-
NOT SO SECRET
Jae C. Hong / AP (FILE)
1. Agent’s Name Released
Time to put a name with the man at the center of the Secret Service scandal. Arthur Huntington has been identified as the agent who refused to pay a prostitute in Colombia, and then sparked a sweeping investigation that's led to the discipline and firings of 12 Secret Service agents. The agent, who lives in Saverna Park, Md., is a married father of two whose wife leads Bible study in the neighborhood. In light of the scandal, the Secret Service has created new rules forbidding all foreigners but hotel staff in agents' rooms and barring them from visiting "seedy establishments."
-
BIG MONEY
Justin Sullivan / Getty Images (FILE)
2. Apple Avoids Billions in Taxes
Apple subsidiaries in low-tax regions have helped the company save an enormous amount in taxes across the globe. A New York Times investigation shows that instead of collecting and investing profits in California, where the company is based, Apple is sending their funds to Reno, Nev., where the corporate tax rate is zero compared with 8.84 percent. The company is doing this around the world, with subsidiaries in places like Ireland and the British Virgin Islands. Last year, the tech giant coughed up $3.3 billion on its $34.2 billion in profits worldwide. Without the inventive, and legal, accounting tactics they've been using, Apple would have to pay an estimated $2.4 billion more in taxes to the United States government alone.
-
-
UNDERGROUND
Boxun.com / AP Photo
3. U.S. Protecting Chinese Activist?
Under cover of darkness, a blind Chinese lawyer and dissident is believed to have escaped house arrest Friday and begun a journey that ended in Beijing, where he is thought to be in hiding at the U.S. Embassy. In 2005, Chen Guangcheng took up a campaign against officials who forced couples into having late-term abortions and sterilizations. Since then, the Chinese government has confined Chen to his home in a secluded village. Chen was convicted of criminal charges in 2006 in a trial that Chinese legal experts widely felt made a sham of the Communist country's judicial system.
-
PROTEST
Saeed Khan, AFP / Getty Images
4. Malaysian Police Tear Gas Thousands
Police cracked down Saturday in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur as tens of thousands took to the street to demand election reform. Dozens of arrests were reportedly made and 20 police were injured, officials said. The demonstration, attended by thousands of people dressed in yellow T-shirts, was peaceful until a small group tried to get past barricades and the police responded with tear gas. The massive crowd scattered, and video showed one group overturning a police car. The police acted with “utmost restraint,” said Malaysian Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein, though organizers said the protests were peaceful and the use of tear gas was inappropriate.
-
TRAGIC
Sid Hastings / AP
5. Storm Kills 1 in Missouri
Fifty-mile-per-hour winds shattered the aluminum poles holding up a beer tent where fans were celebrating after a Cardinals game in St. Louis. Of the 200 people gathered under the tent, 1 was killed and 17 were hospitalized, with 5 seriously injured. The owner of the bar behind the tent says firefighters told him that a bolt of lightning that struck right after the winds was what killed the patron. He described the storm as so strong, it lifted the DJ’s 100-pound amplifier into the air. Missouri has been on storm warnings all day.
-
HUH?
Jae C. Hong / AP Photo
6. Aide: Auto Bailout Mitt’s Idea
A senior adviser to Mitt Romney’s campaign claimed on Saturday that the decision to bail out Chrysler and General Motors was actually Mitt Romney's idea, despite Romney having previously criticized the bailout as “crony capitalism.” "The only economic success that President Obama has had is because he followed Mitt Romney's advice," Eric Fehrnstrom said at a forum on Saturday. Romney criticized Obama's decision to lend billions of dollars to the struggling industry during the primary, even writing an editorial in the Detroit Free Press against it shortly before the Michigan primary.
-
NO SLOW JAM
7. Romney Camp: Obama Too Cool
Mitt Romney's senior advisers took a jab at President Obama on Saturday for a sketch he performed in during his appearance on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon. Calling the move "off key," strategist Eric Fehrnstrom said the student-loan crisis isn't something to joke about in that manner. While acknowledging Obama's superior coolness, Romney's camp maintains that won't win voters this time around. "This election is not going to be about who's cooler," said one adviser.
