AUGUSTA ( AP) — The chief executive of Maine’s newest hospital says it is eliminating almost 130 jobs and laying off 16 people this summer. Chuck Hays, chief executive of MaineGeneral Health, says the Alfond Center for Health that opened in Augusta in November is busy but overstaffed. The budget that Maine- General officials are […]

CHICAGO President Barack Obama is preparing to boost the profile of an up-and-coming young Hispanic Democrat by nominating San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro to become the nation’s housing secretary. Obama’s current housing chief gets a new title: budget director. Obama was expected to announce his latest Cabinet shuffle at the White House this afternoon, a […]

DETROIT (AP) — When they pull up to a gas station these days, Detroit drivers are looking beyond the price per gallon at a far more threatening concern: carjackers. The armed auto thieves have become so common here that parts of the bankrupt metropolis are referred to as “Carjack City,” and many motorists fear getting […]

JOINT BASE LEWISMCCHORD, Wash. (AP) — An undeveloped stretch of native prairie in south Puget Sound offers one of the few habitats in the world where a two-inch colorful checkered butterfly thrives. It also happens to be the main artillery impact range for Joint Base Lewis-McChord. The Army’s Stryker combat brigade and other troops regularly […]

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Police in Oregon held an unlikely suspect overnight: an adorable black bear cub. Myrtle Creek Police Chief Don Brown says a teen boy and his parents dropped off the cub in a large plastic storage bin at the police station Monday. The teen found the small animal whimpering in the bushes […]

BEIRUT (AP) — A mortar shell struck an election gathering in southern Syria for President Bashar Assad, killing a number of people, state media and opposition activists reported today. Assad, rarely seen in public since the start of Syria’s 3-year-old conflict, has not been seen campaigning since he announced his candidacy last month and was […]

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia today accused the West of triggering the Ukrainian crisis by its “megalomania,” as fighting continued in Ukraine’s east between pro-Russia insurgents and government forces two days before a presidential election. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov urged the West to reach a settlement based on mutual interests. “If we sincerely want to […]

LONDON (AP) — Britain’s High Court has ruled that King Richard III should be buried in the city of Leicester, where his skeleton was found under a parking lot in 2012. A group of distant relatives wanted the monarch, who died in 1485, interred in the northern England city of York, to which he had […]

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iranian state television is reporting the Islamic Republic’s army has begun a twoday ground and air military exercise that will include testing short-range missiles. State television quoted Gen. Ali Mehrabi, a top army commander, as saying today that the drills involve forces in central Iran. The war games commemorate the anniversary […]