United States

Inside the tidy suburban St. Louis home of John and Linda Johnson, no photos of their eldest daughter grace the walls. Army Pfc. LaVena Johnson was just 19 when she died in Iraq in 2005; to this day her parents cannot bear to display reminders of her life. John Johnson does possess other photos of his daughter -- explicit color shots of her autopsy and death scene. He shows them to a visitor. They are horrifying: LaVena in a pool of blood. LaVena's corpse on a coroner's table.

Religious and labor leaders called upon Congress and President-elect Obama to pass a comprehensive immigration package this year and said that the U.S. economy could not be restored without legalizing the nation's undocumented immigrants. "Immigration reform is a necessity in order to fix the American economy," John Wilhelm, president of Unite Here's hospitality-industry division, said Thursday during a national teleconference call on immigration reform.

Rennison Vern Castillo thought his legal troubles were nearly over at the end of a jail stay for harassing his ex-girlfriend. But then a U.S. immigration hold order blocked his release. "They think you're here illegally," a jailhouse guard said to him. Castillo, mystified, insisted it was all a mistake. Though born in Belize, he had come of age in South Los Angeles, spoke fluent English, served a stint in the Army and had become an American citizen about seven years earlier.

U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke are in Beijing this week to talk about climate change with Chinese leaders. The hope is to open the nation's market to American clean technology products while nudging China toward committing to hard targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. They have their work cut out for them.

President Obama's threat to cut off government loans and bring on bankruptcy has given him unprecedented leverage to realize his vision of Detroit as the world leader in greener cars. Yet even if the president succeeds in getting domestic carmakers onto firmer financial ground, even if Detroit overcomes decades of consumer skepticism about the quality of its products and begins cranking out fuel-efficient cars that don't damage the environment -- even then the U.S. auto industry could die.

It's official: This recession is the worst the United States has experienced in more than 25 years, the government said Friday. And it appears likely to get worse before it gets better. At the White House, where the new administration is working on a broad strategy to combat the crisis, President Obama described the downturn as "a continuing disaster for America's working families."

At a stop on his grand global apology tour this spring, President Obama was asked by a reporter in France if he believed in "American exceptionalism." This is the notion that our history as the world's oldest democracy, our immigrant founding and our devotion to liberty endow the United States with a unique, providential role in world affairs.

Under bright spring sunshine, the mood at the White House was celebratory last week as President Obama announced an agreement on new rules to force drastic improvements in the fuel efficiency and tailpipe emissions of the nation's cars and trucks. But what made the Rose Garden audience unusual was not the environmentalists and liberal Democrats, who have long supported such requirements.

The U.S. military has launched a program of armed Predator drone missions against militants in Pakistan that for the first time gives Pakistani officers significant control over routes, targets and decisions to fire weapons, U.S. officials said. The joint effort is aimed at getting the government in Islamabad, which has bitterly protested Predator strikes, more directly engaged in one of the most successful elements of the battle against Islamist insurgents.

This sprawling industrial park south of Nairobi was supposed to be a centerpiece of a Clinton-era U.S.-Africa trade program designed to make "Made in Kenya" almost as familiar as clothing labels from China and Taiwan. Well-known American brands, including wrinkle-free Dockers, Gloria Vanderbilt jeans and Izod polo shirts, roll off sewing assembly lines here before being shipped to Target, Sears and other U.S. retailers.