Tony Blair has urged MPs not to force "a compromise with the nation's security" over his anti-terror plans.

Read full story for latest details.

Unrest across France reaches new levels, as hundreds are arrested and an apparent victim of the violence dies.

French Lieutenant's Woman author John Fowles dies aged 79 after battling a long illness.

Schools and churches were burned in several French towns in an eleventh straight night of unrest and arson, despite words from the president that restoring order was a top priority.

Read full story for latest details.

Read full story for latest details.

Indian Foreign Minister Natwar Singh is stripped of his post after claims he benefited from the Iraq oil-for-food deal.

Global greenhouse gas emissions and energy demand will rise by 52% by 2030, the IEA warns.

A global bird flu pandemic could punch a vast hole in the world's economy, a high-level conference hears.

The Inmarsat-4 F2, one of the largest and most powerful communications satellites ever built, has its launch bumped to Tuesday.

CEOs from the nation's biggest oil companies face a grilling in Congress Wednesday before a joint Senate committee hearing on energy prices and record industry profits.

A Texas death-row inmate who escaped from a Houston jail last week was arrested Sunday night outside a liquor store in Shreveport, Louisiana, police and U.S. marshals said. Charles Victor Thompson, 35, appeared to be intoxicated, authorities said. The convicted killer escaped jail Thursday by shedding his handcuffs and prison jumpsuit for street clothes and flashing a fake ID.

A militant leader from the oil-rich Niger Delta goes on hunger strike in protest at police treatment in custody.

UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw says the UK will only give up its EU rebate if farm spending is reduced.

Western observers monitoring elections in Azerbaijan say the vote fell short of international standards.

Chile arrests fugitive former Peruvian leader Alberto Fujimori just hours after he arrives for a surprise visit.

England captain Michael Vaughan's chances of playing in the first Test are rated as slim after he suffers a knee injury.

Sony's release of a software patch for a controversial anti-piracy CD program has failed to stem criticism.

A cruise liner attacked by pirates off Somalia docks in the Seychelles after a grenade is removed from a cabin.

The European Union says it is studying a call by Iran for the resumption of talks over Tehran's nuclear programme.

Pakistani police fire tear gas to disperse hundreds of angry Kashmiris as the de facto border opens for quake relief.

Ethiopia's opposition launch a week-long strike after the deaths of at least 46 people in last week's demonstrations.

President George W Bush arrives in Panama, a US ally, after tense trade talks in Argentina and Brazil.

Fabien Pelous is cited for elbowing Australia's Brendan Cannon during France's 26-16 win.

US and Iraqi troops battle insurgents on the third day of an operation near Iraq's border with Syria.

Trade ministers are due to meet in London on Monday to continue efforts to break a global trade talks deadlock.

Syria says it is considering a UN request to question six officials in connection with the killing of Rafik Hariri.

Thousands of people demonstrate against a joint US-India air force exercise in eastern India.

Burma's military junta confirms it has begun moving parts of the government to a new jungle location.

Six million poultry are culled in a Chinese province hit by bird flu, as talks on tackling the virus' spread begin in Geneva.

India's former captain Saurav Ganguly is not in the Indian team for the remaining two ODIs against Sri Lanka.

A Hong Kong man is jailed in what is believed to be the first case involving BitTorrent file-sharing software.

Australia's government wants new laws to allow its troops to deploy in support of police against any terrorist attack.

A killer tornado struck in the middle of the night with such force in Indiana and Kentucky that Sunday is being called the deadliest day of twisters since 1998. Authorities have recovered 22 bodies from the wreckage in Indiana. At least 230 other people were injured when the twister destroyed 100 homes and damaged 125, authorities said.

Prisoners have helped discover one of Christianity's earliest churches when they took part in an archaeological dig inside one of Israel's top security jails.

The bodies are arriving at the mortuary in Baghdad in such large numbers that the orderlies have run out of places to store them properly.

The mules of the Pakistan army have transported hundreds of tons of relief supplies, ferried the lightly wounded to field hospitals and helped to set up advance bases to reach the remotest of mountain dwellings.

An Italian farmer's wife who brought up 12 children was beatified at Vicenza Cathedral in northern Italy amid a Vatican campaign to encourage larger families.

The people of Azerbaijan have voted, some of them several times, in parliamentary polls that demonstrated the ruling dynasty's proficiency at winning elections, if not perhaps at grasping democratic principles.

A British colonel saw the left engine of a Nigerian airliner explode hours before an identical aircraft from the same carrier crashed killing all 117 people on board.

Remember the guy who battled U.S. forces from inside Iraq's holy shrine of Imam Ali last summer? That renegade cleric whose radical anti-American rhetoric stirred violent uprisings around the country last April, who only stood down when an elder cleric pulled rank? Well, he's back.

Sunscreen, check. Laser treatment, check. Botox, check. Wrinkle filler, check. Cancel face-lift for another few years, check check.

Flawless skin is a thing of beauty. We coddle it, we nourish it, we try to improve it. Yet, we regularly dis it as "only" skin, misunderstood and undervalued. It's a shame. Man has never made anything better as sensor, shield, and communicator.

A study out this week should bring some peace of mind to women who need medical help to become pregnant. Previous reports have suggested that women who use assisted reproductive technology, including fertility-enhancing drugs and in vitro fertilization, are more likely to have a baby with birth defects, Down syndrome, or low birth weight. But a study of more than 36,000 women published in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology finds that babies conceived with an assist from science are at no greater risk than those made the old-fashioned way.

