GEORGE W. BUSH

Energy traders and companies will face fines of up to $1 million a day if they manipulate oil markets, the Federal Trade Commission ruled on Thursday in a crackdown on fraud that they said causes widespread damage to the U.S. economy.

James Lockhart, the U.S. regulator who nationalized Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, will soon resign after more than three years as overseer for the mortgage finance companies, an administration official said on Wednesday.

James Lockhart, the regulator for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, will soon step down after more than three years as overseer for the mortgage finance companies, an administration official said.

North Korea released two jailed American journalists on Tuesday after a visit from former U.S. President Bill Clinton in the highest-level U.S. contact with Pyongyang since Clinton was president nearly a decade ago.

Bill Clinton, whose hopes for a peacemaking trip to North Korea fizzled while he was still president, got a second chance on Tuesday and negotiated the release of two American journalists in Pyongyang.

Microsoft's offer to settle a decade-long battle with EU antitrust regulators cements the European Commission's reputation as one of the world's toughest watchdogs and could force other firms to follow its example.

Long after President Barack Obama's first term ends in 2013, millions of U.S. families will still be paying the price for the recession.

The remains of a U.S. Navy pilot have been found and positively identified, more than 18 years after he was shot down over Iraq and became the first U.S. casualty of the first Gulf War, the U.S. Defense Department said on Sunday.

U.S. President Barack Obama directed federal agencies on Thursday to enact new rules governing federally funded research on human embryonic stem cells.

A New York judge reinstated part of former TV news anchor Dan Rather's $70 million lawsuit against CBS on Tuesday, although the ruling could be legally meaningless if an appeals court dismisses the entire case.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton signed a friendship treaty with Southeast Asia on Wednesday, underlining Washington's renewed focus on a region that has increasingly come under China's influence.

As unemployment rises and economic forecasts sour, the White House has delayed until August the release of its mid-year budget review, which may include a record-shattering deficit projection.

More than 80 percent of the U.S. banks that received federal bailout funds said the money had helped them increase lending or avoid a drop in lending as the recession worsened earlier this year, according to a new survey released on Sunday.

Former CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite, whose authoritative delivery of news events from the John F. Kennedy assassination to the Apollo moon landing and Vietnam War, made him the most trusted man in America, died on Friday at age 92.

The United States is ready to hold talks with North Korea if the conditions are right but will also press U.N. sanctions to punish Pyongyang for its nuclear and missile tests, a senior envoy for Asia said on Saturday.

The House Intelligence Committee said on Friday it was launching a formal investigation into the concealment of a secret CIA program from Congress that one senator said was withheld on orders from former Vice President Dick Cheney.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton leaves for India on Thursday on a high-profile mission to deepen ties and dispel any doubts about the U.S. commitment to New Delhi under U.S. President Barack Obama.

Sonia Sotomayor looks almost certain to emerge from Senate hearings this week poised to become the first Hispanic member of the U.S. Supreme Court.

U.S. President Barack Obama warned Iran on Friday the world will not wait indefinitely for it to end its nuclear defiance, saying Tehran had until September to comply or else face consequences.

A G8 summit made scant progress toward a new U.N. climate treaty due to be agreed in December with some nations back-pedaling on promises of new action even before the end of a meeting in Italy.

The world's most powerful countries have injected momentum into long-running negotiations over a new global free trade pact by setting a 2010 deadline.