-
MANHUNT
Elaine Thompson/ AP Photo
8. Body Found in Washington Bunker
CNN is reporting that a body has been found Saturday morning in the survivalist bunker where Washington resident Peter Keller is believed to have holed up. Police have been looking for Keller in connection to the shooting deaths of his wife and daughter last Sunday. SWAT teams surrounded the fortified bunker Saturday where Keller was believed to have stocked supplies. Law enforcement was hesitant to enter the bunker after attempting to flush the man out with tear gas on Friday, as Keller was believed to be armed and to have prepared the area with booby traps.
-
HERO
Evan Agostini / AP Photo
9. Dempsey Pulled Teen From Wreck
Patrick Dempsey likely had not a single hair out of place when he ran, crowbar in hand, to the rescue of a teen who flipped his Mustang in the actor’s Malibu front yard on Tuesday, according to TMZ. The car reportedly rolled several times, but the Grey’s Anatomy star pulled out the driver, who walked away with only a concussion. Dempsey got some props from The Shield creator Shawn Ryan, who tweeted on Friday: "True Story: Grey's Anatomy actor Patrick Dempsey pulled my friend's son out of overturned car after bad accident on Tuesday. #GoodDude"
-
CRIME
Louis Lanzano / AP Photo
10. Delmon Young Released on Bail
Five-thousand dollars later, Delmon Young is a free man. The Detroit Tigers slugger was released on bail Saturday morning, after being arrested Friday morning for allegedly spewing anti-Semitic remarks at a bachelor party and then throwing a tourist to the ground. According to police, Young was “highly intoxicated” and began harassing a group from Chicago after a panhandler wearing a yarmulke asked them for money. Young, who has no criminal record, was charged with aggravated harassment, a misdemeanor that includes a hate-crime element.
-
VOWS
Pascal Le Segretain / Getty Images
11. Mariah Carey, Nick Cannon Renew Vows
We get it, you love each other. Nick Cannon and Mariah Carey took to the City of Light to renew their wedding vows, saying "I do" for the fifth time at a hotel near the Eiffel Tower. Dressed in matching white outfits, the couple hammed it up for the cameras at the event open to the press, with Cannon going down on one knee to propose—again. The couple, who married in April 2008 and have taken to renewing their vows annually, were also in Paris to celebrate the birthday of twins Moroccan and Monroe, born April 30.
-
UNFRIEND
Paul Sakuma / AP Photo
12. Yahoo Adds Patents to Facebook Suit
An intellectual-property war between two of America’s tech giants is heating up as Yahoo added two more patents to its suit against Facebook on Friday. “Today’s filing underscores the breadth of Facebook’s violation of Yahoo's intellectual property,” a Yahoo spokesman told reporters. The suit was first filed last month, and Facebook immediately countersued. Facebook has escalated its efforts to stockpile patents recently, snatching up $550 million in AOL patents, as well as hundreds of IBM patents. Yahoo says Facebook broke an understanding that the companies would talk over infringement issues before taking them to court.
-
WASTE
Betsy Blaney / AP Photo
13. Texas Radioactive Dump Opens
Texas gave the go-ahead Friday for a radioactive-waste dump near the New Mexico border, making it the fourth such site for low-level waste in the U.S. The dump will mostly be used for Texas medical waste, as well as some waste transported to the site from 38 different states. Environmentalists have raised concerns about the plans for the site managed by Dallas-based Waste Control Specialists, saying that the syringes, laboratory animals, and other contaminated materials disposed of there may have a hazardous effect on groundwater.
-
TOUGH ADVICE
Jae C. Hong / AP Photo
14. Romney: ‘Borrow Money From Your Parents’
Mitt Romney’s latest business advice might not be the most effective way to win over young voters. At a talk Friday at Ohio’s Otterbein University, the presidential candidate offered his expertise to a room of students, telling them that if they want to start a business or pay for their education, they should just borrow from mom and dad. “Take a shot, go for it, take a risk, get the education, borrow money if you have to from your parents, start a business,” he said, citing a friend of his who took out a $20,000 loan from his parents. This remark came on the heels of a gaffe made by two of Romney’s national-security advisers, who made outdated Cold War–era references Thursday. One mistakenly spoke of Czechoslovakia, which was divided into two countries in 1993, while another attacked Obama for failing to lead the free world, saying, “We are seeing the Soviets pushing into the Arctic with no response from us.”
