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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Five hours after starting space shuttle Atlantis on a slow crawl toward its hangar, NASA reversed course Tuesday and sent it back to the launch pad, saying the forecast for Tropical Storm Ernesto had improved. The change could give NASA a small window — a day …

TOKYO – The new Japanese robot Miuro turns an iPod music player into a dancing boombox-on-wheels. The 14-inch-long machine from ZMP Inc. blares music as it rolls and twists from room to room. The robot, which looks like a ball popping out of an egg, has a speaker system from …

WASHINGTON – While the British terror suspects were hatching their plot, the Bush administration was quietly seeking permission to divert $6 million that was supposed to be spent this year developing new homeland explosives detection technology. Congressional leaders rejected the idea, the latest in a series of steps by the …

HELSINKI, Finland – The European Union presidency on Tuesday accused member states of leaking important foreign policy documents to countries outside the bloc, including Israel. Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, wrote in an opinion piece that the leaks are hampering the 25-member bloc’s …

Doctors have their first proof that a man who was barely conscious for nearly 20 years regained speech and movement because his brain spontaneously rewired itself by growing tiny new nerve connections to replace the ones sheared apart in a car crash. Terry Wallis, 42, is one of the few …

TOKYO – Toyota has no interest in blocking or joining the proposed partnership between General Motors (GM) and the Renault-Nissan alliance, the Japanese automaker’s president said Thursday. The remarks from Toyota Motor Corp. (TM) President Katsuaki Watanabe come at a time when GM is in talks about a possible partnership …

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon is moving ahead with scheduled troop deployments to Iraq next month as the U.S. military struggles to gain control of the escalating violence in Baghdad, according to a senior defense official. The decision caps weeks of internal discussions about whether to delay or cancel the deployment …

LOS ANGELES – Jan Murray, one of the fabled generation of comics who rose from the Catskills to prime time TV, tickling fans of the 1950s game show “Treasure Hunt,” has died. He was 89. Murray, who appeared in dozens of movies and TV shows, died Sunday at his home …

NEW YORK – Katie Couric will make her prime-time CBS News debut on Sept. 6 with a one-hour special tied to the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the network said Monday. “Five Years Later — How Safe Are We?” will air at 10 p.m. EDT and talk …

SAN FRANCICSO – Security gaps around America’s freight trains are putting citizens at risk, according to some railway conductors and engineers. “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out, all they’d have to do is take a pot-shot at a chlorine tanker passing by and you could kill hundreds …