WORLD

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg gave his 2012 State of the City speech Thursday in the Bronx, focusing on education, innovation and jobs in the wide-ranging address.

Santorum has frequently referred to how his grandfather fled Italy to “escape fascism” but apparently he left out the fact that the old man was a Marxist.

It turns out Rep. Lamar Smith, author of the Stop Online Piracy Act, has been caught red-handed infringing copyright with an image used on his personal Web site.

Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney criticized President Barack Obama for his stance on Israel on Thursday, telling a Florida crowd that if elected he would stand with our friends.

Former United Nations ambassador John Bolton endorsed Mitt Romney on Thursday, adding another name to the list of conservative politicians who have come out in support of the former Massachusetts governor as he attempts to gain credibility among conservative voters.

A Gingrich PAC is using clips from anti-Romney documentary King of Bain: When Mitt Romney Came to Town to go after the GOP frontrunner, calling him a corporate raider who gutted companies for profit (watch here). But where did the documentary come from? What was Romney's response to the film? And was Gingrich involved in its production? Here's everything you need to know about the controversial documentary.

Originally intended as emergency legislation, the law has periodically been amended and extended over the years.

The U.S. government has spent hundreds of millions of dollars housing suspected terrorists in the military prison since 2002. So far, only six people have been convicted by a military commission.

At least two of the four Marines captured on an Internet video that appears to show them urinating on Taliban corpses in Afghanistan have been identified, an official said Thursday.

Greece could reach a bond swap deal with private creditors to reduce its debt load by the end of next week, with a formal offer possible by early February, a finance ministry source said on Thursday.

During his Latin American trip this week Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad met with former Cuba leader Fidel Castro.

The U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel said in a legal memo that the Senate was unable to perform its constitutional duties on presidential nominees, despite holding "pro forma" sessions aimed at blocking recess appointments.

Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari left the country Thursday for a one-day private affair to Dubai, amid an escalating crisis between his civilian government and the Army, officials said.

Europe's markets closed mixed on Thursday after a profit warning from retail heavyweight Tesco and weak U.S. retail and labor data more than offset relief from successful Spanish and Italian debt auctions.

The government estimated that about three-fourths of all homicides in the country are connected to the drug trade.

Berkshire Hathaway's Warren Buffett said he would donate $1 to paying down the national debt for every dollar donated by a Republican in Congress. The only exception is Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell -- for whom Buffett said he would go $3-to-$1.

Far from dismissing Ron Paul's 2012 candidacy, Republican strategist Jack Burkman believes the Texas Congressman can actually secure the Republican nomination.

The body of Kim Jong-il will permanently lay in state in Pyongyang, North Korea.

A federal appeals court's ruling against a proposed constitutional amendment to ban Oklahoma courts from using Islamic Sharia law represents more than a setback to the measure's proponents. Experts say that the decision also reveals how such laws fall somewhere between impractical and unconstitutional.

U.S. President Barack Obama's re-election campaign, together with the Democratic National Committee (DNC), raised more than $68 million in the fourth quarter of 2011, Obama's campaign manager Jim Messina said on Thursday.

Japan has joined the U.S. in its economic efforts to pressure Iran to abandon its nuclear program by agreeing to buy less Iranian oil.

The video is somewhat reminiscent of the abuses of Iraqi prisoners in the Abu Ghraib jail by American troops.

Societies and nations are very much like people in how stubborn and resistant to change they are. Few forces are actually capable of suddenly changing the base nature of people, on either a large or small scale, and it takes a great deal of sustained effort over a long period of time for them to change their own nature.

Americans believe that there is more conflict between rich and poor than between immigrants and the native-born or between blacks and whites, according to a Pew Research Center opinion survey.

A YouTube video showing what appears to be U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan urinating on the bodies of dead Taliban fighters will not affect efforts to broker peace talks, according to Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid who spoke to Reuters on Thursday, despite investigations being launched.

The Burmese government signed a ceasefire agreement with the Karen National Union, an ethnic rebel group, on Thursday.

The Veteran's Day mugging case may have finally been solved. Westminster, Colo. police arrested two suspects, Jose Luis Pizarro and Jill Erickson, Tuesday in connection with the mugging of a 91-year-old Marine Corps veteran on Veteran's Day in November of last year.

@MichelleObama wrote her first tweet on Thursday morning at 8 a.m. ET. In a second tweet, she announced that the social media account will be managed by campaign staff, with any tweets from the First Lady herself signed '-mo.'

Paul has struck a chord among many of the electorate and may ultimately influence the policy direction of the Republican Party.