Protesters clogged streets in some Argentine cities, and Venezuela's leftist president Hugo Chavez seemed to be girding for a confrontation with President Bush over the U.S. role in Latin America. As leaders from more than 30 countries in the Western Hemisphere gather in Argentina for the fourth Summit of the Americas, which kicks off this afternoon, the official aim of increasing jobs and alleviating poverty in Latin America will play out against a backdrop of increased tension with the United States.

Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito is a Philadelphia Phillies fan with an Ivy League pedigree; a straight-arrow husband and father lauded by friends and colleagues from both sides of the political aisle for his resolute character and first-rate intelligence. But more important--for now, anyway--he's a jurist with a deep, wide, and undeniably conservative legacy from 15 years on the federal bench.

Drawing a line in the subway; tribute to a quiet American hero; Colorado lifts the spending cap; a hefty price tag for the church; trouble for American Girl

Does the shape of the yield curve mean anything to you? You might not think so, but if you're thinking about buying a house or refinancing your current one, and you're trying to figure out what kind of loan you want, it means a lot.

People are generally most likely to die of a heart attack between 6 a.m. and noon, as the body and its systems wake up, and least likely to succumb to heart attacks between midnight and 6 a.m. But that pattern may not hold true for all people, particularly those who suffer from obstructive sleep apnea, a condition affecting up to a quarter of all American adults, in which a blocked airway causes breathing to stop periodically during sleep. Researchers from the Mayo Clinic looked at the timing of death from heart attacks in people with and without obstructive sleep apnea to see if the time of death differed.

Marshall Ramsey cartoon on grateful turkeys and Supreme Court nominees

Women tend to get all hung up on their skin's cosmetic attributes. Is that a new wrinkle? How can I make my elbows smoother? Will this self-tanner turn me orange? But their concern with skin as upholstery ignores a larger truth: Skin is a big organ that you can see. Because the skin is connected to the rest of the machinery--blood vessels feed it, nerves tell it what to do--diseases that affect the systems of the body often give an early warning on the skin. "You pick the disease, and I'll tell you the skin manifestation," says Bob Brodell, a dermatologist in Warren, Ohio. He remembers seeing an 8-year-old girl with hives when he was a young resident in the emergency room who a few weeks later was diagnosed with leukemia--which has been known to trigger hives.

Just when it seemed the long fight over the Pentagon's latest round of base closings and realignments was over, a handful of states are hoping to make a last stand in federal court.

Former Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, has become the point man for the Bush administration's efforts to combat a pandemic flu outbreak. He spoke with U.S. News last week after unveiling the administration's long-awaited $7.1 billion plan.

Well-toned hips and a trim waist–not just the pounds you carry–appear to be among the best protections against heart attacks, according to a study of thousands of people in different countries.

By all means also read Victoria Toensing's article with that headline on yesterday's Wall Street Journal editorial page. I can't find it on www.opinionjournal.com, so you may have to paw through your pile of old newspapers to find it; maybe it will be posted on the site this weekend.

The feminist left is outraged that judge Samuel Alito voted in 1991 to uphold a Pennsylvania law that would have required married women to notify their husbands of a decision to abort. Alito stands accused of patriarchal overreach and making it possible for outraged and abusive husbands to attack their wives. Planned Parenthood called Alito's vote "callous disregard of battered women." Karen Pearl, interim president of Planned Parenthood, said much the same thing in a blog, and the criticism spread rapidly on the left. A woman writing in the Philadelphia Daily News said Alito's vote in the case proved he is "dangerously radical."

U.S. News readers write about sexual slavery, landmark battles, feverish over flu, laurels for leaders, lack of greats, and teacher standards

There are something like 10 million illegal immigrants in the United States today. Most of them are working at jobs with willing employers or as day laborers or are the children of such workers. You can see the day laborers, if you live in a metropolitan area with any economic vibrancy, lined up at 7 a.m. on street corners waiting for the offer of a day's work. You can see them clustered in those storefront shops offering cheap phone calls to Mexico or El Salvador or the Philippines. Or if you could go out with the Border Patrol and a pair of night vision goggles, you could see them in the mountains and valleys and desert floors of Cochise County, Ariz., as they move across the border and head toward booming Phoenix or Las Vegas.

You call this simplification? A new manager sets sail with Magellan; bah humbug; profit pause

Were the American people taken into war on false pretenses? That is the mushroom cloud of a question conjured up by the Senate Democrats' imposition of the rare closed-session discussion they held last week. Party leader Harry Reid accuses the Republicans of manipulating intelligence to justify the invasion, a serious charge that excites the media and disturbs a war-weary public. The central question is whether anyone in the executive branch had good reason prior to the war to believe that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.

Because nearly a third of people with asthma don't effectively control their condition, two groups of medical professionals who specialize in treating it have just released new guidelines on patient care. The recommendations, by the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology and the American College of Allergy, Asthma, and Immunology, urge doctors to carefully tailor their treatment to each person.

Millions of middle-aged American women whose pimples disappeared along with their youth seem to be breaking out again just as they start fighting wrinkles. Blame the trend on an ever more stressful lifestyle--or on baby boomers' insistence on a solution for every problem. "It's partially increased prevalence and partially increased awareness," says Diane Berson, an assistant professor of dermatology at Cornell University's Weill Medical College who specializes in helping women battle breakouts. "We're really seeing an increase in adult women with acne."

