 AP - A Democratic Congress, unwilling or unable to approve a $25 billion bailout for Detroit's Big Three, appears ready to punt the automakers' fate to a lame-duck Republican president.
 AP - A growing fear of economic deflation helped take the air out of the stock market Wednesday, and another white-knuckle final hour on Wall Street pushed the Dow Jones industrials under 8,000 to their lowest close since the financial meltdown began.
 AP - Barack Obama is enlisting former Senate leader Tom Daschle as his health secretary, embracing a third Washington insider in the early stages of Cabinet-building by the president-elect who promised change. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the capital's most famous woman for two decades, seemed ever more likely to be his secretary of state.
 AP - California's highest court agreed Wednesday to hear several legal challenges to the state's new ban on same-sex marriage but refused to allow gay couples to resume marrying before it rules.
 AP - Al-Qaida's No. 2 leader used a racial epithet to insult Barack Obama in a message posted Wednesday, describing the president-elect in demeaning terms that imply he does the bidding of whites. The message appeared chiefly aimed at persuading Muslims and Arabs that Obama does not represent a change in U.S. policies.
 AP - A 30-day age limit in the Nebraska safe-haven law appears headed for final approval. The state Legislature voted 41-6 Wednesday to give second-round approval to the limit. A final vote is expected Friday and then the bill will go to Gov. Dave Heineman, who has said he would support a 30-day age limit.
 AP - Bringing "Jurassic Park" one step closer to reality, scientists have deciphered much of the genetic code of the woolly mammoth, a feat they say could allow them to recreate the shaggy, prehistoric beast in as little as a decade or two.
 AP - King Herod may have been buried in a crypt with lavish Roman-style wall paintings of a kind previously unseen in the Middle East, Israeli archaeologists said Wednesday. The scientists found such paintings and signs of a regal two-story mausoleum, bolstering their conviction that the ancient Jewish monarch was buried there.
AP - Three male and three female inmates at a southern Indiana jail face charges that they devised a way to sneak between cell blocks to help pass their time behind bars by having sex.
 AP - The Kansas City Royals picked up the leadoff hitter they had been seeking, acquiring center fielder Coco Crisp from the Boston Red Sox for reliever Ramon Ramirez on Wednesday.
 Reuters - U.S. auto executives went to Capitol Hill for a second day on Wednesday to argue their case for $25 billion in aid as legislators proposed changes to help a bailout pass Congressional and White House muster.
 Reuters - Federal Reserve officials slashed economic growth forecasts through 2009 and some believed even deeper interest rate cuts may be needed if growth slows further, minutes of their October policy meeting show.
 Reuters - California's Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to hear a legal challenge against the state's voter-approved ban on gay marriage and let the ban stand until it ruled.
 Reuters - President-elect Barack Obama has chosen Tom Daschle, a key early supporter and former U.S. Senate leader, as his top official to overhaul the U.S. healthcare system, two Democratic sources said on Wednesday.
 Reuters - Consumer prices fell at a record pace in October and new-home building slumped to fresh lows, according to government reports on Wednesday that suggested the economy likely is already in a recession that may be long and deep.
 Reuters - Citigroup Inc faced a crisis of confidence on Wednesday as investors questioned the survival prospects of the U.S. banking giant, and its shares tumbled 23 percent to a 13-year low.
 Reuters - Former U.S. President Bill Clinton has offered to allow ethics reviews of future business and charitable activities should his wife be picked by President-elect Barack Obama as secretary of state, Democrats familiar with the issue said on Wednesday.
 Reuters - The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development will loosen terms of its foreclosure-prevention effort so that the program, meant to backstop $300 billion in home loans, can be more effective, the agency said on Wednesday.
 AFP - An Indian warship destroyed a pirate "mother vessel" in the Gulf of Aden, the navy said Wednesday, as bandits demanded a ransom for a Saudi super-tanker seized in the most daring sea raid yet.
 AFP - At least one Thai anti-government protester was killed and 21 were wounded in a pre-dawn bomb blast Thursday inside a demonstration site in Bangkok, emergency services said.
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