The stress test results are out, and remarkably similar to the leaked versions that have peppered business media all week: Federal regulators say America's 19 biggest banks needs to raise $75 billion by November. Though somewhat cheerier than estimates from only two months ago, the "too big to fail" banks still have a lot of work to do, said Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner at a news briefing Thursday afternoon. Among the stressed-out banks is Citigroup, which needs to raise $5.5 billion in new capital on top of the $45 billion in rescue funds they must convert into ordinary stock (which will makes the U.S. a 36-percent owner of the bank). Bank of America needs $35 billion but is expected to resist converting government shares; the New York Times reports the bank is more likely to sell assets, including its stake in China Construction Bank. GMAC, General Motors' finance arm needs $11.5 billion more capital. Among the lucky banks that aren't being instructed to raise more capital: JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, MetLife, Bank of New York Mellon, and Capital Onel. But will the stress tests put to rest the nation's economic anxieties? Bloomberg reports that stocks slid today, and bank experts remain divided.

Drew Peterson was arrested Thursday for allegedly murdering his third wife, Kathleen Savio, whose death had previously been ruled an accident. The former Illinois police officer is accused of beating and drowning Kathleen Savio to death in a bathtub in 2004 based on new evidence collected from the exhumation and autopsy of Savio’s body. Peterson made headlines in 2007 when his fourth wife, 23-year-old Stacy Peterson, disappeared in October 2007. At the time, Savio’s family voiced suspicions that Peterson killed Savio and filed a lawsuit seeking more than $100,000.

Apparently, Bristol Palin's message of abstinence just did not ring true for a crowd of NYC teens today. After listening to the young mother's comments at a town hall forum, some 150 teenagers left unimpressed, calling her a "hypocrite" and "a big flop," among other things. One media-savvy teen told ABC News, "She's just trying to help her mother. She said it herself that abstinence education doesn't work. I looked it up." The room where the forum was held was decorated with banners using scare tactics to ward kids away from sex. One example featured a big picture of a baby crib, along with the question, "Not really what you pictured your first crib, huh?" None of this is new to teens, of course, and one put the event in perspective. "This (message) is a good thing. We'd take it from someone true and honest, not a celebrity."

The GOP’s effort to rebrand itself through a series of town hall meetings led by the newly-formed National Council for a New America—starting last night with a pizza party-slash-press conference in Virginia—is drawing fire from social conservatives who think the group is avoiding hot-button issues like abortion, gay marriage, and immigration. Led by Minority Whip Eric Cantor, Mitt Romney, and Jeb Bush, the group is already raising rancor in the Republican ranks. "The moderates have been saying the same thing all these years, and now they're just seeing a renewed opportunity to push their ideas," Congressman Steve King said. Politico reports that the New America council invited some, but not all, Republicans to join. Uninvited presidential candidate-turned-Fox News personality Mike Huckabee said the rebranding effort marked a "sad day" for the Republican party.

Jacob Zuma is taking all three of his wives to his inauguration as South Africa’s president this Saturday, sparking speculation as to which of his wives will take on the role of first lady. The 67-year-old has been married five times and has 19 children. He grew up a Zulu in rural South Africa, where polygamy is common, though he will become South Africa’s first polygamous president. Political experts say the role of first lady isn’t defined in South Africa as it is in the U.S., and that Zuma will probably rotate his wives through official occasions, bring them all along, or even have one of his daughters take on the role.

Jack Bauer will have to come up with quite the cunning plan to escape this imbroglio. The often-inebriated star of 24 has turned himself into cops, and is being charged with 3rd degree assault. The embarrassment occurred at a star-studded party Monday evening when fashion designer Jack McCollough attempted to slip by Brooke Shields, who was chatting with Sutherland at the bar. Though Shields insists McCullough did nothing inappropriate, Sutherland took exception, and the confrontation quickly escalated. McCullough ended up walking away with his nose split and filed a complaint the next day in the wake of "the vicious, violent, unprovoked assault," as his rep put it. The filming schedule of 24 may be delayed due to the arrest, which likely constitutes a violation of Sutherland's probation.

Have some time on your hands? President Obama has released a new, detailed 1,500-page budget for fiscal year 2010 that fills in the broad outline he unveiled in February. 40 percent of the $3.4 trillion budget is discretionary spending, which Congress will appropriate. In a letter and press conference, President Obama vowed to cut the federal budget deficit in half by the end of his first term and said he would bring nondefense discretionary spending to its lowest level as a share of GDP since 1962 within 10 years. Also, under the budget request for the Pentagon, spending for Afghanistan surpasses spending for Iraq for the first time.

