National/World

Fresh skepticism greeted U.S. automakers over their pleas to Congress for an expanded $34 billion rescue package they say they need to survive.

The Treasury Department is reportedly considering a program to encourage banks to make mortgage loans at low rates to help revive the battered housing market.

Federal prosecutors have dropped four counts of lying to a grand jury against the baseball star leaving him to face trial next year on 10 counts of making false statements plus an addition obstruction of justice charge.

A California couple has been charged with kidnapping and torturing a 17-year-old boy police say they sometimes kept shackled in their home.

The National Christmas Tree is sporting more energy-efficient lights this year, reducing the energy used by 55 percent from last year.

A Minnesota man has pleaded guilty to answering an online advertisement for baby-sitting work and then using the client's child to make a pornographic video.

Six weeks after someone with HIV said dozens of students at a St. Louis high school might have been exposed to the virus, it remains unclear whether an outbreak has occurred.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is calling on the government to ramp up efforts to stem home foreclosures that are feeding into the country's deep economic troubles.

The White House is welcoming Iraq's approval of a security pact that sets a three-year timeframe for U.S. troops to leave.

Orders to U.S. factories plunged in October by the sharpest amount in over eight years as a deepening recession caused big cutbacks in demand for steel, autos, computers and heavy machinery.