Smokers today inhale more nicotine per cigarette than they did six years ago. That's the finding issued this week by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, which requires manufacturers selling cigarettes in the state to report on nicotine content annually. (Utah and Texas are the only other states to collect such data each year.)
The nation's unemployment rate dropped slightly to 4.7 percent in August as the economy added 128,000 new jobs, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported this morning.
AP - Authorities on Sunday announced the capture of al-Qaida in Iraq's No. 2 leader, accusing him of "brutal and merciless" terror operations, including the bombing of a Shiite shrine that touched off the sectarian bloodletting pushing Iraq toward civil war.
AP - Warplanes and artillery pounded Taliban fighters hiding in orchards Sunday during a big Afghan-NATO offensive that the alliance said killed more than 200 militants in its first two days. Four Canadian soldiers also were killed.
AP - The federal government has fallen back to prosecuting international terrorists at about the same rate it did before Sept. 11, according to a study based on Justice Department data.
The San Diego Chargers' Steve Foley is in a hospital being treated for gunshot wounds. The NFL player was shot by an off-duty policeman who had followed him after noticing Foley's car driving erratically, a sheriff's investigator in San Diego, California, said. Foley was shot twice; his wounds are not believed to be life-threatening, said San Diego Sheriff's Department Lt. Dennis Brugos.
Doctors have amputated the leg of one of the New York state troopers shot last week during a search for fugitive Ralph "Bucky" Phillips, a police spokeswoman told CNN Sunday.