German Education Chief Quits in Scandal Reflecting Fascination With Titles

Tobias Schwarz/ReutersEducation Minister Annette Schavan, left, with Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday. BERLIN — For 32 years, the German education minister’s 351-page dissertation sat on a shelf at Heinrich Heine University in Düsseldorf gathering dust while its author pursued a successful political career that carried her to the highest circles of German government. The academic work...

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Stars salute MusiCares honoree Bruce Springsteen

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Be it concert or charity auction, Bruce Springsteen can bring any event to a crescendo.Springsteen briefly took over auctioneering duties before being honored as MusiCares person of the year Friday night, exhorting the crowd to bid on a signed Fender electric guitar by amping up the deal. The 63-year-old rock 'n' roll star moved the bid north from $60,000 by offering a series of...

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In Nigeria, Polio Vaccine Workers Are Killed by Gunmen

At least nine polio immunization workers were shot to death in northern Nigeria on Friday by gunmen who attacked two clinics, officials said. The killings, with eerie echoes of attacks that killed nine female polio workers in Pakistan in December, represented another serious setback for the global effort to eradicate polio. Most of the victims were women and were shot in the back of...

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Digital Domain: Digital Tags Help Ensure That the Price Is Right

SOME decades ago, a grocery store’s aisles were often filled with “chunk-a-chunk-a” sounds, as clerks stamped prices to the tops of cans and boxes before putting them on shelves. It was a labor-intensive operation, but it did result in a price being affixed to most every item in the store. Randy StrossA paper “Sale” sign accompanies an Altierre screen in a Kohl’s store. ...

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Your Money: For This Girl Scout, It’s More Than Pushing Cookies

Chris Hinkle for The New York TimesLast year, customers of 10-year-old Mary Ruiz of Tucson bought 5,007 boxes of Girl Cookies.  TUCSON — When you buy a box of Girl Scout cookies and devour 10 in a single sitting, as untold numbers of people will in the next month, you are propping up a pretty sizable enterprise. During last year’s sales season, scouts sold $785 million worth of Thin...

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Year after Houston's death, Davis gala returns

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. (AP) — Last year, Whitney Houston died hours before Clive Davis' annual pre-Grammy gala went on. This year, the music executive says she'll be remembered."In saying I'm proud of her legacy, I'm going to make sure that she's felt somehow during that night, yes," the 80-year-old said in an interview Thursday.Davis' gala will take place Saturday night at the Beverly Hilton, where...

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Well: One Dish, One Hour

Fast-food from a restaurant is not as fast as you think. There is drive time to and from the restaurant, waiting time to pay and collect your food, and then it still takes a few minutes to sort through it and set it on the table at home. (Assuming you don’t just eat it in the car.) But if you are willing to invest a few more minutes of time for a more healthful option, you can still make a homemade...

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Bits Blog: Google Changes Its Ad Program to Try to Solve the Mobile Ad Riddle

Google has a mobile problem, and it is trying to fix it.Searches on desktop computers, Google’s most lucrative way to sell ads, are slowing. Searches on mobile devices are increasing, but mobile ads cost less.The result has been that an important business metric for Google — the amount that advertisers pay each time someone clicks on an ad — has declined for five quarters in a row.This week, Google...

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Massive Manhunt On for Ex-Cop Accused of Killing 3

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Thousands of police officers throughout Southern California and Nevada hunted Thursday for a former Los Angeles officer who was angry over his firing and began a deadly shooting rampage that he warned in an online posting would target those on the force who wronged him, authorities said. Authorities issued a statewide "officer safety warning" and police were sent to protect...

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Afghan boys from nominated film to walk red carpet

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Fawad Mohammadi has spent half his life peddling maps and dictionaries to foreigners on a street of trinket shops in Kabul. Now the 14-year-old Afghan boy with bright green eyes is getting ready for a trip down the red carpet at the Oscars.It will also be his first time out of the country and his first time on a plane.Mohammadi was plucked from the dingy streets of the Afghan...

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