In the eye of the storm, a place of calm and comity

The voting is still two months off, but partisans hoping for a battle royal over judicial nominations are probably going to have to wait even longer after the much-vaunted "Gang of 14" centrist senators signaled that Judge Samuel Alito, with his 15 years of service on the federal bench, may not meet the group's criteria for a filibuster. In May, the bipartisan gang forged an alliance to avoid--or at least postpone--a procedural endgame over judicial filibusters. The infamous "nuclear option" would have Republicans changing Senate rules to allow a pure majority vote on judges--and Democrats vowing to logjam the session.

From the day she got it, Coralie Meslin of Baltimore had doubts about her tattoo. She was, after all, only 15 years old--underage--when she sweet-talked the tattoo artist into etching two fish onto her belly. "I looked down, and I was like, 'Oh, God, what have I done?' "

Man Bites Dog Department. Jeffrey Rosen of the New Republic has written an article arguing that special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's indictment of Scooter Libby is "indefensible." Rosen notes that Fitzgerald in his defense of the indictment said that perjury, false-statement, and obstruction-of-justice indictments are common, even when, as in this case, there is no indictment for violation of any underlying crime. Rosen has taken the trouble to look at Justice Department statistics. He found that such indictments are not very common but that Fitzgerald as U.S. attorney in Chicago has brought a larger proportion of such cases than most prosecutors. But read it all. This is the most cogent criticism of the Libby indictment that I have read and all the more compelling because it comes from a liberal writer and appears in a liberal magazine.

Why is Paris burning? Scoping out the CIA's "black sites"; an Army call-up that comes late; Afghan fields are going to pot; war is brewing on the horn of Africa; we will bury you--or maybe not

Three weeks ago, with the blessing of the Bush administration, Gov. Bill Richardson was in North Korea to discuss its contentious nuclear weapons program. It was classic Richardson, a Democrat who has crossed party lines when he thought it was the right thing to do and whose public life over three decades has included seven terms in Congress, high-wire negotiations with some of the world's biggest thugs, two cabinet posts under President Clinton, and now the Statehouse of New Mexico, his adopted home state.

It has become a staple of Sunday newspapers, television talk shows, and late-night news programs: the cautionary tale about the Internet turning America's youth into a generation of socially inept zombies, plugged in but tuned out, incapable of any conversation longer than an instant message, and headed for a sedentary life of weight gain, eye strain, and information overload.

On a recent Saturday afternoon, I confirmed a lunch date, made two friends, and asked somebody to be my boyfriend--without uttering a word. The first magic trick was facilitated by a text message; the second two by the social-networking website Facebook.com. When my romantic gesture was politely declined 20 minutes later, I was still sitting in front of my computer in total silence.

Third-quarter earnings season winds down this week. While none of the companies in the Dow Jones industrial average are due to release their quarterly results, two technology giants who used to move the markets in the late '90s are set to report their profits this week: Dell and Cisco Systems. Of particular interest is Dell, which recently issued a profit and sales warning. If Dell's third-quarter results come in worse than expected, the Nasdaq could be pressured.

Erin Elovecky loves to feel the warmth of the sun on her body. Growing up, she spent many summer days on Long Island Sound, cruising around in her parents' boat and soaking up rays. Elovecky admired her mother, who could quickly develop a rich, brown tan, thanks to her Lebanese heritage. But Elovecky took after the Irish side of the family, with fair skin and green eyes, and got burned by the sun more often than not.

Washington Whispers: Albright's brooch diplomacy; put J. Edgar Hoover back in a closet; this time we know who the leaker is; what next, feng shui in war plans? Hillary Clinton and the yogurt man; stage right for candidate McCain; cake and bones for Bush birthday gals; Reid's wardrobe malfunction

It's OK to put french fries back on the menu. That's a political judgment, not a dietary one. But what's clear is that after a run of France bashing on this side of the Atlantic, Washington and Paris have staged a surprisingly strong rapprochement.

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 9

Republicans would relish an Alito fight--but next year; tricks are no treat for the White House; big oil, big profits, big opportunity? Not exactly a Texas-style prince

John Hinderaker of www.powerlineblog.com asks why the Democrats are spending so much political capital on an issue—did the Bush administration unduly manipulate prewar intelligence on Iraq?—that is not likely to help them in 2006 and 2008? Unlikely, because (a) Bush isn't running again, (b) Iraq is likely to be in better shape then, (c) the Democrats themselves as well as practically every country took the same view of the intelligence the Bush administration did, and (d) the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report and the bipartisan Silberman-Robb Commission concluded that there was no such manipulation of intelligence. Good points all.

Far from being chastened by recent setbacks, including the indictment of his chief of staff, Vice President Dick Cheney is thumbing his nose at his critics--and encouraging President Bush to do the same. "Bush and Cheney are standing as one," says a prominent Republican who regularly advises the White House. "Their strategy is to get the conservative base solidified again, and Cheney is key because he is the administration's main link to the right."

Marshall Ramsey cartoon on grateful turkeys and Supreme Court nominees

Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and Judge Samuel Alito have often--but not always--been at odds on key legal issues.

Take a snap look at the upcoming 2007 presidential election in Sierra Leone and it appears to be leaning toward the Sierra Leone Peoples’ Party (S.L.P.P.).

The heir to the British throne may not have a hand in actually governing the United Kingdom, but his position in the centuries-old monarchy has the potential to wield considerable clout with public opinion. That was the delicate balancing act on display this week as Prince Charles made his first official visit since 1994 to those former colonies known as the United States. He has hit New York and Washington and will go on to the San Francisco area.

Call it the Labor Market waltz. Every time the job market seems to take one promising step forward, the employment outlook takes two discouraging steps back.

