the world's largest independent commodities broker.

  
  


• Nebraska Beef Ltd. recall now 5.3 million pounds (AP)

  AP - Nebraska Beef Ltd. is expanding a recall announced earlier this week to include all 5.3 million pounds of meat it produced for ground beef between May 16 and June 26.

  
  


• NY judge orders prison for former Refco CEO (AP)
  AP - The former head of Refco Inc., blamed for the collapse of one of the world's largest commodities brokerages, was sentenced to 16 years in prison Thursday by a judge who decried the "staggeringly arrogant" greed of white collar criminals.


• Oil steady above $145 in Asia on Saudi declaration (AP)

  AP - Oil prices remained near record highs above $145 a barrel in Asia after Saudi Arabia's oil minister suggested his country doesn't plan to boost production.

  
  

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Technology

Most Recommended Technology

• Court orders YouTube to give Viacom video logs (AP)

  AP - Dismissing privacy concerns, a federal judge overseeing a $1 billion copyright-infringement lawsuit against YouTube has ordered the popular online video-sharing service to disclose who watches which video clips and when.

  
  


• Internet addressing agency loses its own addresses (AP)
  AP - This doesn't sound good: The nonprofit agency in charge of the Internet's addresses recently lost track of its own.


• Mozilla claims Guinness Record for downloads (Reuters)

  Reuters - Mozilla, developer of open-source Web browser Firefox, said on Wednesday it set a new Guinness World Record for the largest number of software downloads in 24 hours.

  
  


• Canadians protest iPhone plans (Macworld.com)
  Macworld.com - One of my favorite things about the iPhone is the unlimited data plan I get from AT&T. Even with the mediocre EDGE speeds I get on the current iPhone, unlimited data means that I can read all the emails, view all the web pages, and play all the games I want on the cellular network. So, I was very disappointed to see that not all countries getting the iPhone on July 11 will have this option.


• Swedes e-mail lawmakers, protest eavesdropping law (AP)
  AP - Swedes have bombarded lawmakers with more than 1 million e-mails protesting the country's new eavesdropping law, adding to the growing public outcry over the measure, an official said Monday.

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended

Most Recommended

• Syria returns stolen marble artifact to Iraq (AP)
  AP - Syria has returned a marble artifact to Iraq that was stolen from one of the country's archaeological sites.


• July 4th boaters: Steer clear of NJ dolphin family (AP)

  AP - Authorities protecting a dolphin family in a New Jersey river are stepping up enforcement over the July Fourth holiday.

  
  


• Marines to stay longer in southern Afghanistan (Reuters)

  Reuters - Some 2,200 U.S. Marines battling insurgents in southern Afghanistan have had their tour of duty extended by 30 days, U.S. officials said on Thursday.

  
  


• Former Refco CEO gets 16 years in prison (Reuters)

  Reuters - Phillip Bennett, the former chief executive of Refco, was sentenced to 16 years in prison on Thursday for fleecing investors of more than $2.4 billion in a fraud that destroyed the world's largest independent commodities broker.

  
  


• NY judge orders prison for former Refco CEO (AP)
  AP - The former head of Refco Inc., blamed for the collapse of one of the world's largest commodities brokerages, was sentenced to 16 years in prison Thursday by a judge who decried the "staggeringly arrogant" greed of white collar criminals.

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Odd News

Most Recommended Odd News

• Man sells stolen items near home that was robbed (AP)
  AP - Police say an Ocala man was selling stolen property at a yard sale in the same neighborhood as the home he robbed. Fred and Betty McAteers, who live in Ocklawaha, arrived at a home they own in Ocala on Monday to find that it had been burglarized.


• 1851 gun used in Civil War returns to Arkansas (AP)

  AP - An 1851 artillery gun carried into battle by Arkansas military school students who joined the Confederate Army was unveiled in its home state Thursday after nearly 150 years.

  
  


• Man nabbed after calling cops on stolen cell phone (AP)
  AP - A Duluth man is under arrest after he called police on a cell phone from a purse he had just allegedly snatched. Police arrested the 29-year-old man on Wednesday.


• Ben Franklin, Betsy Ross actors wed in Philly (AP)

  AP - Benjamin Franklin and Betsy Ross celebrated the eve of the Fourth of July not with fireworks but with wedding vows.

  
  


• July 4th boaters: Steer clear of NJ dolphin family (AP)

  AP - Authorities protecting a dolphin family in a New Jersey river are stepping up enforcement over the July Fourth holiday.

  
  

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Sports

Most Recommended Sports

• Rays nip Red Sox 7-6 for sweep, widen AL East lead (AP)

  AP - Evan Longoria went 3-for-4 and drove in three runs Wednesday night, helping the surging Tampa Bay Rays beat the Boston Red Sox 7-6 for their second three-game sweep of the World Series champions this season.

  
  


• Federer, Nadal a step away from Wimbledon final (AP)

  AP - The top two players in men's tennis are on course to meet in their third straight Wimbledon final, but both have to get through today's semifinals first. No. 1 Roger Federer plays Marat Safin and No. 2 Rafael Nadal meets Rainer Schuettler.

  
  


• Marian Hossa signs with champion Detroit Red Wings (AP)

  AP - Marian Hossa chose to join the Detroit Red Wings at a discount. He hopes hoisting the Stanley Cup will make it worth the sacrifice.

