Evening Edition

Though undoubtedly the best day since the disaster began more than 15 weeks ago, US officials cautioned that a great deal of clean-up work remained and that the long-term impact could be felt for years, even decades, to come.

BP’s long-awaited “static kill” was conducted overnight as heavy drilling fluid was rammed into the busted Macondo well for eight hours, forcing the oil back down into the reservoir miles beneath the seabed.

Engineers launched their long-awaited static kill at 2000 GMT, ramming heavy fluids into the blown-out Macondo well to force the crude back down into a reservoir almost 3.5 miles (5.7 kilometers) beneath the surface of the sea.

Having conducted “text-book” tests that showed the oil could be subdued, BP was optimistic of success, although senior vice president Kent Wells said it was too early to know if the process would take hours or days.

After pumping heavy drilling fluid into the busted well for eight hours, the company said “the MC252 well appears to have reached a static condition — a significant milestone.”

“The well pressure is now being controlled by the hydrostatic pressure of the drilling mud, the desired outcome of the static kill procedure,” it said in a statement.

Some 42,000 private-sector jobs were created following a revised June number of 19,000, ADP said ahead of a key government report Friday that is expected to show unemployment already at 9.5 percent ticking up.

Most economists had expected 25,000 private jobs to be established in July, the sixth consecutive monthly increase in hirings.

Ahmadinejad was on his way to a sports arena to make a speech in Hamedan, south of the capital, when the explosion occurred.

Conservative website Khabaronline, the first source to report the incident, initially said a hand grenade was thrown at the hardliner’s motorcade but later in the day dropped “grenade” in its report and used the word “firecracker” instead.

With the week-long crisis showing no sign of abating amid Russia’s worst heatwave in decades, the emergencies ministry said hundreds of new fires had started over the past day and more bodies were found.

Medvedev cut short his traditional summer break in the southern resort of Sochi and returned to Moscow to chair an emergency meeting of the national security council on the fire disaster.

The UAE “Telecommunications Regulatory Authority’s (TRA) decision to suspend certain Blackberry services from October 11th is final,” the official WAM news agency quoted a statement by TRA director-general Mohammed al-Ghanem as saying.

The UAE announced on Sunday that BlackBerry services including messenger, web browsing and email will be suspended because they “allow individuals to commit violations” that the country cannot monitor.

Backed by President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga, the “yes” vote has led opinion polls despite a feisty “no” campaign which has stigmatised the text as allowing abortion and harming certain tribes on land issues.

“I have no doubt in mind that the yes will win resoundingly and I will predict a 70 percent victory,” Odinga told AFP after casting his ballot in the Nairobi slum of Kibera.

After months of setbacks in efforts to permanently plug the well, BP said heavy drilling mud injected into it on Tuesday was stemming the flow of crude. The next step in the “static kill” procedure will be to pump in cement behind the mud as a seal.

The British energy giant, which has lost about 40 percent of its market value and seen its image badly tarnished by the disaster, called it a “significant milestone.”

Based on Forbes magazine’s estimates of the billionaires’ wealth, at least $150 billion could be given away.

Among the rich joining The Giving Pledge campaign are New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, media moguls Barry Diller and Ted Turner, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, “Star Wars” movie maker George Lucas and energy tycoon T. Boone Pickens.

BP PLC reported that mud forced down the well overnight was pushing the crude back down to its source for the first time since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded off Louisiana on April 20, killing 11 workers, rupturing the sea-floor wellhead and causing one of the world’s worst oil spills.

Crews still have to determine whether an area between the inner piping and outer casing of the blown-out wellhead is leaking – something they say they can’t answer until they drill in from the bottom later this month.

A parade of GOP senators took to the Senate floor to outline the case against Kagan even as it became clear that President Barack Obama’s nominee had drawn a majority for confirmation. Republicans portrayed the 50-year-old solicitor general as a partisan figure who would be unable to prevent her liberal leanings from interfering with a justice’s responsibility to rule impartially.

“Put simply, Ms. Kagan is a political activist, not a jurist,” Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., said. “Throughout her confirmation hearings, she failed to explain where her political philosophy ends and her judicial philosophy begins.”