With details from President Obama's 1500-page budget emerging by the minute, the Associated Press reports that the Pentagon's proposed $534 billion budget will ratchet up spending on intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance—including billions for Lockheed Martin fighter jets, a naval destroyer, and a handful of new Black Hawk helicopters. In response, perhaps, to the increased threat of high seas pirates, the Navy is requesting cash from Congress for eight new ships. The Army's $142 billion budget includes $21 billion for buying weapons, a proportion representing a 9 percent drop from last year's budget. If the requested purchases for the Army, Navy, and Air Force go through, defense contractors Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and General Dynamics Corp. could end up with brisk federal business—but some of the money is aimed at restarting competition between contracting firms, including the "politically charged $35 billion tanker contract" expected to be awarded to either Northrop Grumman or rival Boeing next spring.

They didn't teach this at finishing school: Thomas Patrick Gilbert Cholmondeley, scion of one of Kenya’s most influential white families, has been convicted of murdering a Kenyan poacher trespassing on his land. The high-profile story captured the racially divided nation's attention, since Cholmondeley was acquitted before of killing a black Kenyan—and many argue his wealth and race were his saving graces. Cholmondeley faces life in prison for manslaughter, and has already spent close to three years behind bars in one of Kenya’s toughest prisons. The convicted claimed he had been trying to shoot the poacher’s dogs, and accidentally shot the victim instead.

As the Pakistani government's deal with the Taliban in the Swat Valley unravels, a full-blown refugee crisis is developing. The U.N. reports that 2,200 families are already registered at refugee camps, and that assistance will be available for 6,000 more. As it turns out, the Taliban's promise to lay down their weapons in return for the institution of sharia law in some of Pakistan's western provinces never worked out as planned. The Taliban, emboldened by the government's pacifist stance, only amped up its terrorizing of the local populace. Inexplicably, the Pakistani government continues to vacillate between talks of peace and taking the fight to the Taliban. Experts are concerned that the refugee camps may become fertile recruitment grounds for radicals. As one frustrated refugee at a camp told The Washington Post, "I feel like I have lost my mind. I work hard to make a respectable life and educate my children. Now we are living in a camp, and my sons are talking of guns."

Arlen Specter’s had a gloomy few days, but here’s a ray of light for him: Tom Ridge, former governor of Pennsylvania and director of Homeland Security, has chosen to not run against Arlen Specter in the 2010 Senate race. “Under the budget request for the Pentagon, Afghanistan war funding surpasses that for Iraq for the first time, part of a shift in priorities that Gates seeks in defense spending,” he wrote in a statement. In some polls, Ridge had been leading Specter.

Just Manny injecting Manny: ESPN reports that Manny Ramirez, the Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder, has tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs and has been suspended for 50 games. Ramirez claims he was taking the drugs for a medical issue and was told they would not be a problem with MLB’s drug policy. He will lose $7.7 million in salary and not return until July 3. What drug did he use? A source tells Yahoo Sports "the substance is supposed to boost sex drive."

Though the H1N1 flu virus may not be as deadly as originally feared, its rapid spread is still remarkable. 2,099 people have confirmed cases of the bug in 23 nations. Half of those cases are in Mexico, which has been hit hardest by the virus. The U.S. comes in second, with 30 percent of the confirmed cases. Health organizations in the U.S. are speaking in a much calmer tone than a week ago, and are now treating the outbreak in a manner similar to the seasonal flu. Nevertheless, the virus has been reported in 41 states and the CDC expects to see many more in the coming days.

Could things get any worse for the Republican Party? First Arlen Specter, now... Joe the Plumber. The working-class pundit with questionable credentials has abandoned the party that brought his 15 minutes of fame, explaining that he is disgusted by the GOP's "overspending." As is often the case for Joe—real name, Samuel Wurzelbacher—his logic broke down in his tangled web of conservatism, as he said he would not support "cuts in defense, Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid—which, along with debt payments, would put more than two-thirds of the budget off limits." Without a party affiliation, how will Joe land more speaking gigs on Capitol Hill?

Thedirty.com has released a new racy photo of Miss California Carrie Prejean, similar to the first, in which she poses in nothing but a pair of pink panties. Prejean had said that the first photo was the only such picture, despite the fact that Thedirty.com says it has seen four. “I shouldnt [sic] have taken the photo of me in my underwear,” she said in an email to the Miss California Pageant obtained by TMZ. “There are no other photos of me. This was the only one I took.” The runner-up in the Miss California Pageant, Tami Farrell, meanwhile, told Access Hollywood that she’s ready to take over the tiara. "I would be honored to represent the state of California if they need me for my responsibilities as first runner-up. I wouldn't mind stepping into the spotlight."

