BENGHAZI, Libya (AP) — Islamic hard-line militias, including the group accused by the United States in a 2012 attack that killed the ambassador and three other Americans, claimed control of Libya's second largest city, Benghazi, after overrunning army barracks and seizing heavy weapons.
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama moved Thursday to require federal contractors to give their workers more rights in labor disputes, putting his pen to an executive order the day after the House voted to sue him for allegedly exceeding his presidential powers. In an election-year dare to Republicans, Obama said congressional obstinacy would only embolden him to take even more aggressive actions on his own.
ROZSYPNE, Ukraine (AP) — Two weeks after a missile brought down Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, an international team of investigators Thursday reached a wreckage site in eastern Ukraine that remains bitterly contested between government forces and pro-Russia separatist rebels.
Exxon Mobil Corp , the world's largest publicly traded oil company, reported a stronger-than-expected quarterly profit on Thursday as higher prices for its crude and natural gas offset a 6 percent drop in production. Exxon has struggled in recent quarters to replenish its reserves quickly, investing in massive new projects in Russia and Papua New Guinea that take years to develop. "Declining production is a recurring theme for Exxon Mobil," said Edward Jones analyst Brian Youngberg. "The company remains growth-challenged, and a lot of that is due to their large size." Adding to the company's challenges are Western sanctions against Russia, since Exxon is more involved in that country than any other U.S. oil company.
(Reuters) - MasterCard Inc, the world's second-largest debit and credit card company, posted a better-than-expected 10 percent rise in quarterly profit, as more customers used its cards to make purchases. MasterCard shares were up 2.8 percent at $78 in trading before the bell on Thursday. The company's net income rose to $931 million, or 80 cents per share, in the second quarter ended June 30, from $848 million, or 70 cents per share, a year earlier. Net revenue rose 13.4 percent to $2.38 billion. Analysts on average had expected the company to earn 77 cents per share, on revenue of $2. ...
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Stocks fell sharply in Argentina on Thursday as the country defaulted on its bills for the second time in 13 years, raising fears the move could diminish foreign reserves, stoke inflation and drive the economy deeper into recession.
Texas Democratic Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee said Democrats had never moved to impeach former President George W. Bush, but she co-sponsored a bill to do just that in 2008.
The House has abandoned a vote on legislation to address the immigration crisis on the border after tea partyers withdrew their support in a dispute over a separate measure on deportations.
Everyone gets into a professional or business slump. The best of the best in their field have had the proverbial bump in the road. When it happened to me, it came in the form an emotional, physical and professional Tsunami. Sadly, with every forward step I made (and believe you me, these were baby steps), I slipped a half to two steps back. ...
U.S. health officials are warning Americans not to travel to the three African countries hit by an outbreak of Ebola.
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) — Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is seeking written pledges of support from all political factions, including rival Hamas, before making any attempt to press for possible war crimes charges against Israel, senior officials said Thursday.
(Reuters) - Time Warner Cable Inc, the second-largest U.S. cable operator, lost more video subscribers in the second quarter compared with the previous quarter. Most cable companies have been shedding video subscribers over the past few years, losing them to satellite and telecom rivals as well as Web-based entrants such as Netflix Inc. Time Warner Cable, which also reported a lower-than-expected quarterly profit on Thursday, said it lost 152,000 net residential video customers in the April-June quarter. Comcast Corp, which is seeking regulatory approval for its $45.2 billion bid for Time Warner Cable, reported a better-than-expected profit last week, citing the highest number of customer additions for its high-speed Internet in six years. Time Warner Cable's net income attributable to common shareholders rose to $499 million, or $1.76 per share, in the second quarter ended June 30, from $481 million, or $1.64 per share, a year earlier.
U.S. health officials are warning Americans not to travel to the three African countries hit by an outbreak of Ebola.
Imagine being an E.R. doctor. The interesting stories you'd have to tell would rival the make-believe stories told on hit TV shows of this similar genre. Then imagine giving it all up to pursue a career as a writer? There goes the stories, the sexy paycheck and the years of schooling. This isn't a made up scenario or the plotline for a TV...
NEW YORK (AP) — A.R. Gurney's romantic play "Love Letters" is about to hit Broadway again with some big movie stars.
