AUGUSTA, Ga. – Perfection isn’t so much a pursuit at Augusta National Golf Club as it is a practice. So there remains the possibility that, come Thursday morning, the azaleas, long since the victims of an early spring, will somehow bloom fresh. The trees felled by a violent storm Tuesday night will somehow re-root themselves. The ground soaked by more than an inch of rain will dry up, and the Masters will be what the Masters almost always is: a roars-from-all-corners, don’t-turn-away-lest-you-miss-something rite of spring. Read full article > >

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Masters 2012: Golf’s best players, including Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, are playing their best

Two Iranian warships docked in a Syrian port as a senior Iranian lawmaker denounced the possibility that the Americans might arm the Syrian opposition.

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Iran Warns U.S. Over Syria as Crackdown Grows

Do you remember from your childhood how satisfying it was to pull apart the two triangles of a toasty sandwich and dip each imminent mouthful into a bowl of steam-wafting soup? Plenty of restaurateurs are capitalizing on the possibility that you might. Read full article > >

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Soup and sandwich, now more than ever

Some banks, using credit-default swaps, are more hedged than others against the possibility of a debt cascade in Europe.

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DealBook: U.S. Banks Tally Their Exposure to Europe’s Debt Maelstrom

A statutory register of Parliamentary lobbyists should be created with the possibility of tough penalties for those who breach the rules the government proposes.

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Rogue lobbyists ‘could face jail’

In announcing the decision, government officials indicated that the possibility of huge fines for Canada’s failure to meet greenhouse gas emissions targets had played a role.

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Canada Leaving Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change

Scientists have opened up the possibility of one day using cancer patients’ own skin to fight their tumours.

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Skin transformed for cancer fight

With the possibility of major Defense Department cuts on the horizon, the sun is already setting on thousands of civilian Pentagon jobs. In August, the Army said it would reduce its workforce by 8,700 people. Then last week, the Air Force announced it was eliminating 9,000 civilian positions in management and support areas. One ray of sunshine in the Air Force announcement is the plan to add 5,900 slots to meet the service’s top priorities, in acquisition, nuclear enterprise, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. Read full article > >

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As Pentagon’s civilian workforce faces cuts, alarms ring about more

A push in Congress to reduce the debt and the possibility that the Pentagon might have to begin trimming core programs have suddenly made retiree benefits vulnerable.

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Retiree Benefits for the Military Could Face Cuts

A push in Congress to reduce the debt and the possibility that the Pentagon might have to begin trimming core programs have suddenly made retiree benefits vulnerable.

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Retiree Benefits for the Military Could Face Cuts

This time a year ago, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke headed to an annual gathering of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyo., amid a faltering U.S. economy, a perilous global situation, and rising calls on Wall Street for the Fed to do something to address both. Here we go again. Bernanke is to deliver a speech Friday morning in the same ballroom in the shadow of the Grand Teton mountains where last year he gave a speech that laid the groundwork for a $600 billion program of bond purchases aimed at lifting the economy. The financial world is obsessing over the possibility of another go-round. The thought that Bernanke may offer hints of new steps to boost growth contributed to big gains on Wall Street Tuesday, with the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index up 3.4 percent. Read full article > >

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Ben Bernanke unlikely to announce big new plans at Jackson Hole

French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde interviews with the International Monetary Fund board on Thursday for the job of managing director. But last year, as a debt crisis in Greece unnerved markets and raised the possibility that the euro zone currency union might not survive, Lagarde wasn’t so interested in the agency she now wants to command. As the United States and the IMF urged fast action on a program to help settle Greece’s problems before they became more expensive and riskier to the world economy, France — through Lagarde — argued that Europe could tend to itself, a position that consumed precious weeks resisting an IMF role in any rescue. Read full article > >

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As Europe stumbles, Lagarde presses IMF bid

On one side was an unconventional presidential candidate. He was enthralled with making documentaries to sell his ideas and captivated by the notion that wooing Chinese Americans could be a key to winning Iowa. On the other side was a team of political operatives shocked by the flamboyance of the candidate’s stumbles, his resistance to their advice and the dire state of his campaign finances. While he was away on a lavish vacation that they had warned him not to take, they drafted a memo raising the possibility of a graceful exit from the race. Read full article > >

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Why Newt Gingrich’s campaign crashed

England move into a 156-run lead after the fourth day of the second Test against Sri Lanka, setting up the possibility of a victory push on Tuesday.

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England build lead over Sri Lanka

The National Zoo is prepared for the possibility that giant panda Mei Xiang — who has been busy constructing a nest of bamboo and mulberry branches — is pregnant. Read full article > >

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Washington’s pregnant panda?