Ten Words from The New York Times - Aug. 7, 2013

For all the talk, however, it will be difficult to alter the government’s role in housing finance, which has remained substantially unchanged for half a century — notwithstanding Fannie and Freddie’s move from informal to formal wards of the state.

“The government is running the market, but there is no coherent policy.

That leaves an unpalatable choice between making the cost of the system an explicit government obligation, or making it harder for Americans to buy homes.

With its suffering largely cut off from the outside world, this landlocked former French colony, population 5.1 million, has catapulted into place as one of Africa’s most troubled countries.

Another top functionary sits alone in a chair in an empty office looted of every machine, said a Western businessman who went to see him.

But the former colonial power would continue to meddle in the cycles of coups, rebellions and violent transitions that have marked the country’s history ever since, though it is taking a back seat now.

At a base in the capital, the president came to inspect illicit weapons that he said had been seized from the city’s streets.

Silently, swarms of motley-clad fighters followed him about the base, some of them young boys.

More children were added to the study because of a drop in their income during the economic downturn, leading researchers to investigate whether the decline could be attributed to an influx of new children with lower weights.

But there was little consensus on why the decline might be happening.