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Some sloppy coding on an update to Microsoft's Windows 7 two years ago has cost the computer giant a $731 million fine to the European Commission.

Microsoft said Wednesday it would not contest the fine, imposed for what the commission said was the company's abuse of its market dominance to stifle competitors' Web browsers.

It all started in 2009, when Microsoft agreed to pay an 860 million euro fine to the commission and to give Windows users in Europe the option to choose browsers such as Google's Chrome or Mozilla's Firefox, instead of having its own Internet Explorer automatically installed.

But some 15 million Windows 7 installations in Europe failed to include the fix and forced users to install Internet Explorer. Microsoft admitted the failure last year.

Microsoft says when it released Windows 7 Service Pack 1 in February 2011, sloppy coding and testing of the new code meant it failed to trigger the alternate browser option when the system first booted up. The company says it was unaware of the problem until regulators brought it to its attention months later.

"We take full responsibility for the technical error that caused this problem and have apologized for it," a Microsoft spokesman said.

Speaking in Brussels at a news conference Wednesday, the EC's top competition regulator, Joaquin Almunia, said that the fine reflected the size of the violation and the length of time it went on for, according to The Associated Press:

"Almunia said it was also intended to make an example of Microsoft and deter other companies from doing same thing. In theory, the commission could have fined Microsoft up to 10 percent of its global annual sales during the period the violation took place.

" 'A failure to comply is a very serious infringement that must be sanctioned accordingly,' Almunia said."

A Portland, Ore., resident was arrested Tuesday on charges of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists. The FBI alleges that Reaz Qadir Khan, 48, gave money and advice to a man involved in a deadly 2009 suicide bomb attack on the headquarters of Pakistan's intelligence service in Lahore.

The attack resulted in an estimated 30 deaths and 300 injuries. Khan, a naturalized U.S. citizen, could face a maximum sentence of life in prison if he is found guilty. FBI agents arrested him at his home Tuesday morning.

Here's how Oregon Public Broadcasting's Kristian Foden-Vencil explains the FBI's case:

"They're saying he allegedly conspired with a man named Ali Jaleel and others. Jaleel died while participating in the Pakistan suicide attack."

"The U.S. Department of Justice says that between December 2005 and June 2009, Khan used email and intermediaries to give Jaleel and his family money and advice."

"They say Khan used coded language to help Jaleel travel undetected from the Maldives, where Jaleel lived, to Pakistan."

"And they also say Khan gave Jaleel money to attend a training camp to prepare for the attack."

Budget-cutting from the government sequester that began March 1 could affect U.S. exports and imports, including what we eat.

Customs and Border Protection officers regulate trade at the nation's 329 ports of entry, in harbors, airports and on land.

One by one, drivers approach booths with Customs and Border Protection officers at the Mariposa Port of Entry in Nogales, Ariz. More winter produce enters here than at any other place in the U.S. Semis filled with tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers headed to grocery stores around the country.

"What goes on here is affecting people over the entire nation," says Lance Klump, chief CBP officer at the port.

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The stock market's long climb from its recession bottom has some people concerned it may be a bubble about to burst — a bubble artificially pumped up by the Federal Reserve's easy money policy. That's led to calls — even from within the Fed — for an end to the central bank's extraordinary efforts to keep interest rates low.

Even as the Dow Jones industrial average was reaching its nominal record Tuesday, Jeffrey Lacker, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, continued his criticism of the central bank's massive intervention, calling it unhealthy. Another regional Fed president, Charles Plosser of Philadelphia, told a gathering of Pennsylvania businessmen that the Fed's easy money policy could cause financial instability and inflation. Plosser said it's time for Fed policymakers to begin winding down their efforts to lower interest rates.

Causing A Stock Bubble?

Randall Kroszner, a former Fed policymaker and now a professor at the University of Chicago's Booth School of Business, says as the economy heals, the debate over Fed policy is healthy.

"The fundamentals are starting to come back and I think there's a legitimate debate on whether more needs to be done," Kroszner said.

But is the Fed's low-interest-rate policy causing a bubble in the stock market? After all, there are still lots of things wrong with the economy. It's still growing very sluggishly — not fast enough to bring down the unemployment rate, which remains very high.

Alan Blinder, whose book After the Music Stopped deals with the financial crisis and the Fed's extraordinary intervention, doesn't think there's a stock bubble. But, Blinder, a former vice chairman of the Fed, says the central bank's low-rate policy has pushed the market higher.

"Stock prices are supposed to depend on earnings and interest rates, and the Fed has made interest rates very low," Blinder said. "But the other part of it is earnings are very high. You may have noticed that the share of national income accounted for by corporate profits has recently hit all-time highs."

Nudging Investors To Take Risks

Blinder says with company profits soaring it's hard to make a case that their share prices are too high and there's a bubble developing in stocks. And, he says, higher stock prices fit in with the Fed's growth strategy: "To gently nudge — or maybe not so gently nudge — people into taking a little risk instead of putting all their money in Treasury bills and under the mattress."

There are also worries that there's a bubble developing in corporate bonds, and it's true investors have driven corporate bond prices very high. But Blinder says it's hard to consider that a bubble because it's obvious why it's occurred. The Fed's policies have driven rates so low on government bonds that investors are chasing the higher yields on corporate bonds. But, Blinder says, they know the Fed's extreme policy won't last forever.

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