-
NEUTRALIZED
Bay Ismoyo, AFP / Getty Images
15. U.S.: Core Al Qaeda ‘Gone’
Al Qaeda is up against the ropes a year after a surgical Navy SEAL strike took out top terrorist Osama bin Laden, counterterrorist officials told reporters Friday. While some pockets of the radical Islamist group remain active in Pakistan, drone strikes and other American tactics have greatly lessened the group’s capacity for attack. The mission that took out bin Laden has become a main stumping point for President Obama as he vamps up his reelection efforts, a way of showing that the cool-tempered commander in chief can give the go when it counts.
-
BY THE BOOK
Pablo Martinez Monsivais / AP Photo
16. Secret Service Gets New Guidelines
Some things shouldn’t need to be spelled out. But in light of a prostitution scandal in Colombia, the men and women who protect the president are getting a new rulebook. Many of the new regulations are aimed at overseas travel, and include no drinking within 10 hours of time on duty, and no bringing foreigners back to the hotel. And if the cautionary tale of the past weeks has not made the danger of the Service’s “wheels up, rings off” culture clear enough, the agency will also be sitting employees down for ethics sessions. The Secret Service has said the new guidelines are “common-sense enhancements” of what’s already on the books.
-
DEPORTED
Aamir Qureshi, AFP / Getty Images
17. Saudis to Let bin Laden Widows Stay
Osama bin Laden’s three widows were among the members of his family deported to Saudi Arabia on Friday—and Saudis said Saturday they would allow them to say on “humanitarian grounds.” The three women and their two daughters served 45 days under house arrest for impersonation and illegally entering and residing in Pakistan. In a deposition given by one of the wives, Amal Ahmed Abdul Fateh, the woman provides details of the 10 years bin Laden spent on the run after the September 11 attacks, saying in her deposition that Pakistanis arranged “everything” while they were in hiding.
-
FISHING
Olivier Morin, AFP / Getty Images
18. Pacific Reef Sharks in Rapid Decline
We may fear them, but they should fear us. Overzealous fishers have had a dramatic effect on populations of Pacific reef sharks in recent decades, causing their numbers to plummet by more than 90 percent. Drawing on new research that overlaps shark population data with information on human fishing activity in the Pacific, scientists say that sharks fare far better in areas of the ocean where human fishing activity is minimal. In areas with no or few humans, sharks were recorded in populations of up to 337 per square mile, a number that dropped to about 26 per square mile near the Hawaiian Islands and Samoa.
-
99 PERCENT?
Win McNamee / Getty Images ; Elise Amendola / AP Photo
19. Brown, Warren in Top Income Bracket
Blue-collar credentials are this election season’s must-have—which means Republican Scott Brown and Democrat Elizabeth Warren, engaged in a heated Massachusetts Senate race, have some explaining to do. Brown’s tax return showed that his family netted close to $840,000 after his 2010 election. Warren’s family did even better, taking in just under $1 million two years out of the last four. In 2010, both Warren and Brown ranked among the nation’s top 1 percent of earners. “Gail and I are very blessed,” Brown and his wife told reporters Friday. “We’ve worked very hard over the last 25 years.”
-
BLOODSHED
DLO / AFP / Getty Images
20. Syrian Forces Kill 10
Syrian activists said Saturday that at least six civilians and four rebels were killed in a village near Damascus when soldiers loyal to President Bashar al-Assad pursued Army defectors in the area. A British Syrian-rights groups also reported 10 dead, but said that all of those killed were defectors. Violence in Syria continues two weeks after a U.N.-backed ceasefire did little to bring peace to the country rocked by 13 months of internal conflict. The killings Saturday took place in the village of Bakha north of Damascus.