  
  


• CAS upholds Landis's two-year doping ban (Reuters)

  Reuters - The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) rejected on Monday an appeal by American cyclist Floyd Landis against a two-year doping ban.

  
  


• Happy family as Serena and Venus set up Wimbledon title clash (AFP)

  AFP - Venus and Serena Williams, who boast six Wimbledon titles between them, will clash for the third time in an All England Club final on Saturday.

  
  

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Health

Most Recommended Health

• Kroger expands ground beef recall to 20 states (AP)

  AP - First it was the tomatoes. Now it's the beef.

  
  


• More than 4,000 Danes may have salmonella (AP)

  AP - Danish health officials fear more than 4,000 people may be infected with salmonella and are checking everything from refrigerators to credit card receipts to find the source of what may be the worst outbreak in 15 years.

  
  


• U.S. salmonella probe expands to Mexico: CNN (Reuters)

  Reuters - The investigation of a salmonella outbreak in the United States is shifting to the southern border to encompass produce imported from Mexico, CNN reported on Thursday.

  
  


• 3-D mammograms, cameras may improve breast exams (AP)

  AP - Remember peeking through a View-Master? Scientists are using the same concept behind the classic kids' toy to try to see mammograms in 3-D.

  
  


• Haywire brain chemical linked to sudden baby death (AP)
  AP - Scientists have new evidence that the brain chemical best known for regulating mood also plays a role in the mystifying killer of seemingly healthy babies — sudden infant death syndrome.

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Science

Most Recommended Science

• China quake was very unusual: US scientists (AFP)

  AFP - The devastating earthquake in China was the unexpected result of a seismological oddity and is likely to occur in the area only about once in every 2,000 to 10,000 years, US geoscientists said Monday.

  
  


• Syria returns stolen marble artifact to Iraq (AP)
  AP - Syria has returned a marble artifact to Iraq that was stolen from one of the country's archaeological sites.


• Voyager Spacecraft Reveals Solar System Edge (SPACE.com)

  SPACE.com - Voyager 2's journey toward interstellar space has revealed surprising insights into the energy and magnetic forces at the solar system's outer edge, and confirmed the solar system's squashed shape.

  
  


• Dramatic volcanism forged Mercury's surface (Reuters)

  Reuters - Volcanic activity has played a central role in forging the surface of Mercury, scientists said on Thursday based on data collected by a NASA spacecraft that zoomed past the closest planet to the sun in January.

  
  


• Volcanoes on Mercury Solve 30-year Mystery (SPACE.com)
  SPACE.com - A NASA spacecraft's first flyby of Mercury has yielded a wealth of information about the inner-most planet, some of which confirms volcanism occurred there, settling a longstanding debate.

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Opinion

Most Recommended Opinion

• History shouldn't forget our 'Founding Printers' (USATODAY.com)
  USATODAY.com - Every fifth-grader knows that Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin were key figures in the creation of the Declaration of Independence. But does anyone know who printed the famous document?


• Black currency (USATODAY.com)
  USATODAY.com - They've probably also heard about the lack of any meaningful energy policy to increase energy supplies, decrease consumption and make the U.S. economy less oil-dependent.


• Yes We Can Talk About McCain's Service (The Nation)
  The Nation - The Nation -- Wes Clark stood by his criticism of John McCain in a television interview last night, stressing that while he would "never, never dis someone's service," it is legitimate to discuss what types of military experience are relevant to being commander in chief. Republicans have been twisting Clark's mundane observation that McCain's experience "getting shot down" in a fighter plane is not a "qualification to be president." Clark made the point in response to a question from CBS' Bob Schieffer on Sunday, while noting that he "honor[ed]" McCain's service and considered him a "hero."


• CONSTITUTION À LA CARTE (Ted Rall)
  Ted Rall - One Amendment from Column A, Another from Column B


• Consider what happened with US occupation in Haiti, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic. (The Christian Science Monitor)
  The Christian Science Monitor - Sen. JohN MCCAIN recently suggested that pacification of Iraq and the departure of American forces was feasible by 2013. But pacification of Iraq is not how President Bush defines success.

Yahoo! News: Most Recommended Travel

Most Recommended Travel

• That Airline Voucher Could Cost You (Aviation.com)
  Aviation.com - Every now and then, airlines throw passengers a bone. They'll credit you if you cancel before takeoff, refund you if the fare goes down after purchase or make it up to you when you get bumped from a flight.


• Airlines Face the Abyss (Aviation.com)

  Aviation.com - We've become familiar with Chapter 11 in recent years, as airline after airline has gone into bankruptcy protection to reorganize its operations. Soon, we may become familiar with an even darker chapter in the airline story: Chapter 7.

  
  


• Biofuels Become Aviation's Big Focus (Aviation.com)
  Aviation.com - As concerns about global warming intensify throughout the world, aviation is receiving a disproportionate level of scrutiny for its contribution to total global production of greenhouse gases.


• Ladies and gentlemen, the Bronx is blooming (AP)

  AP - Ladies and gentlemen, the Bronx is blooming!

  
  


• Life After the $15 Bag Fee (Aviation.com)

  Aviation.com - It was a time-honored tradition among experienced travelers: Never check luggage, even if you're over the carry-on bag limit.