WASHINGTON – Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden is one step away from being CIA director after the Senate Intelligence Committee voted Tuesday to approve him for the job. The full Senate could vote on final approval of Hayden by the end of the week. The White House would like to …

WASHINGTON – Israel’s new prime minister, Ehud Olmert, will make his first official trip to the White House to meet with President Bush on May 23. The White House on Monday said it would be an opportunity to discuss the strong relationship between the United States and Israel as well …

WASHINGTON – New orders for U.S.-made durable goods tumbled an unexpectedly large 4.8 percent in April on drops in orders for civilian aircraft and computer and electronic products, a government report showed Wednesday. Even when transportation orders were stripped out, orders for goods meant to last three years or longer …

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CAIRO, Egypt – An Al Qaeda-led insurgent group said in a Web statement Wednesday that it has decided to kill four kidnapped Russian Embassy staffers after a deadline for meeting its demands passed. The statement, which did not say whether the decision has been carried out, came a day after …

VATICAN CITY – Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone of Italy, a longtime aide to Pope Benedict XVI and the first major church official to speak out against “The Da Vinci Code,” was appointed Thursday as secretary of state, the Vatican‘s No. 2 official. The pope also accepted the retirement of American Cardinal …

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia – Rangers sighted tracks of a baby Sumatran rhino in the heart of Borneo’s jungles, raising hopes for the survival of a species pushed to the brink of extinction by poaching and habitat destruction, conservationists said Wednesday. An expedition by SOS Rhino, a Chicago-based wildlife foundation, found …

Attention fish shoppers: Some “wild” salmon may actually come from a farm. Consumer Reports dishes up the fish fraud in its August issue. Stores aren’t required by law to label their salmon as “wild” or “farm-raised,” but if they use those labels, they’re supposed to be accurate, the magazine notes. …

This weekend and next bring us two of the summer’s biggest blockbusters: “Superman Returns” and “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest.” I’m not a huge fan of action movies, but I was excited to see both. I did, and here are my decidedly anti-analytical, un-intellectual capsule reviews of each: …

SAN DIEGO – Seven Marines and a Navy corpsman could face murder, kidnapping and conspiracy charges as early as Friday in the shooting death of an Iraqi man, a defense attorney said. Military prosecutors plan to file the charges against the men, who are being held in solitary confinement at …