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Drugmaker Merck announces plans to slash 7,000 jobs -- 11 percent of its workforce -- and close five plants by the end of 2008. Merck's troubles include thousands of lawsuits related to its painkiller Vioxx and the impending loss of patent protection of one of its most profitable drugs, Zocor.

The controversial new U.S. ambassador to the United Nations has been keeping a low profile in New York. Analysts weigh in on the prospects for Bolton, a ferocious critic of the U.N., to become an effective U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

President Bush meets with Chinese president Hu Jintao to discuss trade and currency issues. He also attends services at one of China's few state-sanctioned Christian churches, and presses the premier to expand religious, political and social freedoms.

The San Diego Unified School District is getting a jumpstart on recruiting top-notch teachers for a new kind of high school. The revived Lincoln High School in southeast San Diego will actually house

Annapolis/Interview with Roger Fan

South Dakotans will vote next month on a proposed state constitutional amendment that would strip judges, jurors, and other state officials, of their immunity from lawsuits for their official actions. The proposal has alarmed not only judges, but also large swathes of South Dakota society.

Anger at the government's treatment of a blind whistle-blower in East China boiled over Sunday when villagers clashed with police. Chen Guangcheng has been confined to his house by the local government after uncovering a program of forced sterilizations and abortions.

The military promises to help soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with emotional problems, including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. But an NPR investigation at one base in Colorado finds that soldiers aren't getting the services they need.

Betty Friedan, whose manifesto The Feminine Mystique became a best seller in the 1960s and laid the groundwork for the modern feminist movement, died Saturday, her birthday. She was 85.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice heads to London amid a flurry of diplomatic activity over Iran's nuclear program. The U.S. and key European nations want to bring Iran before the United Nations Security Council, and they will be trying to convince Russian and Chinese officials to agree on that step.