The case pits Rafael Izquierdo, who raises pigs and grows malanga in central Cuba, against foster parents Joe and Maria Cubas, a Cuban-American couple from Coral Gables, in a struggle for custody of a 5-year-old girl they both want to raise.

Plans are under way to distribute pills to 1.4 million people in the Carolinas to protect them in a nuclear disaster, replacing ones distributed after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. But don't throw away the old potassium iodide pills yet, public health officials urge.

The federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services wants to cut Medicare fees to physicians by nearly 10 percent next year, under a formula approved in the 1990s. For the past several years, Congress has intervened to stop the cuts from going through.

S.C. National Guard troops were part of a three-week-long effort to push insurgent fighters out of villages along a key road linking Afghanistan to Pakistan. The mopping-up mission, which ended earlier this month, included the Afghan army and national police.

Cody Conway, a combat Marine in Iraq, envisioned a lifelong career in the military. If not, perhaps a return to civilian life as a mechanic. Four years ago, he returned from war unexpectedly, his life and future shattered by a noncombat accident outside Baghdad that tore the muscles and tendons from his right arm and shoulder.