Foreclosures Slow Considerably In February Fears remain about the hundreds of thousands of homeowners who are still being evaluated for help under loan modification programs. Many analysts say most of those borrowers will eventually lose their homes, sparking a new round of foreclosures later this year.

Greece Hit By New Strike Over Austerity Plan Greek police fired tear gas to disperse protesters throwing rocks and firebombs outside Parliament as more than 20,000 people marched through Athens to protest the government's new austerity measures. The strike grounded all flights and brought public transport to a halt.

Mass School Closures Approved In Kansas City, Mo. Facing potential bankruptcy, the board that governs the once flush-with-cash Kansas City school district is taking the unusual and contentious step of shuttering almost half its schools.

House Leaders Ban Earmarks To Corporations With the midterm elections approaching, Democrats and Republicans are battling to claim the clean-ethics crown. That's one reason why Rep. David Obey (D-WI), chairman of the Appropriations panel said he's killing off one of lawmakers' most lucrative perks: corporate earmarks. Most of the earmarks come from the subcommittee that oversees defense spending.

Insurance Mandate May Need Strict Penalties The health care plans before Congress require individuals to purchase insurance. But the penalty for violating the individual mandate may be so low that healthy people might be tempted to pay it instead of buying insurance. That would leave insurers with less healthy customers, prompting companies to raise their rates, prompting more people to drop out, and so forth.

Panel: Vaginal Birth After Cesarean Not Common Cesarean birth rates are steadily rising and still less than 10 percent of women have successful vaginal births after cesareans. A National Institutes of Health panel has been examining the clinical risks and benefits of vaginal births after cesareans — as well as legal, ethical and economic considerations.

Obama Campaigns For Heath Overhaul In Missouri President Obama says the time for talk is over and that Congress needs to take an up-or-down vote on the health care overhaul plan. He traveled to St. Charles, Mo., to sell his plan Wednesday. It was his second trip outside of Washington this week to try to win congressional support for the plan. He also helped raise some cash for Democrats made vulnerable by the long legislative fight.

Talks With Taliban To Decide Afghanistan's Future? The emerging consensus in Afghanistan is that military action alone will not win the war against the Taliban and a political solution will be necessary. Afghan President Hamid Karzai has reached out to some Taliban leaders. But analysts say the Taliban and the U.S. are not ready for full-scale negotiations — yet.

'Al-Qaeda 7' Controversy: Detainees And Politics Justice Department attorneys who once helped represent terrorism detainees are at the center of a raging dispute. Conservatives say that the politically appointed lawyers are influencing U.S. policy to help their former clients.

Terrorism Recruits No Longer All Fit The Mold Colleen LaRose, a petite, 46-year-old blonde from the Philadelphia suburbs, had dropped out of high school and was married several times. She had been arrested for writing bad checks and for drunken driving. She did not fit the terrorist profile — but more and more, that profile seems to be falling by the wayside.

Letters To Haiti Provide A Different Kind Of Help To show support for schoolchildren devastated by the earthquake, fifth-graders in Northridge, Calif., sent the kids letters that included poems, comic strips and stickers. The students in California and those in Haiti say they'd like to be pen pals for life.

Half-Hen/Half-Rooster Shows Cells Can Decide Sex In mammals, a flood of hormones tells cells to develop male or female features. But a new study of gender-bending chickens reveals that birds may be different. They have an additional way of determining whether they appear male or female: Individual cells may be able to do it.

Desmond Tutu, Insisting We Are 'Made For Goodness' The South African cleric and human-rights activist Desmond Tutu joins Renee Montagne to reflect on his long life and his lasting message about forgiveness and reconciliation. His new book, Made for Goodness, is an explanation of his personal sense of spirituality and an invitation to share in his beliefs about the basic goodness of humanity.

Disaster Experts Praise Chile Quake Response A massive 8.8-magnitude earthquake capable of tremendous damage struck central Chile early Saturday, shaking the capital for a minute and a half and setting off a tsunami.

Expert: House, Senate Democrats Have Trust Deficit The divide on Capitol Hill is commonly depicted as Democrats versus Republicans and for good reason — the greatest rift in Congress is indeed partisan. But there's also a cleft between members of the same party, Democrats specifically, with a split between House and Senate members.