A love-spurned madman gunned down his ex-girlfriend at a book store near Wesleyan University in Connecticut Wednesday and remains at large. Cops on the case have launched a manhunt for the disturbed 29-year-old, Stephen Morgan, who scribbled threats in his journal toward Wesleyan students and Jews. His victim, 21-year-old Johanna Justin-Jinich, had filed a harassment complaint against Morgan in the past, Bloomberg reports. The killler stormed the book store wearing a wig, opened fire and then made a hasty escape. Wesleyan University is now on lockdown.

Nothing spurs a dramatic change like economic collapse. Saying that the current business model is "malfunctioning," News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch told reporters Wednesday that his news Web sites would start charging for content. Murdoch cited the Wall Street Journal's success with its subscription program as proof that users would pay for news online. "The current days of the Internet will soon be over," Murdoch told reporters. News Corp., like everybody, has not fared well recently. Its newspaper division "barely broke even" and its profits from television also shrunk drastically. The two divisions that did fare well? 20th Century Fox, the film studio, and—you guessed it—Fox News, which helped push a 30 percent increase in profits from last year in the cable TV division.

President Obama has said he wants to burst the White House "bubble" so perhaps it makes sense he called in pseudo-outsiders to talk about education reform. Rev. Al Sharpton, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich—all participants of the nonprofit Education Equality Project—met with the president today. "There must be a commitment in this country to equal education," Sharpton said. "There can be no sacred cows." Gingrich was also happy to be there. "I think this is an issue that should bring all Americans together," he said.

The “Hobbit” skeletons, found in Indonesia, probably belonged to their own species, according to two new papers in Nature. Researchers have argued heatedly over the origins of the 3-foot-tall, 65-pound people, who roamed the island of Flores 8,000 years ago. The Hobbits most likely descended from an earlier species of human and then were naturally selected to be smaller and smaller in a process called island dwarfing, one team concludes. The Hobbits’ brains were about a third the size of the modern human brain, though the people used stone tools and had “incredibly human” feet—not, apparently, the oversize, floppy appendages imagined by J.R.R. Tolkien.

The pressure is on for California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to fill the state's mega-bucks deficit, and he might have found an answer: selling pot. Schwarzenegger is supporting a large-scale study to investigate the legalization and taxation of marijuana for recreational uses. "I think it's time for a debate," he said. A recent poll showed more than half of the state's registered voters support legalizing and taxing marijuana as a way to fill the budget deficit. Sales could raise over $1.2 billion annually in tax revenues, according to estimates, though that would do little to counteract the state's deficit, which could reach a staggering $20 billion in a little over a year.

What happened in the bombing in Afghanistan? The top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Army General David McKiernan, dispatched a joint American-Afghan team to investigate the airstrikes this week that killed at least two dozen people and maybe, The Times of London reports, up to 100, including women and children. The attacks were ordered when the governor of Afghanistan’s Farah province called for U.S. support after his police were overwhelmed by a battle that started when the Taliban beheaded three civilians. McKiernan also hinted, however, that the U.S. may not be responsible for the deaths. "We have some other information that leads us to distinctly different conclusions about the cause of these civilian casualties," he said.

An inspiration for us all: “A condemned cow made a desperate bid for freedom yesterday, bolting from a slaughterhouse and leading cops on a wild chase through the streets of Queens,” writes the New York Post. The cow, nicknamed Molly, escaped from the Musa Hala slaughterhouse and evaded cops for about an hour. “I heard a lady scream. Then I saw a baby cow,” said one witness. "I wasn't surprised at all," said the woman whose yard Molly was eventually cornered in. "In my home country [Guyana], we are used to it. My father was a butcher.” Molly was subdued with tranquilizer darts and then brought to the Center for Animal Care and Control in Brooklyn. Best of all, there appears to be a happy ending: “She may have earned clemency. Officials hope to find her a permanent home at an animal sanctuary.”

President Obama has been promising to scour the federal budget for savings, “line by line.” The effort has apparently been in vain. The plan, which will be released today, seeks to trim 121 programs by $17 billion—a tiny fraction of the $3.4 trillion budget. Still, the cuts are likely to face a tough battle in Congress. Budget analysts said that few to none of the programs targeted by Obama will be terminated. According to Isabel Sawhill, a Brookings Institution economist who served as a senior official in the Clinton White House budget office, "Even if you got all of those things, it would be saving pennies, not dollars. And you're not going to begin to get all of them."