SAN ANTONIO—When Capt. Jason Feser first arrived in the northern Iraq city of Mosul for his yearlong tour of duty, he found that his headquarters was drowning in information. In the fast-paced environment of Mosul, where soldiers were tracking an adaptable and persistent insurgency in the ancient city, it was hard to keep up with the threats.

Seven nights of rioting by Muslims in the Paris suburbs. This has gone on longer than the Detroit riot of 1967, which I witnessed as an intern to the mayor. The geographical extent of the riot area does not seem to be as large as that in Detroit. Here's a map of the Paris rioting. This is a very big deal. France, like other European countries, has allowed many Muslim immigrants into their country without assimilating them, has preserved an economy that doesn't generate any low-income jobs for them, and then gives them perpetual welfare payments.

If Judge Samuel Alito is confirmed, there will be five Catholics on the Supreme Court. That's fine with me; nothing says that we have to have proportionate religious representation on the court or in any other governmental body. But it's interesting. My pop-sociology theory why goes like this. Presidents appointing justices have for the past 30 years or so looked for people who performed very well academically. Indeed, Justices Antonin Scalia and Stephen Breyer were academics themselves, and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg taught in law school as well. Given that presidents like to appoint justices who are in their 50s, President Bush has been looking at men and women who were in law school in the 1970s.

Two newspapers, The Guardian and ZWNews.com, have revealed that Home Office officials are routinely ignoring the national identities of failed asylum seekers in order to get round a ban on returning them to Zimbabwe.

One month after promising a "quick" rebuilding and recovery effort in the Gulf Coast, President Bush has finally gotten around to appointing a high-level official in his administration to oversee the potentially multiyear recovery effort from Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita.

Maybe its because they're the same age. Or maybe it's because they both loved foreign policy. But former President Jimmy Carter, on a book tour touting his 20th, Our Endangered Values, America's Moral Crisis, has revealed that his best presidential buddy since leaving Washington is former President George H.W. Bush. "When George Bush senior came into office, I had the best relationship I have ever had since I left the White House," he told reporters at a breakfast sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor this morning. "George Bush senior and [Secretary of State] James Baker relied on the Carter Center to do some major things, so I had an intimate relationship with them."

The holiday shopping season has officially kicked off. And so far, Santa's bag is decidedly mixed.

MOSCOW—Russians are having a hard time settling on what to do with a relic of their Soviet past, the embalmed body of Vladimir Lenin. Dressed in a dark suit and black and white polka-dot tie, Lenin rests in a glass box in a marble mausoleum just outside the Kremlin, as he has for nearly eight decades.

Here's a clearsighted view of the Alito nomination from the left, by David Corn of The Nation. Though I disagree with Corn on many issues, I like his writing because he tries to see clearly what's happening, and he writes well. He's always pleasant when I encounter him around town on the campaign trail or in the Fox News Channel green room. A good example of civility on the left, where you don't seem to find much of it today.

It failed. But you don't read much about it in mainstream media. At the G8 summit Tony Blair essentially moved away from Kyoto, and it's apparent that the European countries will not meet their emissions targets. Here's the latest on Blair, from the left-wing Guardian, via www.instapundit.com. As Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit writes, "Since it's quite clear that the U.S. will never ratify Kyoto, and Europe will never actually abide by it, it's time for some rethinking." Kyoto, by the way, expires in 2012, in just seven years. In 1998 the Senate voted 98-0 for the Byrd-Hagel amendment, which rejected any emissions agreement that doesn't limit Third World countries like China and India—a key provision of Kyoto.

It's been two months since Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast, disrupting the nation's economy, and leading to major layoffs in the region. And finally, there are some hopeful signs that the labor market is starting to stabilize.

You might know a habitual hacker or could be one yourself—someone whose cough won't go away no matter how many doctors have looked for a cause and tried different treatments. Weeks turned long ago into months, then years.

On Monday, Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito was asked by Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter to comment on superprecedents and superduperprecedents. Evidently Specter was relieved by Alito's comments that there was something in the nature of a sliding scale in determining whether precedents must be followed. Specter doesn't want to seem responsible for overturning Roe v. Wade. Alito, whose opinions show him to be a judge who carefully follows governing precedents, doesn't want to say whether he would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade or not. My guess is that he's not sure how he would vote and wants to be able to approach any such decision with an open mind.

Senate Democrats, wanting to keep Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the job through April's end of Supreme Court arguments, are building a case to move slowly on the confirmation of her nominated replacement, Samuel Alito. "I think that we should just wait," said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid.

As a practical matter, even if Roe v. Wade is overturned, abortion is not going to be effectively criminalized in the United States. That's because a substantial number of our fellow citizens—arguably a majority, depending on which poll you consult—believe they have a right to an abortion. Not unreasonably: For 32 years the Supreme Court has been telling them so. You can argue, as even many liberal law professors do, that Roe v. Wade is bad constitutional law. But you can't really say that citizens are irrational to believe that they have a right when the Supreme Court tells them they do.

Buyers of pricey Los Angeles Dodgers collectibles don't exactly line up at your door when your music, comics and memorabilia shop is located in Joplin, Missouri. So when Rodney Spriggs finds that one of his 10 Vintage Stock stores in the Midwest has slow-moving merchandise, he lists those items on eBay to reach a wider audience.

President Bush outlined a $7.1 billion strategy to prepare for the danger of a pandemic influenza outbreak, saying he wanted to stockpile enough vaccine to protect 20 million Americans against the current strain of bird flu as a first wave of protection.

