President Donald Trump gleefully announced that, under his direction, U.S. military troops had swooped down on the Governor’s Mansion in Sacramento and kidnapped California Governor Gavin Newsom. “We’re charging Newscum with fraud.” When a reporter asked for specifics about the fraud charges, Trump pointed to Attorney General Pam Bondi. Bondi, clearly taken by surprise, said, “We’re looking into it and will let you know the details as soon as we’ve created them.”   read more

Going after criminal cases targeting fraud has come down to what’s easier to prosecute for the Obama administration.   While Americans of all stripes have clamored for justice in the wake of the financial crisis, the U.S. Department of Justice h...   read more

The islands of Maldives in the Indian Ocean are famous for their white sands, turquoise waters and tourism, which accounts for 28% of the nation’s gross domestic product. A full 90% of government tax revenue comes from import duties and tourism-re...   read more

Alpha Natural Resources has been ordered to pay the largest penalty ever for a mining disaster. The company will pay $209 million in restitution and civil and criminal penalties for owning Massey Energy, the notorious mining business that operated...   read more

In the wake of the MF Global controversy, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has adopted new regulations that limit how futures brokerages handle their customers’ money.   The new rules ban firms from borrowing client money through the use...   read more

With a shortage of available farm workers, thanks to the state’s anti-illegal immigrant law, Alabama may use prisoners to pick crops.   Farmers are pushing the idea to state agricultural officials, arguing they need someone to help harvest field...   read more

First-class mail service is headed for a significant slowdown beginning next spring, unless Congress acts to help the struggling U.S. Postal Service.   In order to save $2.1 billion annually and stave off possible bankruptcy, USPS is planning ne...   read more

Five hundred and thirty-five lawmakers on Capitol Hill spent the last 12 months producing one of the least productive congressional sessions in recent memory. As of November 30, the House had approved only 326 bills, the fewest in at least 10 non-...   read more

Conservatives have demanded that President Barack Obama fire his ambassador to Belgium for remarks linking anti-Semitism to the unresolved Palestinian-Israeli conflict.   The two leading Republican candidates for president, Mitt Romney and Newt ...   read more

Efforts to slow the effects of global warming went out the window last year with a record release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. A small number of big developing nations, trying to stimulate their economies out of the global recession, fue...   read more

The top official at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has resigned after being arrested last weekend for drunk driving outside of Washington, DC.   FAA Administrator Jerome Randolph “Randy” Babbitt was pulled over by police in Fairfax Ci...   read more

With prompting from the media, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has decided to make public its secret lists that include repeat corporate polluters.   Following the publication of a story by the Center for Public Integrity’s iWatch News ...   read more

The process of presidential pardons for convicted criminals has not been colorblind in recent years, according to an investigation by ProPublica.   After examining hundreds of pardons issued during the Bush and Obama administrations (mostly the ...   read more

The number of illegal immigrants arrested at the U.S.-Mexico border has continued to decline, down to a 40-year low.   About 327,000 people were apprehended during fiscal year 2011, according to the Department of Homeland Security. This figure i...   read more

Users of Android, BlackBerry and Nokia mobile phones can forget about keeping their cellular activities to themselves. Almost everything a person does on these phones is recorded by a secret program that few knew about until last week.   That wa...   read more

Having previously attested to the product’s safety, the Food and Drug Administration is now considering guidelines to limit the amount of harmful arsenic in apple juice.   The FDA currently does not regulate arsenic levels in fruit juices. But r...   read more

For the millions of Americans who lost their jobs during the Great Recession, finding new employment has been only one hurdle to clear. Getting their old way of life back is still another.   Using four surveys administered between August 2009 an...   read more