The Detroit dream-pop duo Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. released its Horse Power EP in July 2010, and followed it with a set of remixes, including one of Junip's "In Every Direction." Easily capturing the sunny warmth of surf pop, the EP takes traditional pop structures and fills them with lush melodies that melt together with upbeat guitar maneuvers and dashes of electronic soundplay.

In a highly anticipated speech Thursday night, French President Nicolas Sarkozy laid the groundwork for tighter French-German cooperation.

He made an ambitious call for a re-write of European treaties, but his speech — billed as his last-ditch plan to save the euro — offered no concrete emergency measures to contain Europe's debt crisis.

Yesterday, we reported about the tempest brewing about Carrier IQ, a secret software a researcher says has been installed on millions of phones and is capable of logging websites a user visits, the contents of voice and text messages and even the content of online searches.

Today Sen. Al Franken, a Democrat for Minnesotta, sent a letter to the company asking for a detailed explanation of the kind of information the company's software logs.

Richard Branson built a global business empire with the philosophy "have fun and the money will come."

As the founder of Virgin Group, he built a mail-order record company into a major record label and a chain of record stores, started an airline, created a space tourism company, and has been actively involved in humanitarian efforts.

There are basically two solutions to the European debt crisis. One, someone can show up with really deep pockets and bail out all the countries. Or, two, the European Central Bank can create a bunch of money and loan it to the countries who need it. The problem is there's a barrier blocking both these potential solutions — a certain European country known for its beer and brats: Germany.

We're a day late, but some stories just beg to be passed along:

"Utah Duck Hunter Shot In Buttocks By His Dog." (The Salt Lake Tribune)

It seems two guys and a dog were out hunting on Sunday. One man was in their boat with the canine. A loaded shotgun was lying across the bow pointed toward the other guy, who was in the water. Fido got excited, stepped on the gun and ... a little while later doctors were plucking 27 pieces of birdshot out of a butt.

Despite international condemnation and tough sanctions from the Arab League, the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad has continued clashing with protesters.

The United Nation's top human rights official said today that the death toll during the eight-month conflict has reached at least 4,000 and he characterized the conflict as a civil war.

The AP reports:

An Afghan woman who was sentenced to prison after being raped by a relative — because in the eyes of authorities she had committed adultery — has been pardoned by President Hamid Karzai.

But her freedom comes with a price, according to news reports: She must become the second wife of the man who attacked her. Karzai's office says the woman and her attacker both have agreed to the marriage.