Brooklyn, NY - A Norfolk, VA, resident detained since August on criminal charges of securities fraud has renewed his effort to be released on bail. Joseph Shereshevsky, the part-owner and former chief operating officer of investment company WexTrust Capital, is asking a judge in the U.S. District Court in Manhattan to reduce the $10 million bail that another judge imposed in September. The...

Israel - On a Wednesday night in Romema, a traditionally big night for grocery shopping in one of Jerusalem's up-and-coming haredi neighborhoods, shopping carts inside the local supermarket were filled to the brim. Bamba, Bisli, and cardboard cases of RC Cola were among the more popular items, along with bulk packages of sugar, flour and rolls of paper towels. As men in black hats and modestly...

Washington - Palestinian circles can only have been disappointed by the first appointment made by President-elect Barack Obama, because his hand-picked chief of staff, Congressman Rahm Israel Emanuel, who once served in the Israeli army, is a strong supporter of Israel, right or wrong. His father, Benjamin Emanuel, a pediatrician, helped smuggle weapons to Irgun, the Zionist militia of former...

New York - Let me expand on my Rahm Emanuel theory, and it's fascinating the way Obama did this. Obama publicly says, "I'm going to offer the gig of chief of staff to Rahm Emanuel." Now, a lot of people don't understand why it's a big deal whoever the chief of staff is. The chief of staff sets the ideological tone in the White House. You don't get to see the president without the approval...

Washington - Sen. Joe Lieberman's affiliation with Democrats was in question after a meeting Thursday with Majority Leader Harry Reid, steamed over the Connecticut independent's high-profile support of John McCain for president. Reid, in a sternly worded statement after the 45-minute meeting, said no official decisions have been made. But an aide to the Nevada Democrat said Reid was leaning...

Las Vegas, NV - Las Vegas Sands Corp., billionaire Sheldon Adelson's casino company, fell the most in New York trading since going public after saying it may default on debt and face bankruptcy. The casino owner, which had $8.8 billion in long-term debt at the end of June, said in a regulatory filing today that it probably won't meet the requirements of loans arranged by Citigroup Inc., Goldman...

Brussels, Belgium - The leader of Belgium's far-right National Front party, Michel Delacroix, resigned today a few hours after he was shown on television singing a song making light of the Holocaust. "Mr Delacroix, perfectly aware of what his actions would mean for him, has decided to resign from his post as president of the National Front," the party said in a statement, underlining that his...

New York - Stocks continued to slide Thursday as weak outlooks from Cisco and Toyota, dismal October retail sales and the prospect of a very grim payrolls number tomorrow rattled the market. The Dow Jones Industrial Average wandered around at the open, then spiraled into a triple-digit decline and was down more than 400 in afternoon trading. This is the market's second straight day of...

Washington - Former Obama chief strategist David Axelrod has accepted the position of Senior Adviser in the White House, sources tell ABC News. Axelrod is a sharp political strategist and is said to be the closest person to Obama. He was the man behind the "Change" and "Yes We Can" slogan movement. Axelford 51, is said to be the most trusted man to president elect Obama and is the son of...

Kiryas Joel, NY - There was a time when the honchos who control thousands of votes in Kiryas Joel were reliably Republican in their choices. But shifting political winds blew the village's majority voting bloc leftward in 2006, when it famously supported Rep. John Hall, D-Dover Plains, in his narrow victory over incumbent Republican Sue Kelly. Their endorsements this week suggest their...

Washington - White House press secretary Dana Perino warned Thursday that the administration is “very concerned” about the threat of a terror attack during the transition or the early weeks of the Obama administration. “That is something that we're very concerned about,” Perino said. “We've seen that in other countries — Spain, obviously, had that terrible bombing.” Perino...

Tehran - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has congratulated Barack Obama on his election win — the first time an Iranian leader has offered such wishes to a U.S. president-elect since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Ahmadinejad sent a message to Obama in which he congratulated the Democrat on "attracting the majority of voters in the election." The text of the note was carried by the official...

New York - The Lexmark printer company once commissioned Dr. Aric Sigman, a British psychologist, to write a study about fonts and how the use of a particular font might influence what the reader thinks about the writer. He wrote that using a Times font indicated that one is trustworthy and respectful. The Courier font is the equivalent of sensible old shoes. Serif styles, such as Times New...

New York, NY - Brooklyn Councilman Simcha Felder wants to end the broken-meter rule confusion. The rules now on the books say that a driver can park in a metered spot where the meter is missing for up to the maximum amount of time specified on the signs in that particular zone. But when someone parks at a meter that is physically there, but is broken, the time limit is one hour, no matter...

Washington - Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), a wily, aggressive West Wing strategist under President Bill Clinton, has accepted the post of White House chief of staff for President-elect Barack Obama, Democratic officials tell Politico. The selection is the first major public decision by Obama since he was elected in a landslide on Tuesday. The announcement will send a signal that Obama is...