ELECTIONS

Prime Minister-designate Mario Monti raced to assemble a new government for Italy on Tuesday while a sharp rise in French borrowing costs raised fears that the two-year debt crisis may spread to the euro zone's second biggest economy.

Prime Minister-designate Mario Monti raced to assemble a new government for Italy Tuesday while a sharp rise in French borrowing costs raised fears that the two-year debt crisis may spread to the euro zone's second-biggest economy.

What to know about the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to hear arguments on the Affordable Care Act.

Prime Minister-designate Mario Monti meets the leaders of Italy's biggest two parties on Tuesday to discuss the many sacrifices needed to reverse a collapse in market confidence that is driving an ever deepening euro zone debt crisis.

Egyptians are facing a blizzard of posters and TV adverts seeking their votes in the first free parliamentary election in decades but some campaigners are turning to tricks like tearing down rival posters in a race where every vote counts.

The Supreme Court agreed on Monday to decide the fate of President Barack Obama's healthcare law, with an election-year ruling due by July on the healthcare system's biggest overhaul in nearly 50 years.

Italy anxiously awaits the reaction of financial markets Monday to the appointment of former European Commissioner Mario Monti to head a technocratic government, hoping it will end a disastrous week for the Eurozone's third largest economy.

Italy's head of state begins talks Sunday to appoint an emergency government to succeed outgoing Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and handle a crisis that has brought the Eurozone's third-largest economy to the brink of financial disaster.

Only Italy could produce a leader like Berlusconi.

Can anyone bring any sense of fiscal stability and normalcy to the Italian government? Perhaps Mario Monti, center, can -- and all in the European Union, and those who believe in the euro, not just the citizens of Italy, will no doubt be rooting for him.

To most Republicans in Congress, it is a given that any deficit-reduction deal would have to include cuts to entitlement programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. According to a newly released survey, however, Republican voters in four key early-voting states disagree.

Vladimir Putin's United Russia party has released a steamy new ad encouraging people to go to the polls for the Dec. 4 parliamentary election.

Rivals President Robert Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai together on Friday condemned political violence in Zimbabwe and said parties should freely hold meetings at a time when tensions are rising ahead of possible elections in 2012.

This spells more bad news for the ruling Socialist government which is likely facing a huge defeat at the hands of the opposition conservative Popular Party in the November 20 elections.

Bollore plans to invest 18 billion CFA francs in Abidjan port by 2013 to make it the region's key sea hub, the French logistics and transport group's Africa chief said.

Gold prices recouped big early losses Thursday to start Comex floor trading about one percent down as the U.S. dollar fell against the euro on hopes a new Italian and Greek governments may pave the way for Europe to avert a recession.

Former European Commissioner Mario Monti emerged on Thursday as favorite to replace Silvio Berlusconi and form a new government to stave off a run on Italian bonds that is endangering the entire euro zone.

The new interim government will be sworn in at 12:00 London time on Friday.

Political and economic crisis in Italy spurred fears of a split in the Eurozone with borrowing costs for Europe's third biggest economy at unsustainable levels and the bloc unable to afford a bailout.

Ed Lee won San Francisco's mayoral race on Wednesday, becoming the first elected mayor of Chinese descent in a city steeped in Chinese American history.

Election Day 2011 will best be remembered for Democratic victories on ballot initiatives in Ohio and Mississippi, but another statement was made when the few states electing legislators and governors generally held on to incumbents and their parties.