It's 2009 and we're back. This year we begin taping the - geebus - 35th season of Austin City Limits. That's a landmark by any television standard, let alone one for a music show. 35 years old - we're just...

When it comes to financial products, annuities would seem to be the perfect vehicle for retirees. The concept behind them is simple enough: you trade in a lump-sum of cash that you’ve built up over the years for a stream of monthly checks for the rest of your life. But...

Recently, Ghanaians returned to the polls for a runoff election after both major presidential candidates failed to gain a majority in last month's vote. John Atta Mills of the opposition National Democratic Congress party narrowly defeated Nana Akufo-Addo of the ruling New Patriotic Party. Leaders from the United Nations and several...

Leon Panetta is a fascinating choice to head up the CIA, mostly because he doesn't seem to have any of the usual qualifications you'd expect in a spy master. He does, however, have exquisite political skills and a deep understanding of Congress. He also has something else: sterling...

Ahmed Al-Omran is a student at King Saud University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He writes in "Saudi Jeans" Boring Drama, Happy Endings Cinema is back to Saudi Arabia… sort of. Rotana, the entertainment group owned by the country’s richest man Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, premiered the comedy Menahi in Jeddah and Taif…...

Even before the current war began, terror was a part of daily life for Israelis living on one side of the Gaza Strip. Mortar shells and rockets fired by Palestinian militants often rain down on Sderot, a city of roughly 20,000 people. The people of Sderot faced thousands of rocket...

I visited Dubai for the first time over the holidays and, as a business reporter, was anxious to hear how the global economic crisis was affecting this financial hot spot. If all you did was drive through the city, you might not think the city was feeling the impact...

His nose knows, and so do New York's toughest critics. Witness Kevin Kline's foray into the treacherous waters of Broadway as Edmond Rostand's proboscisly challenged 17th-century warrior-poet Cyrano de Bergerac.

This week in SundayArts News: get a look at the annual Christmas Tree and Neapolitan Baroque Crèche, check out the exhibit Art and Love in Renaissance Italy at the Met, get familiar with the photography of Eggleston in William Eggelston: Democratic Camera, grab a ticket for Billy Elliot the Musical,...

Inside Thirteen Blogger: Cara Cosentino, coordinating producer, Great Performances Can you imagine a chance to be in Vienna to welcome the new year with none other than Julie Andrews? Well, that’s exactly what I had the good fortune of doing last week. Working on staff on the Great Performances series, I have...

In 2001, the hate-based attempted murders of two Mexican day laborers catapulted the town of Farmingville, New York into national headlines. Filmmakers Carlos Sandoval and Catherine Tambini spent a year in Farmingville so they could capture first-hand the stories of residents, day laborers and activists on all sides of the...

As a young boy, renowned reptile expert and conservationist Romulus ("Rom") Whitaker dreamed of finding dragons. Years later, the successful herpetologist decided to set out to discover the real-life origins of these mythical monsters. Rom's snake park and crocodile bank in India, where he works to conserve and breed reptiles in...

Each year the tide of the art world carries hundreds of young artists into Chicago’s several art schools to earn their MFAs. And each year the tide also carries a number of newly credentialed artists away, usually to NYC or LA. The money apparently flows more freely there...

For Wall Street and many on Main Street, 2008 was an "annus horribilis"...of gigantic proportions. Bookended by the collapse of Bear Stearns and the near collapse of GM, it is a year many would like to forget. As an investor I wish I could make "2008" disappear from my 401k...

Thousands of Israeli troops are massing on the Gaza border, and a ground invasion is now considered imminent. This seven-day Gaza conflict has so far seen Israeli airstrikes in the Gaza Strip and Hamas rocket attacks in Israel. The Israeli cabinet approved a ground invasion of Gaza last week. Hampton Stephens...