Four U.S. women tore through the water to a gold medal on Saturday in the 4x100-meter medley. Missy Franklin, Rebecca Soni, Dana Vollmer, and Allison Schmitt kept America’s winning streak afloat, securing their medal in the world-record combined time of 3:52.05. Australia came in second, and Japan took the bronze. It’s the fourth gold medal for the 17-year-old Franklin, and her fifth medal overall for these Games. Schmitt, another of the American team’s outstanding competitors in the London Games, will also go home with five medals. Moments later, the men's team won the same event, giving Michael Phelps his 18th career gold medal, likely his last before his announced retirement.

Syrian government troops are ramping up violent attacks as they push rebels out of the capital city, Damascus, and fight for the most populous city, Aleppo. According to CNN, Free Syrian Army fighters are reporting executions in Damascus by Syrian forces. The escalating fighting is sparking fears about a full-blown battle for Aleppo, where rebel forces are controlling significant portions of the city. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told the U.N. General Assembly that the situation could be much worse and described it as a “vicious battle.” Tens of thousands have already fled the violence in the north in recent days.

Jared Loughner, who killed six people in the Arizona shooting rampage that critically injured Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, is expected to plead guilty and agree to a life sentence Tuesday. Loughner, a diagnosed schizophrenic, was originally deemed unfit to stand trial by a federal judge.

It all happened so fast. Tennis star Serena Williams took Olympic singles gold on Saturday in a match that hardly gave the capacity crowd time to get comfortable in their seats. In a little over one hour, Williams seemed nothing less than a force of nature as she won 6-0, 6-1. Both players had Golden Slams on the line—a rare opportunity to cap their four grand-slam titles with an Olympic gold medal. “Whether I win or lose, that’s not the big deal,” Williams said Friday of her impending match against the Russian pro. “The big deal for me, USA is guaranteed another medal.”

Eighteen gold medals later, Michael Phelps retired from competitive swimming on Saturday after one last race. The American team won gold in the men’s 400-meter medley relay for Phelps’s final Olympic event, and the crowd rose in a standing ovation. “I couldn’t ask to finish on a better note,” Phelps said. “I have done everything I wanted to do. I am very happy.” He was presented with a lifetime-achievement award to add to his collection of a record-breaking 22 total medals, with four golds from the London 2012 Games, not to mention a personal Tweet from Barack Obama.

While President Obama spent his 51st birthday on Saturday playing golf, he’ll be partying with close friends–close friends of his campaign coffers, that is. At a party scheduled for the president’s Chicago residence on August 12, the birthday boy will press the flesh with well-wishers who paid to attend the bash. It’s an election-year adaptation for the incumbent, who spent previous birthdays while in office in more private settings. About 1,000 campaign events wrapped around Obama’s birthday are scheduled to take place across the country over the next week.

The Los Angeles U.S. attorney's office is investigating whether the Las Vegas Sands Corp., the multibillion business controlled by political high roller Sheldon Adelson, and some of its executives are involved in money-laundering activities. Though Adelson himself is not said to be a subject of the probe, the company is reportedly under scrutiny for its relationship with a Mexican businessman who was later indicted in the U.S. for drug trafficking and a California businessman who was convicted of taking kickbacks. Adelson has given millions to Republican candidates this election cycle. His family all but bankrolled Newt Gingrich's failed campaign. Adelson has said he's prepared to spend millions to remove President Obama from the White House and has already pledge large sums to presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney.

It was a stuffed toy bunny that led law-enforcement officials to an international pedophile ring that eventually brought down 43 in both the U.S. and Europe. An undercover officer in Boston received a photo of an 18-month-old boy clutching the toy. From there, more than 40 men in the U.S. and Europe have been arrested as investigators tracked down the ring over the past two years. The photo was forwarded to Interpol, where officials identified the toy as a character from a popular Dutch children's book. They were able to identify the child and arrest his babysitter, who allegedly had thousands of images of children being molested. Investigators have been able to identify more than 140 victims so far in the case.

Nearly 50 Iranians were kidnapped in Syria on Saturday, according to state media. The victims were on a bus near the shrine of Sayyida Zainab, a Shia holy site on the outskirts of Damascus. The Iranian government blamed the incident on "armed groups," and said it knew the location of the hostages. The area has seen intense fighting in recent weeks, as rebel groups step up their attacks against the Bashar al-Assad regime. Meanwhile, fighting resumed in rebel-held parts of Damascus and Aleppo.

Ozzy and the gang are back in business. English rockers Black Sabbath returned to the stage to kick off Lollapalooza 2012 on Friday, their only reunion performance in the United States. "Fuckin' A man," said the 63-year-old Osbourne to a roaring crowd in Chicago's Grant Park. "Let me hear you!" The band played some old classics, and the black-leather-clad frontman referred to the song "Snowblind"—a song about cocaine—as one of the band's "favorite pastimes." Time, it seems, has not blunted Sabbath's edge.

In the second gold medal–winning tennis performance of the day for the U.S., brothers Mike and Bob Bryan took the coveted Olympic prize after beating France’s Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Michael Llodra, 6-4, 7-6. The two have in their pocket a total of 11 grand-slam titles as a team, and won the doubles bronze in the 2008 Games in Beijing. The bronze medal was taken home on Saturday by France’s Richard Gasquet and Julien Benneteau, who were competing in their first Olympics and beat out David Ferrer and Feliciano Lopez of Spain.

