Category: News

The New York Yankees star failed a drug test for two anabolic steroids, four sources told the magazine in a story posted Saturday on its Web site.

His name appears on a list of 104 players who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in a 2003 baseball survey, SI said. He reportedly tested positive for Primobolan and testosterone while playing for the Rangers.

Economists call it the “paradox of thrift.” What’s good for individuals – spending less, saving more – is bad for the economy when everyone does it.

On Friday, the government reported Americans’ savings rate, rose to 2.9 percent in the last three months of 2008. That’s up sharply from 1.2 percent in the third quarter and less than 1 percent a year ago.

On Friday, NBC, a unit of General Electric Co., said it was in talks to sell the last two of the 67 spots for the game, which have gone for between $2.4 million and $3 million per 30-second slot.

“Considering the state of the economy in the United States, we couldn’t be any more thrilled,” said Dick Ebersol, chairman of NBC Universal Sports & Olympics.

The president’s comments, made with new Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner at his side, came in swift response to a report that employees of the New York financial world garnered an estimated $18.4 billion in bonuses last year. The figure, from the New York state comptroller, drew prominent news coverage.

Yet Obama’s stand also came just one day after he surrounded himself with well-paid chief executives at the White House. He had pulled in those business leaders and hailed them for being on the “front lines in seeing the enormous problems in our economy right now.”

Was Darwin right? Should schoolchildren be exposed to contrary views in science class? These two controversies continue to rage, partly because both sides are evenly matched.

Most scientists and courts that have ruled on the matter say that overwhelming evidence backs Darwin’s explanation of the origin and evolution of species, including humans, by natural selection.

They’re just working around it – and perhaps inadvertently making the process more secretive.

The projects run the gamut: a Metrolink station that needs building in Placentia, Calif.; a stretch of beach in Sandy Hook, N.J., that could really use some more sand; a water park in Miami.

“You know that’s the way I roll,” Obama replied jokingly.

Rick Bayless, the chef of that restaurant, Topolobampo, says Obama’s comfortable demeanor at the table – slumped contentedly in his chair, clearly there to enjoy himself – bodes well for the nation’s food policy. While former President George W. Bush rarely visited restaurants and didn’t often talk about what he ate, Obama dines out frequently and enjoys exploring different foods.

“We intend to win this fight. We’re going to win it on our terms,” Obama declared, turning U.S. policy abruptly on just his second full day in office. He also put a fresh emphasis on diplomacy, naming veteran troubleshooters for Middle East hotspots.

The policies and practices that Obama said he was reversing have been widely reviled overseas, by U.S. allies as well as in less-friendly Arab countries. President George W. Bush said the policies were necessary to protect the nation after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks – though he, too, had said he wanted Guantanamo closed at some point.

But what if they’re wrong?

Some conservative economists say that additional stimulus may only prolong the grief at best, triggering runaway inflation down the road and resulting in an even more bloated federal bureaucracy.

Not since Franklin D. Roosevelt has a new president been poised to pack so many ambitious, costly – and, under more normal circumstances, highly contentious – projects into one fast-moving bill. As in 1933, a frightening economic collapse makes the quick political work possible, choking off longer debates and possible opposition that many of the initiatives would have faced in better times.

Congress is working on a mammoth stimulus bill, costing $825 billion or more, to treat the sick economy. Obama is using it as a vehicle for an array of priorities, including billions of dollars for renewable energy, education and health care innovations.