New York, Oct. 21: Fifty three percent of American voters claim that Illinois Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has far greater appeal than his Republican rival John McCain.

However, according to a New York Times report, 33 percent say they have an unfavorable view of Obama.

As far as McCain is concerned, only 36 percent of the voters view him favorably, while 45 percent view him unfavorably.

Oslo - The global financial crisis has affected the Norwegian aluminium and power generation group Norsk Hydro's third quarter sales and earnings, the group said Tuesday.

Third-quarter turnover was 23.98 billion kroner (3.65 billion dollars), down 9 per cent from the third quarter of 2007.

Underlying earnings before financial items and tax (EBIT) were down 8 per cent in the quarter to 1.49 billion kroner, the group said.

"The global financial crisis and uncertainty in world commodity markets have affected our results for the third quarter and will continue to do so in the coming quarters," Hydro Chief Executive Eivind Reiten said in a statement.

According to a leading psychiatrist, 20th century is look like the ‘age of paranoia’. These days general public feels threatened. Paranoia is more common among them because of media and the threat of terrorism.  

Dr Daniel Freeman, from the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London, believes, one in four people regularly suffer irrational fears of being threatened or in danger. “These days, we daren't let our children play outside; we're suspicious of strangers; security cameras are everywhere. We seem to have entered an age of paranoia. And the indications are that things may only get worse,” he claims.

After suspension of four priests of the famous Guruvayur temple, the assistant priests are on a go slow strike.

According to the sources, A devotee had bought ‘appam’ from the counter of the temple on Thursday and he found a cigarette butt in that ‘prasadam’. He reported to the temple management of finding the cigarette butt in ‘prasadam’. Following his complaint, the managing committee of the Guruvayur Devaswom suspended the four priests who were involved in the preparation of ‘appam’

Washington, Oct 21: A US military team, dubbed as “Red Team” for challenging conventional thinking over terrorism, has said that words like ‘jihad’ and ‘Islamist’ were needed in discussing terrorism in the 21st Century, and that the federal agencies that avoid these words were “soft-pedaling” the link between religious extremism and violent acts, reported the Washington Times.

According to the daily, the report titled “Freedom of Speech in Jihad Analysis: Debunking the Myth of Offensive Words” was written by unnamed civilian analysts and contractors for the US Central Command.

The Chief Executive of Google Inc., Eric Schmidt will actively hit the campaign trail this week on behalf of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, after having kept a low partisan profile till now, in the 2008 election.

Making the announcement in Monday’s Wall Street Journal, Schmidt said his planned endorsement of the Illinois senator is a ‘natural evolution’ from his role as an informal adviser to the Obama campaign. He noted that he has been advising the campaign on technology and clean-energy issues for most of the summer.