Standard & Poor’€™s -€” the same rating agency that touted insurance giant AIG, Fannie Mae and subprime mortgage-backed securities before their collapses nearly sank the economy -€” is now taking heavy fire after downgrading U.S. credit, a move that drove markets down sharply yesterday.

About 45,000 Verizon employees, including 6,000 in Massachusetts, went on strike today after failing to reach a new union contract in one of the biggest labor actions in the US in recent years.

Honeybees under stress apparently become pessimistic, just like anxious mammals (including humans).

More than half of the 114 House Democrats who signed a letter vowing to support a “clean” increase to the nation’s debt ceiling rejected the final deal earlier this week.

PALE, bespectacled and polite, Bekir Berat Ozipek, a young professor at Istanbul’s Commerce University, is no street-fighter. But he was excited by the heady atmosphere he experienced on a recent trip to Egypt. He and two fellow Turkish scholars went to a conference at the University of Cairo where their ideas on civil-military relations were […]

As we head toward the end of the week when the government will release July’s employment data, the economy, we now know, grew only 0.4 percent in the first quarter of 2011, rather than 1.9 percent, as reported previously. Overhanging this dismaying news, the acrimony of the debt ceiling crisis lingers in the Washington atmosphere.

To change the beliefs of an entire community, only 10 percent of the population needs to become convinced of a new or different opinion, suggests a new study. At that tipping point, the idea can spread through social networks and alter behaviors on a large scale.

In an interview with 13WMAZ’s Frank Malloy, two experts gave outside opinions on the Lauren Giddings murder case.

The Kevin Youkilis who stepped to the plate in the eighth inning of Tuesday night’s win at Fenway Park was the super-competitive one, the one who is one of the best corner infielders in baseball.

The Obama Administration healthcare reform legislation -€“ which already includes Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services programs for coordinated care and requirement changes for hospitals that are tax-exempt -€“ may also be altering the compensation of hospital leaders.

You know which colleges rank highly for academics and status. But what about the most beautiful campus? Or the most robust financial aid?

Politico’s Ben Smith notes today that Mitt Romney hasn’€™t just been avoiding Iowa -€“ he’€™s been nearly absent from the rest of the traditional campaign trail as well. Here’€™s what he says in a piece that labels the front-runner’s campaign strategy as the ‘€œMittness Protection Program’€: