NATIONAL
June 25, 2010 | By Janet Hook and Noam N. Levey, Tribune Washington Bureau
Senate Republicans on Thursday once again blocked legislation to reinstate long-term unemployment benefits for people who have exhausted their aid, prolonging a stalemate that has left more than a million people without federal help. With the Senate apparently paralyzed by partisan gridlock, the fate of the aid, as well as tax breaks for businesses and $16 billion in aid for cash-strapped states, remains unclear. California and dozens of other states are hoping for federal aid to help balance their budgets.
ENTERTAINMENT
December 24, 2009
Where you've seen him Tom Waits had small parts in films such as "Rumble Fish" and "The Cotton Club" before he got his first major role in 1986 as a jailhouse escapee in director Jim Jarmusch's "Down by Law." He spectacularly embodied the demented Renfield in Francis Ford Coppola's lavish 1992 feature, "Bram Stoker's Dracula"; the following year he starred opposite Lily Tomlin in Robert Altman's adaptation of Raymond Carver tales "Short Cuts" and, more recently, he earned critical raves as a streetwise guru in the 2006 dark comedy "Wristcutters: A Love Story."
WORLD
January 8, 2009 | Barbara Demick
Like many Chinese peasants of his generation, 53-year-old Wang Zhengnian had never seen a cow until he reached adulthood. He certainly never drank a glass of milk. The fact that Wang now spends his days tending 400 cows on a farm near Beijing says a lot about the way China created a dairy industry out of thin air. But in their haste, the Chinese made mistakes that left six babies dead and hundreds of thousands ill from tainted milk. Milk is not part of the traditional Chinese diet.
ENTERTAINMENT
October 29, 2008 | Stephanie Lysaght, Lysaght is a Times staff writer.
Last January, in a classic "American Idol" preseason meltdown, the hyper-emotional Josiah Leming was sent home -- which in his case meant his car. Now, less than a year later, in one of "Idol's" unlikely turns of fate, the high school dropout who'd left his ailing mother, out-of-work stepfather and eight siblings in Morristown, Tenn., is back, living the high life in Los Angeles and poised to release his first album on Warner Bros. Records.
IMAGE
March 2, 2008 | Emili Vesilind
Hollywood's glamour girls are getting snippy with it lately, trading in their flowing manes for short, kicky 'dos. And we say it's about time. Long-and-sleek locks feel about as fresh as a "Rambo" sequel. Victoria Beckham's manicured bob sparked short-hair mania for the masses last fall, with stars such as Renee Zellweger saying adios to their long tresses soon after. Now it seems that every red carpet features a freshly shorn celeb or two. Here's how the new cuts stack up.
ENTERTAINMENT
April 16, 2006 | Diane Haithman, Times Staff Writer
BOSTON graphic artist Karl Stevens, 27, has found a way to get his foot in the door of the museum world -- the back door. Stevens, who dropped out of two prestigious art schools to pursue his career his own way, is also a guard for the Harvard University Art Museums. His favorite parts of the job are the Tuesday and Thursday late shifts, 7:30 to 11 p.m., when he can be found fortifying the back entrances of the Fogg Art Museum and the Arthur M. Sackler Museum, respectively.