Saudi king warns West will be jihadists' next target AFP 1 hr ago  —  Jeddah (Saudi Arabia) (AFP) - King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has warned that the West will be the next target of the jihadists sweeping through Syria and Iraq, unless there is “rapid” action.

Considering Catcalls  —  No one is catcalling Rosie O'Donnell, Barbara Bush, or Janet Napolitano.  No one is catcalling my plump elderly mother as I wheel her down the sidewalk in her wheelchair.  Marilyn Monroe once observed that she could walk down the sidewalk without drawing attention …

Myth of arctic meltdown: Stunning satellite images show summer ice cap is thicker and covers 1.7million square kilometres MORE than 2 years ago...despite Al Gore's prediction it would be ICE-FREE by now  — Seven years after former US Vice-President Al Gore's warning, Arctic ice cap has expanded for second year in row

McConnell campaign chief resigns amid scandal  —  Jesse Benton resigned as Sen. Mitch McConnell's campaign manager Friday following reports that he had emerged as a figure in an endorsement scandal during the 2012 Iowa presidential caucus.  —  In an emailed statement Friday evening …

Coverage for End-of-Life Talks Gaining Ground  —  DUNDEE, N.Y. — Five years after it exploded into a political conflagration over “death panels,” the issue of paying doctors to talk to patients about end-of-life care is making a comeback, and such sessions may be covered for the 50 million Americans on Medicare as early as next year.

Walnut Creek officer accused of beating woman with bat  —  A man who'd been in charge of upholding the law for three decades is now accused of breaking it.  Richmond police arrested an off-duty Walnut Creek Police Officer for allegedly donning a mask and beating a woman with a baseball bat on August 16.

Syria's violence prompts worst humanitarian crisis in a century  —  IRBIL, IRAQ — Nearly half of Syria's population has been displaced either internally or externally as refugees in the worst humanitarian crisis to strike the Middle East in at least a century, according to new data released by the International Rescue Committee.

Lost chapter of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory published  —  Chapter with more characters and Quentin Blake illustration deemed ‘too wild’ for British children appears for first time  —  A lost chapter of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, deemed too wild, subversive and insufficiently moral …

Afsun Qureshi: The Muslim prayer that might save your life  —  London, England — As a young girl in a downtown Toronto hospital, I stood on my tiptoes, peering at my cancer-ridden uncle lying mutely on the hospital bed.  He was asleep — exhausted and wasted from years of waging war with cancer.