By Libby Ryan
The United Nations voted Thursday to recognize Palestine as a 'non-member observer state'.
The 193-member U.N. body voted 138 to 9, with 41 abstentions, according to the Washington Post.
The vote was met with condemnations from the United States and Israel.
The New York Times said that the new status will give Palestine more freedom to oppose Israel in international legal forums.
By Libby Ryan
The drawing for the Multi-State Lottery Association's prize has failed to come up with a winner after 16 consecutive drawings.
According to the Washington Post, the Powerball winnings have become the second-largest potential lottery payout in U.S. history.
The $550 million prize has been predicted to have a winner by Wednesday night, said Powerball officials.
The BBC reports the numbers that were drawn were numbers were 5, 23, 16, 22, 29 and 6 but there has yet to be a winner.
During the day on Wednesday tickets were selling at a rate of 130,000 a minute nationwide.
The leader of the military wing of the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas was killed Wednesday in an air strike over the Gaza Strip.
Ahmed Said Khalil al-Jabari died in his car in Gaza City when it was hit by fire from an Israeli air strike, said the BBC.
Al-Jabari was the most senior Hamas official to be killed by Israeli fire since the invasion of Gaza four years ago, according to the New York Times.
Spandex leggings are becoming a distraction to students, said Minnetonka principal.
Principal Dave Adney of Minnetonka High School sent an email to parents asking them to talk to their children about current fashion trends and modesty.
Students once chose to pair tight fitting leggings with long tops that covered their hips but increasingly this season, shirts are being worn shorter, said the Pioneer Press.
The Minnetonka students handbook bans clothing that is disruptive, offensive or inappropriate and principals said that each year there are trends that become concerns for the administration, according to the Star Tribune.
Adney said earlier this month, "Cover your butts up -- I'm just going to say it straight up. We're seeing too much."
Nancy Pelosi announced Wednesday that she wishes to continue serving as the House of Representatives Minority Leader for at least two more years.
Pelosi said she wants to remain in a leadership position in order to work to resolve the fiscal crisis, to limit the amount of money in politics and to empower women in the workplace and government, regardless of the fact that the Democratic party has failed to regain majority in the House for two consecutive elections.
There are leadership election scheduled for after Thanksgiving and Pelosi is certain to win, according to the Washington Post.
CBS News said no Democrat has made a move to run against Pelosi for the position.
By Libby Ryan
In the Associated Press story, Greek Parliament passes 2013 austerity budget with comfortable majority, numbers are used in three clear ways.
Firstly, numbers are used to show the vote (167-128 vote in the 300-member Parliament). These numbers are not overwhelming because the author balanced them with some background on what else the parliament has been voting on recently.
Secondly, the author describes the next loan payments Greece will receive. These numbers are overwhelming because they are listed first in Euros and then in the dollar amount. The author could have found a more readable way to write these statistics. However, the numbers are manipulated and converted correctly.
Thirdly, numbers are used to show the difference in the crowd gathered to protest the new budget as compared to a previous protest. This nears being too many numbers as there are two large numbers in one sentence but it makes enough sense to be readable because the article overall is not filled with number after number.
Mayor RT Rybak and his mother ended election night with crowd surfing from the stage in a ballroom filled with people.
On Tuesday night, after President Obama was re-elected, Lorraine Rybak jumped into the arms of the crowd before her son joined her, said the Star Tribune.
The mayor's mother said before the election that if Obama won she wanted to crowd surf after her son said he was too old to repeat his stunt. She said if she was not too old, he was not, according to MinnPost.
By Libby Ryan
A promoter of Lumberjack Days festival in Stillwater was charged with 10 felonies on Friday.
David W. Eckberg, 61, was charged with five counts of issuance of a dishonored check and five counts of theft by check after a year-long investigation by local law enforcement and prosecutors, according to the Star Tribune.
The bad checks totaled $54,859, according to criminal charges filed in Washington County District Court.
