AP - The unprecedented turtle rescue effort at NASA's Kennedy Space Center is winding down.

AP - Stocks resumed their rally Wednesday after a successful auction of Portuguese government debt eased worries about Europe's financial system.

AP - Detroit Mayor Dave Bing defended a stretched fire department Wednesday and its response to what he termed "a natural disaster," after wind-whipped flames destroyed dozens of occupied and abandoned homes across the city.

AP - A Muslim stonemason who spent nearly four decades helping to restore a Roman Catholic cathedral in France has been immortalized as a winged gargoyle peering out from its facade — with the inscription "God is great" written in French and Arabic.

AFP - At least 11 people including civilians died on Wednesday in fighting between African Union troops backing the Somali government and Islamist rebels, officials and witnesses said.

AP - Mayor Richard M. Daley said Wednesday that he will not endorse anyone to replace him as leader of the nation's third-largest city as speculation grew about who would emerge as a front-runner from a long list of potential contenders, including one-time aide and current White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel.

AP - The remnants of Tropical Storm Hermine caused massive flooding in northern Texas on Wednesday, killing at least one person and much of the city of Arlington under water.

AFP - US President Barack Obama Wednesday admitted some of his policies were unpopular and had not revived the economy quickly enough, but sought to rekindle his frayed bond with American voters.

AP - Firefighters encountered a tangle of rattlesnakes, downed power lines and combustible propane tanks Wednesday as authorities looked for eight people missing in a wildfire that has destroyed dozens of homes.

Reuters - President Barack Obama, fighting to keep Democrats in charge of Congress, said on Wednesday the United States could not afford to extend Bush-era tax cuts for the rich and accused Republicans of being fiscally irresponsible.

AP - President Barack Obama is getting a little personal about the sluggish economy, telling a Cleveland audience about his own family's struggles and hardships.

AP - European Union nations and the continent's biggest human rights organization slammed Iran on Wednesday for its plans to stone a woman convicted of adultery, increasing the global pressure on Tehran over a case it has tried to frame as a criminal matter and not one of human rights.

Time.com - In North Korea, the first congress in 30 years of the Workers' Party of Korea may be imminent, suggesting that a succession is being prepared to hand power from Kim Jong Il to his son Kim Jong Un

AP - President Barack Obama strongly defended his opposition to extending Bush-era tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans on Wednesday and delivered a searing attack on Republicans and their House leader for advocating "the same philosophy that led to this mess in the first place."

Reuters - Fidel Castro said Cuba's economic model no longer works, a U.S.-based journalist reported on Wednesday following interviews with the former president last week.

Reuters - Australia's fragile Labor government suggested on Wednesday it could adjust a planned profits-based tax on mining companies to bend to demands of the independent MPs giving it a slender grip on power.

AP - Demonstrators pelted police for a second night in a poor immigrant neighborhood following the fatal shooting of a Guatemalan day laborer who allegedly threatened people with a knife and then turned the weapon on a responding officer.

AP - The leader of a small Florida church that espouses anti-Islam philosophy said Wednesday he was determined to burn copies of the Quran on Sept. 11, despite pressure from the White House, religious leaders and others to call it off.

AFP - The US economy is showing "widespread" signs of deceleration, the US Federal Reserve warned in its latest Beige Book report published Wednesday.

AP - The Taliban's shadowy leader told Afghans on Wednesday that the insurgents are winning the war and warned Americans that they are wasting lives and billions in tax dollars by continuing in the conflict.

AP - In an internal report released Wednesday, BP blames itself, other companies' workers and a complex series of failures for the massive Gulf of Mexico oil spill and the drilling rig explosion that preceded it.

AP - The hidden face of the Emirates' economic crunch is in places such as Industrial Zone 18 and the ramshackle compound for about 700 migrant workers within. For more than six months, they have lived on charity, fought off rats and slept amid piles of trash after a construction company abruptly closed and left them jobless.

AP - Most of the country will see a colder-than-usual winter while summer and spring will be relatively cool and dry, according to the time-honored, complex calculations of the "Old Farmer's Almanac."

AP - The FBI on Wednesday was trying to determine whether a passenger staged a bomb hoax that prompted a search of a Thai Airways jetliner at Los Angeles International Airport.