Trying to Keep Your E-Mails Secret When the C.I.A. Chief Couldn’t

If David H. Petraeus couldn’t keep his affair from prying eyes as director of the Central Intelligence Agency, then how is the average American to keep a secret? In the past, a spymaster might have placed a flower pot with a red flag on his balcony or drawn a mark on page 20 of his mistress’s newspaper. Instead, Mr. Petraeus used Gmail. And he got caught. Granted, most people don’t...

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Investigators find major flaws in L.A. Fire Department data

A long-awaited review of the Los Angeles Fire Department found the agency relied on inaccurate data, which provided the public...

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French mayor ends hunger strike after crisis aid

PARIS (Reuters) – A French mayor who went on hunger strike a week ago to demand emergency aid for his town ended his protest on Thursday and packed up the tent he had been sleeping in outside parliament after the government met his demands.“I regret that things came to that but it was necessary,” Stephane Gatignon, mayor of Sevran, a poor town on the outskirts...

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High & Low Finance: Bank of America and MBIA Revisit the Mortgage Debacle

Two villains in the financial crisis — whose negligence, or worse, caused untold suffering when the property bubble burst — are fighting it out. They are battling in the courts, and now in the bond market, where lucky owners of one bond issued by a company that may yet go broke are being offered the chance to cash out at par value. Lawyers are cleaning up.The only people who don’t seem to be doing...

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October home sales hit 3-year high; prices up 17% year over year

Consumer columnist David Lazarus talks with real estate reporter Alejandro Lazo, DataQuick analyst Andrew LePage and Bill McBride of the Calculated Risk blog about the strong October real estate numbers. ...

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NBC names new “Today” show chiefs

(Reuters) – Comcast‘s NBC has appointed two executives to take charge of the “Today” show, a day after the television network announced that longtime producer Jim Bell would be leaving to take a larger role in the sports division.Don Nash, a broadcast producer who has worked on NBC’s morning show for 23 years, will become the executive producer, reporting...

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F.D.A. Seeks More Control Over Drug Compounders

Susan Walsh/Associated PressBarry Cadden, chief pharmacist for the company that made the contaminated drugs, at a Congressional hearing on Wednesday. WASHINGTON — The commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday called on Congress to empower the agency to better police compounding pharmacies like the one at the center of a national meningitis outbreak. But Republican lawmakers...

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Hormone may help protect monogamous relationships

If retired Army Gen. David H. Petraeus had gotten an occasional dose of supplemental oxytocin, a brain chemical known to promote...

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Man who accused Elmo puppeteer of teen sex recants

NEW YORK (AP) — A man who accused Elmo puppeteer Kevin Clash of having sex with him when he was a teenage boy has recanted his story.In a quick turnabout, the man on Tuesday described his sexual relationship with Clash as adult and consensual. Clash responded with a statement of his own, saying he is “relieved that this...

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‘Dream Team’ of Behavioral Scientists Advised Obama Campaign

Chris Keane/ReutersDOOR TO DOOR Ricky Hall, an Obama volunteer, in Charlotte, N.C., last week. Late last year Matthew Barzun, an official with the Obama campaign, called Craig Fox, a psychologist in Los Angeles, and invited him to a political planning meeting in Chicago, according to two people who attended the session. “He said, ‘Bring the whole group; let’s hear what you have to say,’ ”...

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