Chinese Passenger Train Tops 300 MPH During Test Run

A Chinese passenger train hit a speed of 302 miles per hour (486 kilometers per hour) during a test run Friday on a route between Beijing and Shanghai that is expected to open in 2012.

China's Xinhua News Agency said it was a record for an unmodified, conventional commercial train.

China already has the world's longest high-speed rail network, and it plans to cover 8,125 miles (13,000 kilometers) by 2012 and 10,000 miles (16,000 kilometers) by 2020.

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Critics Won't Be Able to Repeal Health Law

Jonathan Cohn, New RepublicMy latest column for Kaiser Health News:Critics of health care reform this week thought they would get their first win in the campaign to repeal the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Instead they got a lesson in just how politically challenging a wholesale repeal might be.At issue was an obscure, but unpopular, provision within the new health law that requires businesses to file 1099 tax forms anytime they purchase goods or services worth more than $600. The idea is to collect income taxes from the vendors producing those goods and services -- taxes many vendors avoid paying now....

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Obama grants first pardons

Washington (CNN) -- President Barack Obama granted the first pardons of his administration Friday, erasing the records of nine people convicted over the past 50 years for a range of crimes ranging from drug possession to conspiracy to defraud.

Presidential pardons are traditionally granted around the holiday season.

The following individuals were pardoned by Obama:

-- James Bernard Banks of Liberty, Utah, who was sentenced in 1972 to two years of probation for illegal possession of government property;

-- Russell James Dixon of Clayton, Georgia, who received two years of probation in 1960 for a felony liquor violation;

-- Laurens Dorsey of Syracuse, New York, who was sentenced in 1998 to five years of probation and required to pay $71,000 restitution for making false statements to the Food and Drug Administration;

-- Ronald Lee Foster of Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, who was sentenced in 1963 to one year of probation and received a $20 fine for the mutilation of coins;

-- Timothy James Gallagher of Navasota, Texas, who was sentenced in 1982 to three years of probation for possession and conspiracy to distribute cocaine;

-- Roxane Kay Hettinger of Powder Springs, Georgia, who was sentenced in 1986 to 30 days in jail and three years of probation for conspiracy to distribute cocaine;

-- Edgar Leopold Kranz Jr. of Minot, North Dakota, who received a bad conduct military discharge in 1994 for wrongful use of cocaine, adultery and writing three insufficient fund checks;

-- Floretta Leavy of Rockford, Illinois, who was sentenced in 1984 to one year and one day in prison -- along with three years of parole -- for distribution and possession of cocaine, as well as possession of marijuana with intent to distribute; and

-- Scoey Lathaniel Morris of Crosby, Texas, who was sentenced in 1999 to three years of probation and required to pay $1,200 in restitution for passing counterfeit obligations or securities.

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