MALIN, India (AP) — Rescuers using earth-moving equipment and their bare hands dug through heavy mud and debris Thursday after a landslide engulfed an entire village in western India, killing at least 41 people and leaving about 100 missing and feared dead.
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks fell sharply on Thursday as investors reacted to disappointing corporate earnings and outlooks from major U.S. companies including Exxon Mobil and Whole Foods Markets. The slide put major indexes into the red for July, leaving the market on track for its first monthly loss since January. Argentina's stock market plunged after the South American nation defaulted on its debt for the second time in 13 years.
Studies show that the biggest mistake entrepreneurs and businesses make on social media is not investing enough. Though experts continue to espouse the virtues and benefits of social media, many businesses and thought leaders have failed to make it a priority. Companies that invest time, energy, and resources in social media marketing are...
TORONTO (AP) — Famed DJ deadmau5 asked Rob Ford to go for a coffee run in his Ferrari and was jolted by the Toronto mayor's order: five espressos in one cup.
INGLEWOOD, California (AP) — 5 Seconds of Summer fit the boy band mold: a quartet of young men with a feverish female fan base touring with British megastars One Direction. But the Australian pop-rock group identifies more with Pete Wentz than Harry Styles.
You've got to give this much to Rand Paul: Kentucky's junior senator is willing to do something almost unheard of in modern presidential politics, which is to make arguments that not everyone in his party already cares about. For this reason alone, Paul is probably the most interesting presidential hopeful out there, if not the most likely to succeed.
Unemployment at five-year low of 6.1 percent; July jobs report said positive. But many still feel wallet pain.
WASHINGTON (AP) — CIA Director John Brennan apologized to Senate intelligence committee leaders after his inspector general found that CIA employees acted improperly when the CIA searched Senate computers earlier this year.
By Harriet McLeod CHARLESTON S.C. (Reuters) - A drone being flown in a novel attempt to smuggle phones, marijuana and tobacco into a South Carolina maximum security prison crashed outside its walls, authorities said on Wednesday. The contraband smuggling attempt has been under investigation since the wreckage was discovered in April outside the Lee Correctional Institution in Bishopville, said state Department of Corrections spokeswoman Stephanie Givens. Officials believe it was the first time an unmanned aircraft had been used in an effort to breach prison walls in the state, Givens said. Illegal cellphones, an issue in prisons nationwide, have drawn particular alarm in South Carolina.
MOSCOW (AP) — For Russian President Vladimir Putin, there are few options left in the Ukraine crisis and they all look bad.
(Reuters) - French telecoms operator Iliad SA has made a buyout offer for T-Mobile USA Inc , a person familiar with the matter said, countering an offer by Sprint Corp . The Wall Street Journal reported earlier on Thursday that Iliad had made the surprise offer to T-Mobile's board less than a week ago and was working with several banks to secure financing. T-Mobile and Iliad did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
LISBON, Portugal (AP) — The woes of troubled Portuguese bank Banco Espirito Santo deepened Thursday as its share price plunged on the Lisbon stock exchange, a day after it reported a record half-year loss of 3.58 billion euros ($4.8 billion).
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Hundreds of cars submerged below murky water. A landmark basketball court, newly refurbished, showing signs of buckling. Soaked and stained carpets. An athletic track coated in mud.
Here's your look at highlights from the weekly AP photo report, a gallery featuring a mix of front-page photography, the odd image you might have missed and lasting moments our editors think you should see.
She once called Donald Trump "a maggot, a cockroach and a crumb." This week, he remembered her as "an impossible person."
Houston has developed a reputation as the entrepreneurial capital of Texas, if not the United States. It is the fourth-largest city in the nation and is poised to supplant Chicago as number three by next year. It is a magnet for enterprises ranging from startups to Fortune 500 companies. It is, in fact, second only to New York when it comes to...
A federal judge on Wednesday ordered Bank of America Corp to pay $1.27 billion of damages after a federal jury found the second-largest U.S. bank liable for fraud over defective mortgages sold by its Countrywide unit. The decision by U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff in Manhattan came nine months after jurors found Bank of America and former Countrywide executive Rebecca Mairone liable for defrauding government-controlled mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac through the sale of shoddy Countrywide loans in 2007 and 2008. Rakoff said Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bought $2.96 billion of questionable loans. Lawrence Grayson, a Bank of America spokesman, said with regard to the award: "This figure simply bears no relation to a limited Countrywide program that lasted several months and ended before Bank of America's acquisition of the company.
