To watch “The Talking Points Memo” in the Screening Room click here. You may remember that the then-candidateAl Gore (search)refused to appear on this program during his presidential run while the then-candidate Bush did appear. I’ve always maintained that Mr. Gore made a major mistake because the perception of him …

MINSK, Belarus – Under a new measure in Belarus, people who work less than half the year will have to pay the government for their idleness. The parliament on Wednesday passed the proposal by authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko, which requires work-capable people who work less than 183 days a year …

BAGHDAD – Forty inmates in a prison in eastern Iraq, including some convicted of terrorism charges, have escaped amid a riot that killed at least six police officers and 30 prisoners, Iraq’s Interior Ministry spokesman said Saturday. There were conflicting casualty reports on the attack at the Khalis prison in …

BEIRUT – Syria has been so contaminated with weapons and bombs that the lives of 5.1 million people, including 2 million children, are at constant risk, an international aid group warned in a report released on Tuesday. Handicap International, which helps the disabled during conflicts, called on all parties in …

As we observed the second anniversary of 9/11, the question naturally arose: Are we safer today than we were two years ago? But a simple “yes” or “no” oversimplifies a complex situation. A conditional “yes” is more appropriate. No one can deny that fighting terrorism around the world increases the …

BUENOS AIRES – Two Argentine judges are under fire for cutting the sentence of a convicted child abuser on the grounds that his 6-year-old victim had suffered earlier abuse and therefore had already been traumatized. In the newly publicized 2014 ruling, the judges cut the child abuser’s sentence from six …

During the last presidential campaign, then Governor George Bush said he wanted to bring a new tone of civility to Washington. He has failed, but not for lack of trying. Even as Sen.Edward Kennedy (search) was calling him a fraud and a payer of bribes to other nations to help …

WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif. – Los Angeles County firefighters got creative to rescue a dog that had fallen into a six-inch-wide gap in West Hollywood, California. Inspector Randall Wright says a dozen firefighters were called to the scene Monday afternoon. They found a 60-pound dog wedged upside down between a house …

NEW YORK – One family of six was living in a homeless-shelter apartment where a dead rat festered on the floor for two days. Another family had no living-room furniture and had been without electricity for days. At a different homeless family shelter, a puddle of urine soiled the floor …

NEW YORK – Police say a taxi hurtled onto a sidewalk and hit four people waiting at a New York City bus stop, killing a man and a 5-year-old girl and injuring two other people. It happened around 6:30 p.m. Friday on Grand Concourse near 170th Street, near the Highbridge …