Big day for Al Franken: The Minnesota Senate victor—but not yet senator, pending Norm Coleman’s endless appeals—met with Vice President Biden at the White House Wednesday. Later, Biden said Franken needs to be instated so that Minnesota can have two senators. The Minnesota Supreme Court has scheduled Coleman’s appeal for the first week of June, with a decision expected a few weeks later. The Republican has not ruled out appealing to federal courts if the state court upholds Franken as the winner of November’s race, but it’s expected that Gov. Tim Pawlenty will sign Franken into office before then. “Once the Minnesota Supreme Court has issued its final ruling in this case, the president and I look forward to working with Mr. Franken on building an economy for the 21st century,” the vice president said. Franken is vital to creating a 60-seat filibuster-proof Democratic majority in the Senate.

The Obama administration is about to bring NASA’s ambitions back to earth: The White House Thursday will announce a review of NASA’s proposal to send its astronauts to the moon in the coming years in order to offset losses from the closing of its space shuttle program. NASA’s shuttle fleet retires next year, and there’s a five-year gap between the last scheduled flight and the first launch of the Ares I rocket, which has astronauts and other workers worried they’ll be without work in the interim. Sources say the budget’s five-year plan will reduce funding in 2013 for NASA’s moon projects, including the Ares rocket.

Welcome, Ken Lewis, to the political circus: “Bank of America Corp. Chief Executive Kenneth Lewis and top federal officials will be asked to testify under oath by a U.S. House panel next month, as congressional investigators probe claims the bank was pressured by the government into completing its deal with Merrill Lynch & Co.,” reports The Wall Street Journal. According to one person familiar with the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform’s review of documents from the Federal Reserve last week, “there’s fire there.” Accordng to the Journal, “At issue is February testimony by Mr. Lewis to New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo suggesting he felt pressured by former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke to complete the deal after attempting to pull out when he learned of Merrill's ballooning losses.” Bernanke and Paulson could possibly have to testify.

Looks like somebody could use a stress test: General Motors spent about $10.2 billion in the first quarter of 2009 and posted a net $6 billion loss—twice its quarterly loss at the same time last year. That averages out to a loss of $9.66 cents a share, which is actually better than the $11 a share some forecasted. Revenue dropped 47 percent to $22.4 billion from $42.4 billion a year ago. GM has until June 1 to sell the government on a restructuring plan or else it faces bankruptcy protection.

Bernie Madoff's family may not have known about his Ponzi scheme, but they sure reaped its rewards: According to court records, Bernie Madoff’s relatives and employees routinely charged tens of thousands of dollars a month on his corporate American Express account. The New York Post reports that Madoff’s son, Mark, racked up nearly $81,000 in charges in July 2008, with more than $77,000 going into charter flights. Big-ticket items purchased by the high rolling family include $2,000 dropped at the Giorgio Armani store in Paris by the ponzi schemer’s wife, Ruth. Son Andrew went on a shopping spree at a Polo Ralph Lauren store in June 2008, spending almost $2,400 in a single visit. 18 people held cards for the corporate account, most of them firm employees, except for sister-in-law Marion Madoff, daughter-in-law Deborah West Madoff, and the captain of Madoff's yacht, Richard Carroll. Bernie’s sister-in-law’s name actually appears in the company’s payroll, with an annual salary of $163,500, although there is "no evidence," according to the records, that she did any work for the company.

With all the “pressure” that has been “mounting” on torture-memo authors John Yoo and Jay Bybee in recent weeks, something’s bound to give sooner or later, right? The Associated Press writes that both men are coming under heavy professional pressure—Yoo, who teaches at U.C. Berkeley, is facing calls for disbarment and dismissal, while Bybee, a judge on the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, may be impeached. A draft report by Justice Department investigators stops short of recommending criminal charges against the two men, but does suggest professional sanctions.

This isn’t a good way for Arlen Specter to win over his new friends: “He voted against the Democrats in his first two big votes since the switch, opposing the Democratic budget and helping defeat a measure to allow bankruptcy judges to modify mortgages for troubled homeowners. And on Tuesday night, he retracted a statement, made in an interview, in which he said the Minnesota courts should rule in favor of the Republican, Norm Coleman, in the state’s disputed Senate race.” Behind the scenes, Specter is scrambling to find money to save the jobs of several aides after he lost the payroll authority that came with his committee and subcommittee chairmanships when Democrats stripped him of seniority. Tired, perhaps, of the scrutiny, Specter canceled an appearance with Larry King on Wednesday night.