South Korean automaker Hyundai Motor Co will recall about 883,000 Sonata mid-sized sedans in the United States and Puerto Rico because a potentially defective transmission-shift cable could increase the risk of a crash. The recall affects certain Sonata cars from model years 2011 to 2014, in which the transmission-shift cable could detach from the shift-lever pin, causing the gear selection not to match the indicated gear, according to documents posted Wednesday by U.S. safety regulators.
MUMBAI, India (AP) — The world's largest online retailer is facing off in India against a new name in e-commerce that was founded by former Amazon employees.
U.S. reporters head into Gaza with the Israeli Defense Forces’ 188th Armored Brigade.
Julio Grondona, the veteran president of the Argentine Football Association (AFA) and FIFA vice-president, died on Wednesday at the age of 82 in a Buenos Aires clinic, AFA sources reported. The all-powerful figure, who had been in charge of Argentine football since 1979, had been taken to hospital suffering from heart problems and died while undergoing emergency surgery. Earlier this week he had held meetings with Alejandro Sabella, who decided not to continue as Argentina coach after leading the team to the World Cup final in Brazil recently.
Officials tell The Associated Press that a nonpartisan investigative report concludes that management failures by the Obama administration set the stage for the computer problems that paralyzed the HealthCare.gov website last fall.
McLEAN, Va. (AP) — Nearly every weekend, Chris Nassetta is cooking in his family's oversized kitchen, outfitted with two commercial-grade refrigerators, three sinks and a deep fryer.
Another attempt to reach Malaysia Airlines crash site in E. Ukraine turned away.
By Dan Whitcomb LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A major water main ruptured underneath a street near the University of California, Los Angeles on Tuesday, unleashing a 20-foot-tall geyser and millions of gallons of water that flooded part of campus and stranded motorists on nearby streets. The water gushed across the north end of the campus for several hours, submerging athletic fields and pouring into an underground parking structure, where motorists were caught in water up to their wheel wells, Los Angles Fire Department spokesman Brian Humphrey said. The deluge happened as California suffers through a record drought that has prompted state and local authorities to impose water-use restrictions on residents, such as fines for wasting even a few gallons on excessive lawn-watering. Workers were removing inches of standing water from the floor of the UCLA basketball team's Pauley Pavilion, which in 2012 underwent a multi million-dollar renovation, university spokesman Ricardo Vazquez said.
JEBALIYA REFUGEE CAMP, Gaza Strip (AP) — An Israeli airstrike hit a crowded Gaza shopping area on Wednesday, killing at least 16 people and wounding more than 150, hours after Israeli tank shells slammed into a U.N. school sheltering displaced Palestinians, killing 15 people, Gaza health officials said.
MOSCOW (AP) — U.S. and European sanctions against Russia's energy and finance sectors are strong enough to cause deep, long-lasting damage within months unless Moscow persuades the West to repeal them by withdrawing support for Ukrainian insurgents.
MOSCOW (AP) — U.S. and European sanctions against Russia's energy and finance sectors are strong enough to cause deep, long-lasting damage within months unless Moscow persuades the West to repeal them by withdrawing support for Ukrainian insurgents.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Pointing the finger at Republicans for congressional inaction, President Barack Obama chided lawmakers Wednesday for spending the waning days before their month-long summer break trying to sue him rather than addressing economic issues that could boost the middle class.
BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union's sanctions against Russia are bound to inflict pain on the country's ailing economy. While still narrowly targeted, they come as a warning shot to convince Moscow to change its Ukraine policies or face even tougher penalties.
If you're reading this, let me start by saying congrats for thinking about starting your own business. We need more people creating great things, changing the world and helping the economy. I wish I had read an article like this before I'd started. The more prepared you are for the bumps in the road, the more you can take them in stride. Go get...
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. economy has rebounded with vigor from a grim start to 2014 and should show renewed strength into next year.
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — President Barack Obama says the House GOP's vote to file a lawsuit against him is taking away from time they could be spending on issues that are important to the American people.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The government is underestimating the threat of a chemical attack on America's densely populated cities and has failed to inspect virtually all of the chemical facilities that it considers particularly vulnerable to terrorists, congressional investigators say.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. economy has rebounded with vigor from a grim start to 2014 and should show renewed strength into next year.