A new study suggests that high doses of ibuprofen—generally considered one of the safer painkillers—can cause gastrointestinal bleeding even in healthy adults. While doctors have long known that all nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), which include aspirin and ibuprofen, carry some risk of bleeding, the extent of bleeding in those taking ibuprofen hasn't been clear. There's no need to run to the medicine cabinet and toss the Advil, but the study results is a good thing to keep in mind when treating aches and pains.

Marty Lipset, one of the greatest political scientists in American history, has been disabled by a stroke. His work product over the course of nearly 50 years is immense: Punch in his name on Amazon.com and you get 3,321 results. Karlyn Bowman of the American Enterprise Institute observes, "In the introduction to the festschrift they edited in honor of Marty, Larry Diamond and Gary Marks wrote, 'Throughout this century, and especially since World War II, no theme has more preoccupied the fields of comparative politics and political sociology than the nature, conditions, and possibilities of democracy. And no political scientist or sociologist has contributed more to advancing our thinking about democracy in all its dimensions, both comparatively and in the United States—than Seymour Martin Lipset.

There's no doubt about it–franchises are popular. For someone looking to escape the confines of their boring cubicle, there's something definitely appealing about buying a "business in a box" that takes the mystery (and at least some of the risk) out of starting your own business. Quoted statistics on the success of franchises are also pretty impressive:

For the 12th time in a little more than a year, the nation's central bank voted to raise short-term interest rates in an effort to slow inflation by slowing down the overall economy.

Everyone has an opinion about Donny Deutsch, the brash New York advertising executive and host of CNBC's The Big Idea With Donny Deutsch, but it's hard to deny his success. Now, Deutsch, 47, has written a book, Often Wrong, Never in Doubt: Unleash the Business Rebel Within, with Peter Knobler. He recently spoke with U.S. News about advertising, TV, and how to succeed.

The laws have drawn criticism from ex-prime ministers, civil libertarians and eminent legal officials alike who describe the proposals as flawed, ill conceived and possibly unconstitutional.

Dell, the world's biggest personal computer maker, issued a surprising profit warning late Monday, pressuring technology stocks in early trading Tuesday. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite index, for instance, was down more than 10 points at the open this morning even though the broader stock market opened higher.

The withdrawal of Harriet Miers's nomination wasn't the only retreat by the White House last week. President Bush also gave back a little something to workers in the Southeast by announcing he would reimpose federal rules, which had been suspended in areas affected by Hurricane Katrina, that set high minimum wages federal contractors. The decision, which will affect all federal contracts awarded after November 8, was a blow to businesses hoping for cheap labor but a victory for an unusual alliance of unions, Democrats and moderate House Republicans.

Britain's Conservative Party members will be voting in mail ballots for a new party leader starting soon. The two choices are David Cameron, the 39-year-old shadow education secretary, and David Davis, the 56-year-old shadow home secretary. Davis was the early favorite but delivered what has been considered a disastrous speech at the party conference in Blackpool earlier this month. Cameron delivered, without text or notes, what was widely considered a dazzling speech, and he has been the heavy favorite ever since. Here's the delicious take on Cameron's rise from Matthew D'Ancona in the Sunday Telegraph. And here's a news story on Cameron's support among Conservative MPs rising to a majority of 100. For those hungry for more information on this race, I recommend prowling through the links on the websites of the Telegraph www.telegraph.co.uk, and the Times of London.

George W. Bush has nominated Judge Samuel Alito of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit to the Supreme Court. Judge Alito has a strong record academically and in government. He was U.S. attorney for New Jersey, a high-pressure job in a state where corruption is—how shall we say this?—not unknown. To be confirmed for that position, Alito would have to have been approved by New Jersey's two Democratic senators at the time, Bill Bradley and Frank Lautenberg, the latter of whom is again serving in the Senate. From my knowledge of those two men, I believe they would not have approved Alito unless they were convinced that he was (a) highly competent, (b) completely honest, and (c) not likely to use his power as a prosecutor for political purposes. They certainly understood the importance of the job and would not, I think, have given their approval lightly. Here's what Lautenberg and Bradley said about Alito's appointment as U.S. attorney.

Some House and Senate leaders say they are surprised that President Bush hasn't added his voice to the decrying of massive oil profits by major fuel companies. "Bush should join us," said a top aide to a House GOP leader. "That would rally more people around him." Another aide said that because Bush is viewed as sympathetic to oil firms, speaking out against profits as winter nears would show he means business when it comes to punishing greedy companies and aiding the poor: "That would be huge."

Some House and Senate leaders say they are surprised that President Bush hasn't added his voice to the decrying of massive oil profits by major fuel companies. "Bush should join us," said a top aide to a House GOP leader. "That would rally more people around him." Another aide said that because Bush is viewed as sympathetic to oil firms, speaking out against profits as winter nears would show he means business when it comes to punishing greedy companies and aiding the poor: "That would be huge." Last week, House Republican leaders criticized the large profits and aides said that there's more to come as winter nears. "We are not finished playing our cards on oil," said an aide. But administration officials say it is unclear what political pressure Washington can bring on oil and fuel firms to cut the price of gasoline, natural gas, and heating oil amid high demand.

Now it's official. Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, has been indicted for perjury, making a false statement, and obstruction of justice. Evidently, this is for not testifying that he had heard from Cheney that Valerie Plame was a CIA employee. This is a serious charge. I have long said that I would be astonished if someone as smart and savvy as Libby had testified untruthfully. So I am astonished now. There was nothing legally dubious about Cheney disclosing this to Libby. Both had the highest possible intelligence clearances. So it is puzzling that Libby apparently didn't testify truthfully or fully about this.

