Albany, NY - A state official says Gov. David Paterson's embattled chief of staff is resigning after it was revealed he had to pay nearly $300,000 in taxes and penalties that went unpaid for years. The state official close to the decision says Charles O'Byrne's resignation was accepted with regret by Paterson, his close friend. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because Paterson...

New York - A new wave of fear swept trading floors around the world Friday, resulting in an across-the-board drop in stocks and violent moves in currencies. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was off more than 500 points at its intraday low but at the end of trading it was down 312 points to close at 8,378.00 The action underscored how the crisis that has gripped markets since the...

New York, NY - Consolidated Edison has asked New York utility regulators to raise next year's rate hike to 7.3 percent. The state Public Service Commission says a decision will be made early next year. The company's first application, seeking 5.8 percent, was submitted in May. It said those proposed hikes would begin in April 2009 and would add about $6.18 to the average household bill and...

Pittsburgh, PA - Police tell KDKA that a campaign volunteer has now confessed to making up a story that a mugger attacked her and cut the letter B in her face after seeing her McCain bumper sticker. Ashley Todd, 20, of Texas, initially told police that she was robbed at an ATM in Bloomfield and that the suspect became enraged and started beating her after seeing her GOP sticker on her...

Queens, NY - After seven years of political wrangling and delay, a deal to build a casino at the Aqueduct racetrack is now in place. Under a contract announced by the Paterson administration on Thursday, a Buffalo company will construct a complex featuring a 184,000-square-foot gambling floor and 4,500 video gambling terminals, multiple restaurants including one with a 600-seat buffet, at...

London - - The Reform movement is about to take the first step to launch an alternative to Aish, the Orthodox outreach organisation for young adults. A residential weekend next month will be the inaugural event by the Assembly of Reform Rabbis to offer a "non-fundamentalist" alternative. Rabbi Mark Goldsmith, of London's North-Western Reform Synagogue - who is leading the initiative with...

New York - Barack Obama has re mained cool and confident amid the financial melt down, even as John McCain at times has been embarrassing, lurching from one proposal to the next. But while the polls are reflecting Obama's steady hand, the markets haven't. In fact, they're getting worse by the day as Obama's lead widens. Most investors know the devil is in the details - and the details of...

London - The Chief Rabbi, Sir Jonathan Sacks, is planning a special seminar next month to equip rabbis to deal with the impact of the financial crisis on their congregants. Its aim is to help them provide pastoral care, encourage support networks and be aware of the sort of help available, such as the Employment Resource Centre. He is also inviting some business representatives to advise...

Jerusalem - An Orthodox party announced Friday it will not join a new coalition government being formed by prime minister-designate Tzipi Livni, making it more likely Israel will soon hold national elections. Eli Yishai, leader of the Shas Party, said Livni did not agree to his party's demands for the allocation of more funds to poor Israelis and for a commitment that parts of Jerusalem will...

Montreal, Canada - A Jewish immigrant who said she felt "quite lost and confused" after the "emotionally draining" experience of being denied time off work for the Jewish New Year has been awarded $2,059 in moral damages by Quebec's Human Rights Tribunal. But the tribunal denied her $6,000 she claimed in lost wages, because she couldn't prove she'd been fired for refusing to come to work...

Nablus, West Bank — They came in waves, ardent Jewish settlers, religious women from central Israel, black-clad followers of Hasidic courts and groups of teenage boys and girls, almost a thousand of them in all. Crammed into a dozen buses and escorted by the Israeli military, the Jewish pilgrims slid quietly along deserted streets throughout the early hours of a recent morning while the...

Manhattan, NY - Want to park free on the streets of Manhattan, without fear of having to pay tickets? Go to work for the federal government. In fact, according to the House Transportation Committee, if you have a federal car, you do not have to confine yourself to the streets; you can even park on the sidewalks. "Essentially, all of Lower Manhattan is a free parking lot for government...

New York - The IRS may be looking for you - but this time resist any urge to run and hide. The agency is trying to track down certain taxpayers who are missing their economic stimulus checks or their regular refund checks. Due to mailing errors, some 17,000 New York City residents are owed a total of $7.1 million in economic stimulus checks and $6.7 million in regular refund checks that were...

New York, NY - Dow Jones industrial average futures have fallen 550 points, the maximum daily price change. The Dow starts the day at 8,691. The NASDAQ composite opens at 1,603. Meanwhile, weakness prevailed on Thursday as corporate outlooks and economic news have taken on a downbeat theme. The Labor Department said that new claims for unemployment benefits rose by 15,000 last week to a...