Top Stories - The Christian Science Monitor

Washington - Battered by successive shocks, the world economy may be slipping into multicontinent recession.

Washington - The US Supreme Court is set to hear a case this week that will provide important practical advice to workers asked to participate in an internal company investigation of alleged sexual harassment by a senior manager.

The Supreme Court Monday left in place an appeals court ruling that allows Arizona to issue "choose life" license plates, while in another case the justices rejected for a third time an appeal by antiabortion activists to undo a $16 million verdict against them. The activists were penalized for using "wanted" posters to identify abortion clinic doctors.

Pankisi Gorge, Georgia - When Russian tanks rolled toward Tbilisi, Georgia, in August, shops closed and streets emptied as residents stayed indoors, glued to their televisions and radios. A hundred miles northeast, in the mountainous enclave of Pankisi Gorge, Chechen refugees also watched Russian troops advancing on TV, but with less stupefaction and more cynicism.

Baghdad - The Johara Hotel was a backpacker's delight. Rooms were just $12 at the tiny, 10-room inn that was part youth hostel and part rooming house. European, Asian, and American tourists stayed there, even as embargoes tightened on Iraq ahead of the invasion.

Islamabad, Pakistan - For Pakistan, moments of success have been few in the fight in its northwestern tribal area against members of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

Washington - The military is expanding the number of airplanes for reconnaissance and surveillance in Iraq and Afghanistan in response to demands from the Pentagon chief to assume a "war footing" in getting more planes into the air.

Washington - Wall Street now runs through Washington.

New York - Pink slips are now being handed out at the fastest pace since 2003 – an economic event that may have ramifications from the ballot box to the Christmas tree.

Tshipesong, South Africa - On the way home from school, Thabang Thimbela stops off to visit his girlfriend, a few blocks from the tin shack where he and his foster parents and seven foster brothers and sisters live.

Washington - The new term at the US Supreme Court is a little like a vegetarian buffet, plenty of interesting items but nothing really meaty. At least not yet.

Nice kitty. Now, go away.By her own admission, Beverly Hood is fond of cats.

New York - Brace yourself. The credit squeeze that almost every financial expert has warned about is here.

Tskhinvali, South Ossetia; and Moscow - Who started the Russia-Georgia war?

Toronto - One way or another, Canada's Green Party leader Elizabeth May will make history Wednesday and Thursday nights.

New York - Forget Bear Stearns, Washington Mutual, Lehman Brothers, and AIG. The next casualty in Wall Street's financial crisis may be New York City term limits for public office.

Washington - The US military is working to put a new strategy in place for Afghanistan and Pakistan that could allow it to expand airfields, preposition military forces and equipment, and prepare for a more robust effort soon against Islamist extremists in the region.

London - Europe had no time Monday to monitor the US attempt to bail out its banking sector. It was frantically dealing with new leaks in its own financial boat.

Bogot??, Colombia - The overwhelming approval by Ecuadoreans of a new Constitution that gives leftist President Rafael Correa a tighter grip on the economy puts the country firmly on a socialist track similar to Hugo Ch??vez's Venezuela.

New York - Lloyd Blankfein, chairman of Goldman Sachs, made $73.7 million last year. James "Jamie" Dimon, chairman of J.P. Morgan Chase, had to make do with $57.2 million, reported Forbes magazine.

Even if the $700 billion bailout had succeeded, as massive as it would have been, it would have provided just one new leg for weakened credit markets to stand on.

Beijing - – Almost all the Fortune 500 companies in China will allow unions to open in their factories, according to union leaders who are wrapping up this week a 100-day campaign to organize workers in some of the world's largest corporations.

New York - Barack Obama has picked up steam.

New York - Now that Congress appears poised to sign off on a rescue plan for Wall Street, will that save the United States from an economic downturn?

New York

Precious few films have dealt even tangentially with the stories of black American soldiers in World War II, which is why Spike Lee's "Miracle at St. Anna" is doubly disappointing. Clocking in at 160 minutes, this interminable movie comes across like a rough cut. Perhaps Lee believed its length would give it gravitas. The opposite is true.

The Iraq war has thus far produced no truly memorable dramatic movies, as opposed to documentaries, and the losing streak continues with "The Lucky Ones." Basically a home-front story, it clearly aims to do for Iraq what William Wyler's great "The Best Years of Our Lives" did for World War II. It even lifts a number of narrative threads from that film. (Let's be charitable and call it an homage.)

The 1999 movie adaptation of Chuck Palahniuk's "Fight Club" wasn't very good but it was just outr?? enough to keep the cin??astes humming.