Even if the vote sets no legally binding precedent, it will help mobilize foes of Obama’s agenda in the fall midterm elections, and that could make a difference in some states with close congressional races that could decide the balance of power in Washington.

On Tuesday, Missouri voters cast 71 percent of their ballots in favor of a state measure to bar the government from requiring people to carry health insurance, and penalizing those who don’t.

The $26 billion measure would help states ease their severe budget problems and – advocates said – stop the layoffs of nearly 300,000 teachers, firefighters, police and other public employees. Though scaled back, the bill also would salvage a victory for Democrats who have been unable to deliver most of the jobs help they and President Barack Obama promised.

The legislation advanced by a 61-38 tally that all but ensured it would pass the Senate on Thursday. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she would call the House back into session next week to approve the measure to get it to Obama for his signature before most schools reopen.

A fan set off a firecracker similar to those used during sports matches to express his excitement at Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s visit to the western Iranian town of Hamedan, reported the IRNA news agency. The explosion near the president’s convoy had set off a flurry of media reports, including one that it was a handmade grenade.

The conservative Iranian website, khabaronline.ir, said a grenade exploded as the president’s convoy headed from the airport to the venue for the speech, but did not harm him.

The reluctant Campbell has been subpoenaed to testify about a diamond Taylor allegedly gave her after a dinner party hosted by Nelson Mandela in South Africa in 1997.

Taylor’s lawyer, Courtenay Griffiths, had argued that Campbell should not appear until prosecutors provide a summary of her likely testimony.

Revenue from high-end jewelry, which had held steady in June, plummeted in July from a year earlier, when the figures already were dismal. Furniture also suffered as the boost from homebuyer tax credits wore off. Shoppers even pulled back on shoes and children’s clothing, while luxury spending – excluding baubles – was virtually unchanged.

The figures from MasterCard Advisors’ SpendingPulse, which include transactions in all forms including cash, signal that spending remains choppy as shoppers grapple with an almost 10 percent unemployment rate and tight credit.

Schoolhouse charts of past leaders are crowded with monthslong presidencies and group shots of the military juntas that overthrew them. Heads of state have been flown into exile, crowned themselves emperor or been killed more often than they have completed constitutional five-year terms. One president was torn limb from limb by an angry mob.

Whoever wins the Nov. 28 election will face the Herculean task of rebuilding from the Jan. 12 magnitude-7 earthquake that killed a government-estimated 300,000 people while managing billions in international reconstruction dollars amid feuding officials, families and an estimated 1.6 million earthquake homeless, all hungry – some more literally than others – for their share.

Democratic Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick of Michigan lost her bid for an eighth term on Tuesday, the legal woes of her son Kwame, the former Detroit mayor, dragging her down in a year when fickle voters seem eager to fire longtime lawmakers.

She’s the sixth – and the fourth in the House – to lose so far this year. And the frustrated electorate could deal others the same fate in primaries over the next two months, not to mention the general election in November, when nothing less than the balance of power in Washington will be at stake.

Omar Thornton’s girlfriend, meanwhile, told The Associated Press that he had complained of racial harassment and had shared evidence of it with her: photos of racist bathroom graffiti and a surreptitiously monitored conversation allegedly involving company managers.

Thornton carried two 9 mm handguns to Hartford Distributors inside his lunch box Tuesday and left a shotgun in his car, police said. At a disciplinary hearing, he watched video that showed him stealing beer and then resigned after being asked whether he wanted to quit or be fired.

The delay in releasing information by officials and state media is part of a government attempt to discourage copycat killers and assuage fears over a series of school attacks this year that have caused dozens of deaths and wounded scores.

Online postings about the attack were deleted by midafternoon Wednesday by government censors who police the Internet for material considered politically sensitive.

Interviews with White House and Agriculture Department officials reveal a greater level of White House involvement in the incident than officials initially let on, with staff making calls to Capitol Hill and civil rights groups, and senior administration officials speaking to Vilsack. Most notably, White House staff expressed concerns early on that Sherrod’s remarks about race in an edited video clip may have been taken out of context.