Britain's Conservative Party members will be voting in mail ballots for a new party leader starting soon. The two choices are David Cameron, the 39-year-old shadow education secretary, and David Davis, the 56-year-old shadow home secretary. Davis was the early favorite but delivered what has been considered a disastrous speech at the party conference in Blackpool earlier this month. Cameron delivered, without text or notes, what was widely considered a dazzling speech, and he has been the heavy favorite ever since. Here's the delicious take on Cameron's rise from Matthew D'Ancona in the Sunday Telegraph. And here's a news story on Cameron's support among Conservative MPs rising to a majority of 100. For those hungry for more information on this race, I recommend prowling through the links on the websites of the Telegraph www.telegraph.co.uk, and the Times of London.

George W. Bush has nominated Judge Samuel Alito of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit to the Supreme Court. Judge Alito has a strong record academically and in government. He was U.S. attorney for New Jersey, a high-pressure job in a state where corruption is—how shall we say this?—not unknown. To be confirmed for that position, Alito would have to have been approved by New Jersey's two Democratic senators at the time, Bill Bradley and Frank Lautenberg, the latter of whom is again serving in the Senate. From my knowledge of those two men, I believe they would not have approved Alito unless they were convinced that he was (a) highly competent, (b) completely honest, and (c) not likely to use his power as a prosecutor for political purposes. They certainly understood the importance of the job and would not, I think, have given their approval lightly. Here's what Lautenberg and Bradley said about Alito's appointment as U.S. attorney.

WASHINGTON (AP)—President Bush, stung by the rejection of his first choice, nominated longtime appellate Judge Samuel Alito today in a bid to reshape the Supreme Court and mollify his conservative allies. Democrats said that Alito may be "too radical for the American people."

Nicknamed "Scalito" for views resembling those of conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Samuel Alito Jr. is a favorite son of the political right. Appointed in 1990 by George H.W. Bush to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, Alito has earned a reputation for intellectual rigor and polite but frequent dissent in a court that has been historically liberal. His mettle, as well as a personable demeanor and ties to former Republican administrations, has long had observers buzzing about his potential rise to the high court. "Sam Alito is in my mind the strongest candidate on the list," says Pepperdine law Prof. Douglas Kmiec. "I know them all . . . but I think Sam is a standout because he's a judge's judge. He approaches cases with impartiality and open-mindedness."

Alexander Tsiaras is quite literally a visionary. With the aid of the highest of medical high technology, he peers inside the body and sculpts the raw data that pour from scanning machines into 3-D images that are alive and dramatic, full of color and texture. For more than 20 years, Tsiaras's company, Anatomical Travelogue, has used an artist's eye to stir a mix of photography, medical scans, and computer software to create books such as From Conception to Birth and The Architecture and Design of Man and Woman. His latest is The Invision Guide to a Healthy Heart. At $20, it is more affordable than his previous books, and there's a reason: He wants it to be a consumer guide. Images from the book will be exhibited at the National Museum of Health and Medicine at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., through 2006 and at other museums in the months ahead. Tsiaras broke away from the opening of the Washington, D.C., exhibition to discuss the book.

At a conference in Tehran on Wednesday entitled “The World without Zionism,” President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called for Israel to be “wiped off the map.” He also denounced moves by some Arab states to recognize Israel or normalize relations with it.

From the beginning, the intelligence developed by the Bush administration to justify the war in Iraq was under attack. In May 2003, less than two months after the invasion, the New York Times published some startling news bearing directly on whether Iraq was developing weapons of mass destruction. Columnist Nicholas Kristof described how an unnamed former U.S. ambassador had traveled to Niger before the war to investigate claims that Saddam Hussein had sought to buy nuclear material there and had concluded that the allegations were unfounded. A few weeks after the column, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, began checking out the ambassador and his wife, a CIA covert officer.

For nearly five years, Lewis "Scooter" Libby has been the perfect aide-de-camp for Vice President Dick Cheney--loyal, discreet, disciplined, self-effacing, and, most of all, anonymous. No more. Now Libby's name and photograph are staples of the nightly news and the blogosphere. His possible role in the furor over who leaked the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame has made him a central figure in a federal investigation that could rock the Bush administration.

The financial markets got in Ben Bernanke what they wanted in a Federal Reserve chairman: an expert on monetary policy, an independent and experienced policymaker, a cautious inflation fighter--in sum, a sure hand on the economy's tiller.

A Long Paper Trail to Follow

In Washington, a few words can have ugly consequences. It might not have taken all that much newspaper ink to print the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame for the first time, but the July 2003 disclosure set off a dramatic chain of events that could end up altering the entire course of President Bush's second term in office.

REWE, ENGLAND--When W. O. Bentley launched his automobile company in 1919, he demanded his cars be powerful and quick. He achieved his goal: Bentleys won Le Mans--France's grueling, 24-hour endurance race--a record five times between 1924 and 1930. Those victories accorded Bentleys cachet and made them popular among the "right crowd." Fast-forward 73 years to 2003, and Bentley was back in the Le Mans winner's circle. That victory helped reintroduce the luxury car to the world's--and particularly to America's--growing crowd of wealthy drivers. It needed the boost: Bentley's U.S. brand awareness was then almost nonexistent.

