Top Stories - The Christian Science Monitor

Accountants for Congress this week put a $25 billion price tag on the federal rescue of two companies that anchor US mortgage markets, but that's just the tip of a potential iceberg of taxpayer costs for America's banking mess.

Washington - In a campaign week dominated by Barack Obama's trip abroad, the pro-John McCain camp has made headlines by complaining about coverage of Senator Obama's trip abroad.

We're delighted you chose usFrom Wales comes word that the Coray family is back home again from their vacation trip.

California wildfires, which once numbered 2,000 in the past month, are down to 33, according to state officials, who cautioned that fire danger remains high in some rural areas. Meanwhile, the Union Pacific Railroad Co. agreed to pay $102 million for damages that occurred from a fire in 2000 sparked by a company welder who was repairing track.

As the remnant of hurricane Dolly creeps toward far northern Mexico, the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season already is generating buzz as hurricane specialists look at July's unusually high level of activity.

New York - Rising energy prices are now squeezing consumers from a different direction: their utility bills.

Amherst, Mass. - It all started with a stack of books that needed a home.

Berlin - The centerpiece of Barack Obama's overseas tour comes Thursday in Berlin when the Democratic presidential candidate gives the only public foreign policy speech of his trip to an Obama-mad crowd of Germans who see him as another John F. Kennedy. He's in a country and a continent making no secret it is ready for change.

Campo de Florido, Cuba - In the past year, Nereida Rodriguez Rivero says she has been punched in the mouth, almost thrown from a moving bus, and stabbed on the street in her otherwise sleepy rural hometown.

Paris - The arrest in Belgrade of Radovan Karadzic, political mastermind of the Bosnian genocide, is a clear indication of new Serb president Boris Tadic's intent to integrate his state with Europe, stabilizing an isolated and difficult country and a fragile region, experts say.

It was an average-looking letter that landed in Paul Weaver's mailbox. But bearing news that his veteran's disability benefits had been stopped, it felt more like a ton of crashing bricks.

Oakland, Calif. - It sounds like a plot from Hollywood: A team of techies is busily trying to crack passwords to get access to parts of San Francisco's computer network. They are doing so at the direction of city officials, who have discovered that they are locked out of parts of their new multimillion-dollar system.

VARANASI, INDIA - Most mornings, as the sun steals over the Ganges, Veer Bhadra Mishra takes a dip in India's holiest river. As high priest of a Hindu temple, it is his solemn duty. But as a scientist, the ritual is profoundly discomforting.

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia - Several copies of Barack Obama's "The Audacity of Hope" are prominently displayed in Jarir Bookstore here. They have not moved in weeks.

Washington - As Congress heads into a critical week of votes on how to relieve America's home-foreclosure crisis, one of the toughest issues will be how to deal with the racial and ethnic dimensions of the problem.

Washington - Time was when a presumptive presidential nominee could sit back and quietly ponder his options for a running mate without a daily deluge of media speculation and reports of suspected preening by vice presidential wannabes.

WASHINGTON - When Barack Obama stops in Jerusalem and Ramallah this week – as part of an overseas trip designed to reassure the American electorate about the presumptive Democratic nominee's national security credentials – he'll be wading into the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

EVERGLADES CITY, Fla. - A fisherman turned drug smuggler turned retired old salt, Floyd Brown claims he can find his way back here – one of the last Florida frontiers – without a compass from anywhere in the Gulf of Mexico. It's a skill, he says, he put to use more than once when he ferried bales of marijuana from Latin America to the Shark River in the 1970s.

No one can remember the last time Congress enacted two major economic stimulus packages in one year. But 2008 may see a sequel to the $100 billion worth of checks that started filling individuals' bank accounts in early spring.

Los Angeles - The California legislator who championed the state's ban on using hand-held cellphones while driving has a new target: text messaging at the wheel.

Osama bin Laden's former driver is scheduled to stand trial on Monday in the first war crimes tribunal at America's terrorist prison camp at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

Butare, Rwanda - Sandra Uwimbabazi knows runways – she's modeled for years – but she stumbled on a recent Saturday here.

Trouble at two linchpin mortgage companies is forcing Congress to consider a quick rescue package and in the process reviving an ideological debate about the US government's role in the housing market.

Los Angeles - At 8:34 a.m. the sleek Metrolink train from Oceanside, Calif., swept into Los Angeles's historic Union Station, disgorging a rush of commuters. Some pulled briefcases on wheels, others hefted backpacks, blending seamlessly with bus and subway passengers pressing through the terminal's sunlit corridor.

A federal judge in Washington has refused to halt the war crimes trial of Osama bin Laden's former driver.

For the past three years, when high school students have hit the SAT prep books, that's included a tuneup for a writing section. For colleges trying to predict student performance, the new test has been: (a) helpful, (b) not helpful, (c) both of the above, or d) don't know.

Toronto - At a glance, they look like unrelated events unfolding thousands of miles apart and yet, they're both windows into Canada's passive partnership with the US in the war on terror.

JERUSALEM and NAHARIYA, ISRAEL - Israel received two black coffins on Wednesday containing the remains of the soldiers abducted in a Hezbollah raid at Israel's northern border two summers ago – a surprise attack whose aftereffects are still reverberating.