Amy Winehouse Back in Rehab

Shock horror news: Amy Winehouse does drugs. And there we were thinking she was just out for a jog when snapped running through freezing streets in her bra and bare feet the other week.

John Pilger: Presidential Campaigns Are a Parody

What struck me, living and working in the United States, was that presidential campaigns were a parody, entertaining and often grotesque. They are a ritual danse macabre of flags, balloons and bullsh*t, designed to camouflage a venal system based on money power, human division and a culture of permanent war.

French rogue trader lost his bank $7.2bn.

So was it his fault the markets crashed?

A brilliant young rogue trader, who spun an elaborate web of fake transactions from his desk, has cost France's second-biggest bank €4.9bn (£3.7bn) in what appears to be the largest-ever fraud by a single trader.

NYT Endorses Clinton & McCain

As Nominees for Presidential Election

Her ideas, her comeback in New Hampshire and strong showing in Nevada, her new openness to explaining herself and not just her programs, and her abiding, powerful intellect show she is fully capable of being a leader of the nation.

There's Method to Bill Clinton's "Madness"

"We're going to have a few arguments. It's a contact sport," a cheerful Bill Clinton said. Hillary called him "a tremendous asset." That he is. His anger may be nothing more an affectation to gain a tactical edge in the battle. But it's working.

Liberating Gaza: Palestinians Break out of

Their Concentration Camp

Palestinians have poured into the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing through holes blown along the border wall between the Gaza Strip and Egypt. Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland reports from Gaza, alongside Amr el-Kahky, Al Jazeera's Cairo correspondent.

John McCain Liberal? Bullshit! He's a Raging Warmonger

A lazy, hazy myth has arisen out of the mists of New Hampshire and South Carolina. Across the media, the grizzled 71-year-old Vietnam vet, John McCain, is being billed as the Republican liberals can live with. He is "a bipartisan progressive."

Obama: The White Man's Wet Dream

Tired of hearing complaints about injustices? Take an Obama pill - it'll absolve you. Conservative pundits provide insider testimony on what is behind mass white enthusiasm for Obama. I hate to say this, but Barack has been turned into 'Sambo'.

The Fed Bails Out the Free Marketeers

The policy of slashing rates to rescue big finance is both flawed and fraught with risk. The big flaw in the cheap money approach is that it was too much cheap money that got the US (and Britain, for that matter) into difficulties in the first place.

Heath Ledger: An Overnight Cliché

They're already calling him the next James Dean. They said the same about River Phoenix, when he collapsed from a drug overdose in 1993, even though Dean died in a car crash. The glamour of beauty and self-destruction turned them into tragic heroes.

Obama's Faustian Bargain with Antoin 'Tony' Rezko

It is nothing short of a political godfather story. The tale of an eager, brilliant, ambitious man wanting to rise in politics, and the man who had the money to make it happen. It's the real true tale of Barack Obama and Antoin "Tony" Rezko and the Faustian political deal made in the quest for power, fame and political prowess, which would eventually lead to a bid for the presidency.

Clinton Plays Hardball

Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential campaign aired a new radio ad here Wednesday that repeated a discredited charge against Sen. Barack Obama, in what some Democrats said is part of an increasing pattern of hardball politics by her and former president Bill Clinton.

Heath Ledger: They're already calling him

the next James Dean

Almost as soon as the first reports of Heath Ledger's untimely death emerged on Tuesday night, that process was under way, a collective outpouring of grief for another golden boy, talented, handsome - and gone.

Clinton vs Obama: Too Nasty?

Were the exchanges – in which Obama criticized Clinton’s service on the Walmart Board, and Clinton questioned Obama’s association with a Chicago “slumlord” – too “intense and personal”?

Financial Crisis: How Long Before the Crash?

It's been obvious for so long that the economies of many leading nations were underwritten by simply artificially inflating the value of assets and then using those assets as collateral to borrow against. This led to a consumer boom based on debt.

Hillary Clinton Will Win on the Economy

The economy and fears of a recession will remain the major news story for the next few weeks. Hillary Clinton is best equipped to handle the country's problems. This makes it more likely she'll secure the nomination in the Super Tuesday primaries.

Clitoral Capitalism

With talk about how to stimulate it, the economy is like a giant clitoris. The Fed may not employ this imagery, but the challenge - and now the number one issue in the presidential race - is how best to get the economy engorged and throbbing again.

Why Do We Deny Teenage Sexuality?

A rise in teenage pregnancy rates for the first time since 1991 seems to have re-awakened Americans' fears over the problem of early childbearing. This latest panic reflects the nation's dogged denial about the role of sexuality in adolescence.

Economic Crisis Spells Doom for the Republicans

The magnitude of the Federal Reserve's emergency move yesterday – the largest reduction in the benchmark federal funds rate since 1982 – testifies to the official alarm in Washington at the deteriorating US economy. It's good news for the Democrats.

Maureen Dowd Bashes the Clintons [Again & Again]

Conservative commentators like Maureen Dowd argue that Bill Clinton’s more recent “outbursts” had somehow damaged Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. Yet Obama may find he has committed the more expensive error by attacking Bill Clinton.