A one-night stay? Ninety dollars. Need to see a doctor? Ten bucks. Want toilet paper? Pay for it yourself. In the ever-widening search for extra income during desperate economic times, states across the nation are embracing a new idea: making inmates pay their debt to society not only in hard time, but... 

The bountiful harvest of California strawberries, melons, grapes, peaches and nectarines overflows the nation’s summer tables. But that luscious crop mostly emerges from farm workers who labor in flat fields under a scorching sun — and has a price higher than the grocery store bill. Every year... 

If you’re like me then you’ve probably devoted some thought to what you’d do in the first moments of a zombie apocalypse. My friends and I plan on heading up to a cabin — whose location I am sworn not to disclose — where we’ll hold out with all the guns and food we... 

Batman has been doing a good job of delivering what seems to be an adult experience in Teen-level ratings these days. The Dark Knight was a sometimes-disturbing look into the world of Batman, with a now-iconic take on the sociopathic joker… that came with a PG-13 rating. Batman: Arkham Asylum likewise... 

GENEVA – When launched to great fanfare nearly a year ago, some feared the Large Hadron Collider would create a black hole that would suck in the world. It turns out the Hadron may be the black hole. The world’s largest scientific machine has cost $10 billion, has worked only nine days and has... 

When General Motors Co. emerged from bankruptcy, it was freed of obligations for polluted properties at discarded plant sites that will require millions of dollars to clean up. GM’s unusual, government-engineered bankruptcy allowed the Detroit automaker to emerge as a new company — and to shed billions... 

Nine people were presumed dead Saturday after a midair collision sent a low-flying plane and a tourist helicopter spiraling from a clear blue sky into the Hudson River. The dead included five Italian tourists seconds into a sightseeing tour above the city, both pilots, and two passengers on the small... 

ATLANTA – There aren’t just fewer jobs in a recession. There are fewer babies, too. U.S. births fell in 2008, the first full year of the recession, marking the first annual decline in births since the start of the decade and ending an American baby boomlet. The downturn in the economy best explains... 

Going online in countries where internet censorship is common is rather like visiting a parallel universe run by the world’s strictest, most bigoted parents. Entire sites disappear without warning. YouTube is frequently blocked for hosting content that some regimes don’t want their citizens... 

In one of the great blunders of journalism, Mark Twain once found his name listed in the obituary column. His famous reply, “Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated,” has forever become part of our lexicon for describing hyperbole. Yet, at a certain point in time, Mark Twain’s... 

Imagine that you wander into a video rental place on a Saturday night, because for some ridiculous reason, you still haven’t joined Netflix. After making your selections, you get in line to check out, only to see that the woman working the counter is being threatened with her life, as her assailant... 

Despite being highly poisonous, the yellow-lipped sea krait is vulnerable to attack while probing for food with its tail exposed. But it fools sharks, carnivorous fish and birds with a sideways twist which makes the snake’s tail appear to be its head, which is recognisable by its distinct black... 

NEW YORK (AP) — At least eight players — and possibly more — on the list of 104 names seized by the government did not test positive for steroids, Major League Baseball said Saturday. In statements ahead of a news conference at Yankee Stadium, the commissioner’s office and union general counsel... 

NEW YORK — David Ortiz believes then-legal supplements and vitamins likely caused him to land on a 2003 list of alleged drug users seized by the federal government, and Major League Baseball and the players’ association said some of the players on the list never tested positive for performance-enhancing... 

Everyone started jerkin’ last year. When the kids returned from summer vacation, it was like they’d contracted some rare virus. A tsetse-fly bite in reverse, but rather than sleeping sickness, teenagers from Long Beach to Lancaster started getting geeked up … a dancing dominoes of flailing...