The lowdown on China; Talking About; backyard choo-choo

The weightiest thing most people contemplate on the day after Thanksgiving is either a big sandwich heaped with turkey leftovers or the linebacker for their favorite football team. This year, the government wants it to be different. That's the day that it has identified as a good time for Americans eligible for Medicare--nearly 40 million of them--to sit down with their families and talk about the program's new drug benefit, officially called "Medicare Part D." The benefit, which kicks in January 1, is going to help a lot of people who have poor prescription drug insurance coverage or none at all. But its complexity is a lot to digest.

I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby Jr. resigned today as Vice President Cheney's chief of staff after being indicted on charges of obstruction of justice, making a false statement, and perjury in the CIA leak case.

Harriet Miers's nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court was just days old when White House adviser and former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie was all but booed off the podium after he told conservatives that their objections to Miers carried the stink of sexism and elitism.

New digs for Motown's G-men; gridlocked at ground zero; tough times in the Big Easy; storm forecast: no relief in sight; keeping better track of the bodies

It was the worst of times at the White House. Key officials were in legal jeopardy, investigators were on the hunt, and the credibility of the president was eroding fast. It happened to Ronald Reagan in 1987 at the midpoint of his second term, in what was dubbed the Iran-contra arms-for-hostages scandal. And the parallels to what President Bush confronts today are striking.

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 2

Matt Davies cartoon on Bush's inner-circle inner tube

Alan Greenspan is a man of numbers. So to tell the story of the central banker many consider to be the nation's greatest ever, let's begin with them: 18, 5.55, 3, 2. Greenspan has spent 18 years as chairman of the board of governors of the Federal Reserve System, the second-longest term in the Fed's 92-year history. During his tenure, the unemployment rate averaged 5.55 percent, and the average annual inflation rate was 3 percent. Compare that with 6.85 percent unemployment and 6.5 percent inflation over the prior 18 years. Finally and most important, there's the number 2: two mild recessions during his term, or the longest economic expansion in U.S. history. Impressive, considering that from World War II until the man known as the maestro took the economy's helm, recessions occurred every six years or so.

Detlev Mehlis, the soft-spoken German prosecutor investigating the murder of the Lebanese leader Rafiq Hariri, is no Mario Puzo and had no intention of writing a gripping Mafia chronicle. But his report looking into Syria's reign of terror and extortion in Lebanon is in the best tradition of Mafia chronicles. Behold the principal player in this tale, Bashar Assad, Syria's president: An unlikely inheritor comes into a family dominion, but he lacks the deceased Godfather's touch. The result: Enforcers and "capos" who had been on a short leash now swagger on their own, and then the heir, in a crime at once brazen and pathetically obvious, puts his entire inheritance at risk.

Frontier Airlines is something of an anomaly in its industry: The Denver-based carrier is not in bankruptcy court. United Airlines, Frontier's archrival, is currently in bankruptcy, as are Delta and Northwest.

How bad are things at the White House when the best spin on the news is that it could have been worse--only one senior adviser got indicted? Or that some are breathing a sigh of relief that the president finally got the message and withdrew the nomination of Harriet Miers? "When every single conversation begins, 'At least the election is a year away,' you know things are really bad," one senior House Republican told me. "This is as tough a time as we've ever had."

Phil Miles knows he's lucky. At 68, the retired adult education teacher has no serious health problems, a fact he chalks up to good genes and an exercise regimen that includes stationary cycling, yoga, and weightlifting. "I try to stay fit," he says. But despite his good health, he's paying close attention to the new Medicare prescription drug benefit. He's waiting to see if his existing coverage changes, and then he'll decide whether to keep his current drug plan or switch to a new one. "It's pretty complicated," says Miles. "There's a lot of fine print. I think seniors are pretty anxious about this."

Independent opinion writers have their say on the CIA indictments.

Ever wonder what it takes to get into Harvard, Yale, or Princeton? Do the happy few who win higher education's golden ticket get in because of SAT scores or extracurriculars--or is it because Dad donated a building? Are the Big Three really academic meritocracies? Have they ever been? These are the questions University of California-Berkeley sociologist Jerome Karabel sets out to answer in his new book, The Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton . Karabel, himself a 1972 Harvard grad, is already garnering high praise for pulling back the veil on the Big Three's at times problematic past (anti-Semitic policies, rampant anti-intellectualism, the exclusion of women and minorities) and for offering a sweeping 100-year retrospective on who has gotten into the Ivy giants, who has not, and why.

Word association time: Hollywood. Chances are you just thought of really bad sequels, or surgically enhanced starlets, or some combination thereof. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

The editor of "The New Republic" suggested the other day that "the new liberal political culture emerging on the Internet" looks a lot like the McGovernite revolution that descended on the Democratic Party in 1972. In a lecture at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government, Peter Beinart said the mostly young Internet activists are clearly taking over the party. If so, this would be the first ray of sunshine for conservatives and Republicans in almost a year. The McGovern movement severely damaged the party, pushing it toward four presidential defeats in five tries, until Bill Clinton won by dragging the party back to the center in 1992. If the Internet people had prevailed in 2004, Howard Dean would have won the nomination and then been buried in an enormous landslide, just like George McGovern.

U.S. News readers write about wounded veterans, Jack radio, second-term politics, sex in the classroom, to bash or not to bash Bush, car dealers' lot, on "liberal elites," and doubts about Dems; a correction

A federal grand jury has indicted Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff. While presidential confidant Karl Rove was spared, he still remains under investigation.

I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby Jr. resigned as Vice President Cheney's chief of staff after being indicted on charges of obstruction of justice, making a false statement, and perjury in the CIA leak case.

