AP - The economy lurched deeper into the doldrums Wednesday and took the stock market down with it, sending the Dow Jones industrials to a staggering 733-point loss and erasing any hopes that the convulsions that have shaken Wall Street for a month were over.

AP - John McCain sought to change the course of a campaign moving decidedly in Barack Obama's direction Wednesday night in the third and final presidential debate.

AP - Democratic Rep. John Murtha said Wednesday his home base of western Pennsylvania is racist and that could reduce Barack Obama's victory margin in the state by 4 percentage points.

AP - Nancy Reagan suffered a broken pelvis in a fall at her home and will be hospitalized for several days, her spokeswoman said Wednesday. The 87-year-old former first lady fell last week, spokeswoman Joanne Drake said. She did not seek immediate medical care but decided Monday to get checked out because of persistent pain, Drake said.

AP - American soldiers killed the alleged No. 2 leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, a Moroccan who trained in Afghanistan, recruited foreign fighters and ran operations in northern Iraq where Sunni insurgents remain a potent threat, the U.S. military said Wednesday.

AP - A one-time top lieutenant to Martin Luther King Jr. was sentenced Wednesday to 15 years in prison for having sex more than a decade ago with his then-teenage daughter.

AP - Prosecutors have DNA tests and hair samples. They have testimony about "the smell of death" in the trunk of the suspect's car. What they do not have is a body. Prosecutors building a case against a single 22-year-old Florida mother accused of killing her young daughter will have to rely on forensic evidence and persuade a jury that Casey Anthony lacks credibility and had a motive, legal experts say.

AP - Gale Harold was in critical condition Wednesday after the "Desperate Housewives" actor crashed his motorcycle the day before, a hospital spokeswoman said. Harold was awaiting further tests at USC Medical Center, spokeswoman Adelaida De La Cerda said. She gave no further details on his injuries.

AP - The family of a dead elderly woman cremated her remains on a makeshift barbecue and continued collecting her retirement checks amounting to more than $25,000, authorities in Northern California said. Ramona Allmond's daughter and grandson were arrested Sunday on suspicion of embezzlement, elder abuse and disposing of a body without a permit.

AP - The Tampa Bay Rays are giving Scott Kazmir the chance to pitch them into the World Series. The 24-year-old left-hander was moved up in the rotation so he could start in the potential AL pennant clincher against the Boston Red Sox on Thursday night at Fenway Park. The move keeps Kazmir on his regular rest and bumps scheduled starter James Shields to the if-necessary Game 6 at home Saturday.

Reuters - Wall Street had its worst day since the 1987 stock market crash on Wednesday, as bleak economic data fed worries that all the efforts to unlock credit markets may not stave off a severe recession.

Reuters - Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama face off in their final debate on Wednesday, with McCain needing a strong performance to begin to turn around a White House race that could be slipping away.

Reuters - Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said on Wednesday that turmoil in credit markets poses a "significant threat" to the U.S. economy, suggesting more interest-rate cuts could be coming to help stave off a deep downturn.

Reuters - Gloomy economic data and warnings from the U.S. Federal Reserve that hard times were still to come wiped out two days of relative optimism about the credit crisis and sent markets into free-fall on Wednesday.

Reuters - North Korea has threatened to end all relations with South Korea, a major supplier of aid and cash to the impoverished state, Yonhap news agency reported on Thursday, quoting official North Korean media.