Missy Franklin, the American triple gold-medalist swimmer, said Friday that she plans to maintain amateur status and go straight to college after her senior year of high school. It's a decision that will likely cost the 17-year-old millions in endorsement deals, and one that sets her apart from other Olympic darlings—like gymnast Gabby Douglas, who will appear on a special box of Corn Flakes. Franklin, a native of Aurora, Colo., yesterday broke the world record for 200m backstroke. "Everything I've done here is for them," she said, referring to the victims of the recent shooting there.

Although some of the flames in Oklahoma have started to subside, forest fires had destroyed some 65 homes on Saturday morning as the blaze spread across 80 square miles. Oklahoma has seen 18 days of drought and 100-plus degree temperatures, fueling 12 wildfires and a state of emergency. Authorities are investigating reports that the fires were set deliberately by a man in a pickup truck who threw out burning newspapers.

Later on Saturday, Houston will hold its breath for seven minutes of uncertainty as its car-sized Mars lander, Curiosity, dives into the Martian atmosphere at 13,000 mph and attempts a safe landing on the surface. The rover has been traveling for 8.5 months and crossed a distance of over 352-million-miles, and will use a combination of parachutes, heat shields, rockets, and nylon to get to the surface unscathed. The process will be mediated automatically by computer, and mission controllers won't know if the landing is successful until several minutes later.

The good, the bad, and the Romney? Clint Eastwood, the 82-year-old actor, director, and American icon, threw his support behind Mitt Romney on Friday at a private campaign event. "I think the country needs a boost," the Oscar-winner told the Associated Press, "Now more than ever do we need Gov. Romney. I'm going to be voting for him." Eastwood said he first heard of Romney while filming Mystic River in Massachusetts, back when the candidate was running for governor of the Bay State. "I said, God, this guy, he's too handsome to be governor, but he does look like he could be president," the actor added. "He just made my day," Romney said. "What a guy."

In Russia, the public trial of punk trio ‘Pussy Riot’ has become a cause célèbre, and critics of Putin's illiberal regime are growing bolder. Three demonstrators were detained Saturday for climbing up the balcony of a Moscow courtroom where the band members stood accused of "hooliganism." The protests lit flares while crying out "Freedom for Pussy Riot!" If convicted, the band could face seven years in jail. The trio mounted an anti-Putin "punk prayer" protest in a Moscow cathedral earlier this year. 

Roger Pion, a 34-year-old farmer, hopped in an oversized farm tractor, headed to the police station, and crushed more than seven police cars yesterday, taking revenge for a previous arrest over marijuana possession. The attack took place in Vermont–not a state generally known for Grand Theft Auto-style antics–and claimed more than half of the district's fleet of squad cars. Nobody was hurt, but the police couldn't pursue Pion, due to predictable problems with transportation. “We’re going to have to get the jaws of life up here to pry the trunks open and see about the rifles and shotguns,” Sheriff Kirk Martin told the Associated Press. “The radios are ruined.”

In recent weeks, heavy flooding has swept across North Korea, while the ruling regime has downplayed the damage. On Saturday, the state news agency admitted that the damage was far worse than it had previously said. 169 people have been killed, 400 are missing, and 212,200 people are homeless as water rushes over 161,000 acres of cropland. UN agencies are currently onsite to assist with relief. The nation is particularly prone to bad floods due to inefficient farming practices and deforestation.

Tennessee Democrats were left reeling when conservative candidate Mark Clayton won the state's Democratic nomination for US Senate. On Saturday, less than a day later, the party decided to disavow Clayton entirely, alleging that he's a member of an anti-gay hate group. Clayton handily beat his closest challenger for the nomination, and will face off against Republican Senator Bob Corker. "The only time that Clayton has voted in a Democratic primary was when he was voting for himself,” the party stated. “Many Democrats in Tennessee knew nothing about any of the candidates in the race ... The Tennessee Democratic Party disavows his candidacy, will not do anything to promote or support him in any way." Clayton responded by defending his work for the pro-life, pro-marriage group Public Advocate for the United States—the group that drew the Democrats' ire. He also told The Tennessean, "I have good friends who are liberals."

Six men were crushed under 100 tons of rock and coal on Friday when a mine in the Mexican town of Muzqiz caved in. Just last week, the town buried seven victims–all members of the same family– of a methane gas blast at another mine. According to the company that runs the mine that collapsed yesterday, the tragedy was caused by "a pocket of methane gas." By contrast, state officials said that the rockfall was not caused by a gas explosion. In 2011, 30 people died in similar accidents in the region.

The South African runner Oscar Pistorius, who has both legs amputated at the knee, prevailed in a preliminary heat at the Olympic stadium Saturday. With a time of 45.44, Pistorius will advance to the semifinals of the men's 400m. This achievement will likely throw new focus on the yearlong controversy that his success has sparked; some say that the athlete, who uses carbon-fiber prosthetic blades to run, has an unfair advantage. Pistorius was born without fibulas, and heads into the semifinals an underdog—but one with a large cheering section.

The war for Syria's future is reaching a fever pitch as Assad-loyal forces storm rebel strongholds in Damascus and Aleppo. The military has deployed jets and helicopters to fire on high-density areas of Aleppo, the nation's largest city, and new fighting has broken out in Damascus, the nation's capital. The offensive, intended to wrest power back for the ailing Assad regime, has become methodical. Government snipers moved north through Aleppo to target rebels holed up at a major TV station on Saturday. Human rights groups said 110 people– including 88 civilians–were killed on Friday.