Medicare beneficiaries face one of their biggest decisions ever: whether to sign up for Medicare Part D and, if so, which plan to choose. While everyone's needs are unique, there are some general things each person should consider when beginning the search for a drug plan.

Some things are still blissfully simple. As Mazda redesigned its sprightly Miata two-seat roadster, devotees worried that the convertible's classic, unpretentious curves might get ironed out, that its price might creep beyond reach of the common car lover, that it might stray from its roots as a predigital funmobile into the realm of Internet-era electrosensory overload.

The proverbial man from Mars, landing today, might wonder if we are all off our rockers. He will ask to be taken to our leader, but it will be hard to break through the White House bubble, and when we do find him, we encounter the leader of the free world preoccupied with domestic turmoil--beleagured by the rebellion of the right over the unfortunate Harriet Miers--and bothered even more now by the exposure of the grimy political machinery of a secretive administration in the Valerie Plame/CIA affair.

After a summer of record auto sales, consumers are retrenching, and carmakers are trying to guess which way the market will turn next. Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn took U.S. News for a spin through the car business and its near future.

Dark days at the big house on Pennsylvania Avenue;

Long before Osama bin Laden became a household name, a young federal prosecutor named Patrick Fitzgerald in the U.S. attorney's office in the Southern District of New York became steeped in the emerging world of jihad, toiling with little public recognition to prosecute some of the world's most dangerous terrorists, all with ties to the evolving Islamic fundamentalist movement. Men like Ramzi Yousef, who engineered the bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993; Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, the Egyptian cleric who plotted to destroy New York tunnels, bridges, and other landmarks; the four leaders of the U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998; and, that same year, bin Laden himself. "He is a one-man encyclopedia on al Qaeda because he has this absolutely scary photographic memory," says Deputy Attorney General James Comey, who is Fitzgerald's best friend. "He is a one-man dot connector, which is very valuable."

Will Ben Bernanke be a hawk when it comes to fighting inflation? Or will the Fed chairman nominee turn out to be more of a dove? The consensus on Wall Street is yes--on both counts.

For more than two years, mainstream media reporters have been looking forward to an indictment of Karl Rove. They didn't get it today. Reportedly, Rove is still under investigation and not out of jeopardy. He will presumably be expected to cooperate in the Libby prosecution. No one can say with confidence how this will play out.

Time for Syria to fess up--or else; under the table with Saddam; will Tehran add injury to insult? Arabic TV with a British accent; where terrorists stalk tourists; Brazil: guns OK, bikini shots not; will the princess become emperor?

Wall Street learned last week that oil companies are doing very well indeed (in fact, they're enjoying record profits) and that the overall economy is growing faster than expected. But how are workers faring? The answer will become clearer this week when the Labor Department releases the results of its October jobs report. Workers are being affected not only by labor market conditions but also by rising consumer prices. And several government and industry reports due out this week should shed light on the state of inflation. Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve is expected to hike interest rates—again—to try to keep that inflation in check.

10/28/2005 The grand jury indicts Libby on a total of five counts, including obstruction of justice, perjury, and making false statements. Libby resigns as Cheney's chief of staff.

A second manufacturer is beginning mass production of a vaccine to protect against bird flu, and the Senate moved yesterday to invest $8 billion for preparations in case the influenza strain ever sparks a worldwide epidemic.

The dreary milestone was passed with all the grim commentary it deserved: 2,000 Americans killed in Iraq since the war began, with no end in sight, as lethal roadside bombs and fanatic suicide bombers continue to take casualties from one end of the country to the other. The numbers of American dead in Iraq pale in comparison with the numbers killed in Vietnam and in World War II. But to a generation unaccustomed to armed conflict, the growing toll, and the large numbers of soldiers being brought home with missing limbs and worse, are feeding a growing public disenchantment with the war and fresh skepticism of the Pentagon's efforts to bring security and democracy to a religiously and ethnically riven land long held together by the brutal hands of a dictator.

Washington Whispers: "What does France know?" Scalia asks; Dems rebuild party on change theme; 2008 buzz-o-meter rockets on George Allen; how Hillary Clinton wins the White House; Haley Barbour proves it's all in who you know; it's 15 years for the networker-in-chief; time for a revival on foreign policy; College Picking 101: Get the "feeling"

Nattering negative nabobs have Bush fuming; and now Denny, the blogging speaker; abortion--that pesky litmus test; of Bush, Bernanke, bonding, and baseball

“Despite the fact that defense and intelligence analysts have repeatedly blamed poor coordination between intelligence units and unpopular government policies for the string of terrorist attacks over the last three years, the T.N.I. immediately seized on the statement [by President Yudhoyono] to justify reactivating its regional territorial command network.”

Accurate measurements of the heart's blood flow can help doctors treat people with severe congestive heart failure, but doctors haven't known if one invasive measurement tool, pulmonary artery catheterization, is worth the risk. According to research published in the October 5 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, patients who undergo the procedure—in which a catheter inserted into a blood vessel in the neck snakes a device into the chambers of the heart to measure blood pressure and flow—experience neither significantly greater risk nor significantly greater benefit. Yet there are consequences from the procedure, both bad and good.

Accurate measurements of the heart's blood flow can help doctors treat people with severe congestive heart failure, but doctors haven't known if one invasive measurement tool, pulmonary artery catheterization, is worth the risk. According to research published in the October 5 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, patients who undergo the procedure—in which a catheter inserted into a blood vessel in the neck snakes a device into the chambers of the heart to measure blood pressure and flow—experience neither significantly greater risk nor significantly greater benefit. Yet there are consequences from the procedure, both bad and good.