The Yahoo! Newsroom - In recent days, the Bush administration announced new rules to speed oil shale development across 2 million rocky acres in the West. It scheduled an auction for drilling rights alongside three national parks. It has also set in motion processes to finalize major changes in endangered species protection, allow more mining waste to flow into rivers and streams, and exempt factory farms from air pollution reporting.
AP - Punk musician Travis Barker on Friday sued companies linked to a plane that crashed in South Carolina, injuring him and killing two friends.
AP - Japanese millionaire Daisuke Enomoto had planned to dress up as his favorite cartoon character in outer space and spent $21 million to make it happen. Now he claims the company that was supposed make his dream come true brushed him aside with little more than a "sorry, no refunds."
Reuters - Retired Marine Gen. James Jones emerged as a leading contender for White House national security adviser as President-elect Barack Obama worked on Thursday to assemble his foreign policy team.
AP - Wall Street put a stop to a terrifying decline and stormed higher Friday as President-elect Barack Obama appeared ready to tap the chief of the New York Federal Reserve as the next treasury secretary and hand him the herculean task of righting the U.S. financial system.
AP - President-elect Barack Obama intends to name Timothy Geithner, president of the New York Federal Reserve, as his treasury secretary to confront the nation's intense economic turmoil, senior Democratic officials said Friday.
AP - A Missouri woman's daughter says her mother had wanted an Internet account shut down even before cruel messages were sent from it to a teenage neighbor who later committed suicide.
Reuters - People in a vast seismic zone in the southern and midwestern United States would face catastrophic damage if a major earthquake struck there and should ensure that builders keep that risk in mind, a government report said on Thursday.
AP - While President-elect Barack Obama publicly sidelined himself during congressional debate over an auto industry bailout this week, he and his top aides quietly prodded congressional leaders to find a solution to rescue struggling automakers.
AP - Germany is dropping its pursuit of a ban on Scientology after finding insufficient evidence of illegal activity, security officials said Friday.
E! Online - Just more proof that Tina Fey is possibly some kind of superwoman...or at the very least a good luck charm.
AP - Gov. Dave Heineman signed into law Friday a bill adding a 30-day age limit to a safe-haven law that allowed 35 children including teenagers as old as 17 to be abandoned at state hospitals. The law, approved hours earlier by the Legislature in a 45-3 vote, goes into effect Saturday, and makes Nebraska the 14th state with a 30-day age cap. It had been the only state with a safe-haven law without an age limit.
AP - County officials in Wisconsin are holding the bag following a movie shoot involving Johnny Depp as famed bank robber John Dillinger.
AP - Paul Newman has left the assets to his wife, the Oscars to his foundation and the race cars to the highest bidder.
E! Online - Travis Barker is seeking a different kind of closure.
Reuters - Detroit automakers began work on turnaround plans demanded by Congress in return for $25 billion in aid as General Motors Corp said it would cut production more and give up two of its controversial corporate jets.