Despite the concerns, a White House official said no one in the West Wing asked the Agriculture Department to hold off in seeking Sherrod’s resignation until a full tape or transcript of her remarks could be found. The official said the White House didn’t want to get involved in what it considered to be a USDA personnel matter.

After the death of her husband and her own treatment for cancer, there was speculation that the 77-year-old justice would step down. But she told The Associated Press on Tuesday that she plans to remain on the court for the foreseeable future and still wants to match Justice Louis Brandeis, who retired at age 82.

Ginsburg talked with the AP in her wood-paneled office at the court as the Senate began debate on the all-but-assured confirmation of high court nominee Elena Kagan, chosen by President Barack Obama to replace John Paul Stevens. Last year, Justice Sonia Sotomayor joined the court after David Souter retired.

But BlackBerrys are now being challenged by phones that say you can have your e-mail, and have fun, too.

Research In Motion Ltd., the maker of the BlackBerry, revealed a new phone Tuesday that says the company is still in the game, but it’s doing so by catching up to the competition rather than by breaking new ground.

Plymouth Rock? Try again.

Soaring more than 250 feet above picturesque Provincetown Harbor at the very tip of Cape Cod is the nation’s tallest all-granite structure, a 100-year-old monument at the place where the Mayflower initially dropped anchor after its perilous journey from England. Impressive as the tower may be, its story surprises many visitors who since childhood have learned only the iconic tale of Pilgrims, Plymouth Rock and the first Thanksgiving, and little if anything about what happened first.

Fans of Elizabeth Gilbert’s best-selling memoir “Eat, Pray, Love,” have been following in her footsteps ever since it was first published in 2006. The book describes a year Gilbert spent living in Italy, India and Indonesia on the rebound from a divorce and failed romance.

But the travel industry is betting that the Aug. 13 release of a film version starring Julia Roberts will inspire even more globe-trotting. Hotels, tour companies and even guidebook publishers are offering everything from do-it-yourself itineraries to luxury trips.

The dispute over Robert Appleton’s appointment is the latest salvo in a high-stakes fight within the world organization over how to fix the U.N.’s long-troubled internal watchdog agency. U.N. associate spokesman Farhan Haq said Wednesday that Ban’s office could not comment on matters before the tribunal.

Appleton’s 76-page application to the U.N. Dispute Tribunal, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press, said that Ban’s refusal to hire him is a breach of the U.N. Charter and General Assembly resolutions.

Gatot Dewabroto, spokesman for the Ministry of Communication and Information, wants RIM to set up a server locally so encrypted information sent by the phones will not have to be routed through the Canadian company’s overseas computers.

“We don’t know whether data being sent through BlackBerrys can be intercepted or read by third parties outside the country,” he said, expressing concern that information could be used by criminals or spies.

But the five-door, five-passenger xD can’t seem to shake the image as the Rodney Dangerfield of small hatchbacks. Sales are down 25.5 percent through the first seven months of 2010, and the xD is the slowest-selling of all non-luxury Toyota cars.

It’s easy to overlook the xD at Toyota’s youth-oriented car brand, Scion, where attention goes to the boxy-styled Scion xB and the sporty-looking Scion coupe, the tC. But the xD, with odd styling, also is no bargain.

The portrait has quickly become a symbol of the stakes of a nearly decade-old war. It has been brandished before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on television, dissected in online commentary and extrapolated into a conversation-starter about topics ranging from anti-abortion activism to violence against women.

“Disturbing on so many levels,” Cory Albrecht, a telecommunications technology worker in Kitchener, Canada, wrote of the photo on his Twitter feed. And “completely necessary, unfortunately,” he added by e-mail.

Koua Fong Lee, 32, of St. Paul, is serving an eight-year prison sentence on multiple counts, including two criminal vehicular homicide convictions. He has insisted he tried to stop his car and requested a new trial after Toyota recalled millions of vehicles because of problems with sudden unintended acceleration.

Lee’s attorneys say his 1996 Camry – while it wasn’t part of the recall – may have experienced the same problem.