Eckberg allegedly deposited over $41,000 into personal bank accounts instead of paying money owed to beer suppliers, a lighting company, and a youth hockey booster club.
Eric Thole, Eckberg's attorney, said his client had no intention of swindling anyone and that the festival had financial problems because of the weather, said Minnesota Public Radio.
By Libby Ryan
CIA Director David H. Petraeus resigned Friday after admitting to an extramarital affair.
An FBI investigation into a possible security breach discovered the affair when looking into Petraeus's emails.
The emails described an affair between Petraeus and Paula Broadwell, a former military officer and co-author of Petraeus's biography, according to the Washington Post.
Obama administration officials said the Petraeus met with President Obama on Thursday to say he intended to step down from his position because of personal reasons.
Petraeus wrote in his resignation letter that he showed "extremely poor judgment" and that having an extramarital affair is "unacceptable" for an person in his leadership position, said the Huffington Post.
By Libby Ryan
In India, experts say millions of people in India are infected by the mosquito-borne plague and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated a travel advisory against India because of the epidemic on Nov. 2.
Government officials in India report close to 30,000 people with dengue fever but experts say there are closer to 37 million cases per year, said the New York Times.
Sri Lanka, a country with a populations 60 times smaller than India's, reported three times as many cases of dengue fever in 2011, according to the World Health Organization.
The disease in only life threatening for close to 1 percent of those infected but symptoms of fatigue and depression can last for months in even mild cases.
President Barack Obama was re-elected for a second term in office on Tuesday evening.
The President won 332 electoral votes while Mitt Romney lost the election with 206, said the Huffington Post.
"In the weeks ahead I am looking forward to sitting down with Gov. Romney to discuss how we can move this country forward," Obama said in his acceptance speech.
Both parties focused on key battleground states in the last weeks of the race, with Obama winning eight of nine states still fairly undecided shortly before the election.
The New York Times obituary for Jacques Dupin, a French artist and poet, has a normal obituary lead and second paragraph.
The chronology of Dupin's life differs from a resume because it does not simply list his accomplishments. The writer listed several notable works of art and publications of Dupin's and quoted experts in the fields or fans on the impact these works had on them or art in general. There was no extensive list of everything he had done, simply listed one after another, as a resume would.
The obituary ended differently than with the traditional list of who the deceased is survived by. In this case, the writer chose to end with a kicker, a quote from a professor of French literature commenting on Dupin's character.
By Libby Ryan
Both sides of the presidential campaign sent representatives to Minnesota this week in an attempt to gain as many votes as possible before the election on Tuesday.
Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan spoke to a crowd of thousands at the Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport on Sunday and former President Bill Clinton is also speaking on Sunday on behalf on Democratic President Barack Obama's campaign, said the Star Tribune.
Minnesota's 10 electoral votes were seen as safe for Obama but a poll last week showed a much closer race than had been anticipated, according to CBS Minnesota.
By Libby Ryan
The Minneapolis City Council on Friday asked the musicians of the Minnesota Orchestra to resume talks to resolve contract disputes.
The Minnesota Orchestra has been locked out since they rejected a contract offer on Oct. 1 that would reduce the minimum salary by 32 percent.
The locked out musicians said they want to attend the orchestra board meeting on Monday but the board chairman and CEO both say they have not yet received the musicians' request to do so, the Star Tribune said.
Minnesota Orchestra musicians held a rally at Peavey Plaza for the one-month anniversary of the lockout on Thursday, according to MinnPost.
Concerts have been cancelled through Nov. 25.
Barack Obama has a 3-point lead over Mitt Romney according to a poll b y Pew Research Center.
The poll was released Sunday afternoon and is the final poll that will be released before Election Day on Tuesday.
A third of voters have already voted, with 48 percent voting for Obama and 46 percent voting for Romney, according to the Huffington Post.
Less than a week earlier, a poll by Pew showed the presidential candidates tied at 47 percent. The new poll suggests Obama's chances were helped by the events of Hurricane Sandy, said the Washington Post.
