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CHEER UP! Although the Dow Jones industrial average is nearly 200 points lower this week, the blue-chip index is up 370 points year-to-date, and ahead 1,653 points, or 43 percent, since Jan. 1, 1995.But if you lost money in Wall Street, here are ways to build back cash:"Make automatic payments from your bank to an investment plan. Don't trade stocks willy-nilly; commissions and taxes are expensive. Shop now if you haven't checked life insurance prices recently. Call SelectQuote, 800-343-1985.

I WAS DRIVING along the Beltway in my usual cautious manner -- eyes alertly scanning for traffic hazards, hands at the 10 and 2 o'clock positions on the steering wheel -- when this black BMW up ahead began drifting between lanes.As it was 9 in the morning, I assumed the driver was not drunk or jabbing a syringe in one arm, although in this day and age that might be a charitable assumption.Instead, I figured this driver was talking on a car phone, which has become the new death rattle of the '90s.

Many men will experience prostate enlargement as they get older, some to the point that it will cause urination problems. Dr. Michael Naslund, director of the Maryland Prostate Center at the University Maryland Medical Center, said there are many options for treatment, including surgery, drugs and lifestyle changes. What is the prostate and how does it function in the body? The prostate gland sits beneath the bladder in men. The primary function of the prostate in a young man is to produce some of the fluid in the ejaculate and to transport urine and sperm out of the body through the urethra.

The woman who says she represents North American Power is not telling the truth about the benefits of buying electricity from her company. "You can save up to 10, 15, 20 percent of your bill, depending on your usage," she says in a telemarketing call to my house. But the rate she eventually quotes is only about 7 percent less than the standard price offered by Baltimore Gas & Electric — something the average customer would have no way of knowing. And of course the percentage savings won't vary even if my "usage" goes up to that of a steel mill.

In 2010, a blond-haired girl with a sweet smile stood before the "America's Got Talent" studio audience and millions of TV viewers. The 10-year-old proceeded to sing about asking her daddy to grant her request. So far, so normal. But if the words had an appropriately childlike nature, the music was anything but juvenile - it was the aria "O mio babbino caro" from Puccini's "Gianni Schicchi," ordinarily sung by sopranos who have at the very least reached their late teens, and who have gone through years of operatic training.

Many Americans would be surprised to learn that chimpanzees are still being used in biomedical research and that millions of other animals are utilized in consumer product and toxicity testing. Others may find a sense of security in knowing that this practice continues to provide information on which chemicals and products are deemed safe. The fact is that it doesn't have to be this way, and there are a number of public health, economic and animal welfare reasons to change our ways. The evolving process by which the U.S. regulates chemicals is important to every American household.

The woman who died onboard a cruise ship that originated out of Baltimore was 64 years old and from central Virginia, the FBI said Tuesday as the agency continued to investigate her death as "suspicious. " The passenger from Midlothian, Va., outside of Richmond, was found dead in her cabin aboard the Royal Caribbean Enchantment of the Seas on Sunday. She was on a six-night, seven-day Bahamas cruise that left Baltimore March 18, the FBI said. "It's a death of undetermined causes," said FBI spokesman and Special Agent Rich Wolf.

For about 20 years, I have been teaching a course at Towson University called "Media Criticism," which deals largely with alleged ideological media bias. The claims of liberal bias in the mainstream media go back at least as far as Barry Goldwater's campaign for the presidential nomination in 1964. Perceiving repeated negative interpretations contained in "news reports" on his candidacy, he pleaded with major newspapers to put at least one reporter on his campaign who would just report what he said.

The two men wore body armor with "POLICE" written across the chest and spilled out of their unmarked car, weapons drawn, ordering Christopher Dukes and his passenger out of their vehicle at a South Baltimore gas station parking lot. When Dukes pulled off, they embarked on a high-speed chase down Interstate 295 until catching up and placing the pair under arrest, charging documents show. Then it was time for the real police to take over. The men in the body armor were not Baltimore police officers or federal agents, but instead a little-known classification of security guards known as "special police," who are commissioned by the city or state to arrest and detain citizens - but only on specific properties.

The Humane Society of the United States filed a class action lawsuit Monday in New Jersey against Maryland-based Perdue Farms, accusing the nation's third-largest poultry producer of falsely advertising its chickens as "humanely raised. " The suit was brought on behalf of a New Jersey woman who bought chicken at a BJ's Wholesale Club bearing the Harvestland label, a trade name used by Perdue for birds raised in Kentucky and marketed as "purely all-natural" and "humanely raised. " The suit alleges that the poultry producer's marketing violates New Jersey's consumer fraud law. The complaint seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages against Perdue, as well as an injunction barring it from making claims that it treats its birds humanely.