BALANCE — WPOST STYLE  —  The WPost includes in this morning's predictably sympathetic portrait of Mary O. McCarthy, the CIA officer fired for leaking, the following: … OK.  Let's leave aside that people with access to classified information take an oath not to disclose …

Purported bin Laden tape slams West for 'crusader-Zionist war'  —  (CNN) — Parts of an audiotape purportedly from Osama bin Laden aired Sunday on an Arabic-language TV network in which the al Qaeda leader attacks the West for cutting off funds to the Palestinian Hamas-led government and referred to a …

Can Josh Bolten Rescue the Bush Presidency?  —  He started by shaking up the staff.  Next comes a five-point White House "recovery plan"  —  At the George W. Bush campaign headquarters in Austin, Texas, in 1999, policy director Josh Bolten was a low-key Washingtonian in a building full of brash Texans.

Bush's third term  —  IF PRESIDENT BUSH HOPES the "shake-up" of his administration initiated last week will re-energize his listless presidency, he's bound to be disappointed.  A far more audacious makeover is needed — one that sends Vice President Dick Cheney into early retirement.

How a Billionaire Friend of Bill Helps Him Do Good, and Well  —  After leaving the White House in 2001, former President Bill Clinton was inundated with business and job offers, from investment-bank partnerships to seats on corporate boards.  He turned them all down, with one exception …

Corrections  —  A front-page article on Thursday about strain on government services in Texas caused by hurricane evacuees misstated the number of evacuee children in Houston public schools and the amount of Federal aid the state has received.  The most recent count, in late February, showed 5,475 students, not 30,000.

Iran's president recruits terror master  —  Sarah Baxter, Washington and Uzi Mahnaimi, Tel Aviv  —  Plot for revenge attacks on West  —  IRAN'S president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, attended a meeting in Syria earlier this year with one of the world's most wanted terrorists …

A commemoration for the 70 000 that died under Chavez  —  Acuestate por la Vida,  —  commemorating the 70 000 deaths by violence in Venezuela in the last 6 years.  —  Since Hugo Chavez has become president in 1998, the toll of violent death from crime has been multiplied by three.

The Missing Girls of Iraq  —  Sex trafficking, virtually nonexistent under Saddam Hussein, has resurfaced in Iraq.  TIME reports on a seldom-discussed epidemic: girls being kidnapped and sold to brothels  —  The man on the phone with the 14-year-old Iraqi girl called himself Sa'ad.

Iraqi Lawmakers End Months of Deadlock  —  BAGHDAD, April 22 — Four months of political paralysis lifted on Saturday when a newly convened parliament chose seven top officials to run Iraq's first long-term government since the fall of Saddam Hussein.  —  In a largely ceremonial meeting …

Battling cancer — and Blue Cross  —  Unlike THE TYPICAL Blue Cross "valued member," as the annual letter on rate and benefit changes always calls us, I wasn't upset to learn that my monthly premium would increase by $50, to $395 a month, for me and my daughter.  —  That's because I'm not really a Blue Cross valued member.

New Plans Foresee Fighting Terrorism Beyond War Zones  —  Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has approved the military's most ambitious plan yet to fight terrorism around the world and retaliate more rapidly and decisively in the case of another major terrorist attack on the United States, according to defense officials.

Old States, New Threats  —  You know these bad guys.  But there is a whole other world of tyrants, dictators and despots.  —  Crossing a border has always carried a special drama.  Moments after my train crossed from Hungary to Romania in the 1980s — from a country run by a liberal communist regime …