Datena successfully brokered the release of these women. (Band News/CNN)

Jose Luiz Datena, host of a popular Brazilian crime show, became part of the unfolding story he was covering when a knife-wielding man holding his own mother and sister hostage demanded to speak with him.

The man had been negotiating with police--who had surrounded his Sao Paulo area home--for more than an hour late last month when he told negotiators he wanted to speak with Datena, host of "Urgent Brazil."

Police agreed, and Datena--who was already on the air--pleaded with the man for 20 minutes to release the women. The man eventually agreed, and the women walked out unharmed.

Datena, though, said he regretted blurring the line between journalist and hostage negotiator.

"I deeply regretted doing that," Datena said, according to CNN. "It is not our role as journalists."

(NYPD/Facebook)

The homeless man who was photographed in being given a pair of boots by a New York City police officer in Times Square on a bitterly cold night last month was spotted on the Upper West Side on Sunday. And he was once again barefoot.

"Those shoes are hidden," Jeffrey Hillman, the 54-year-old homeless man, told the New York Times. "They are worth a lot of money--I could lose my life."

On Nov. 14, NYPD officer Lawrence DePrimo, who was on counterterrorism duty in Times Square, saw Hillman without shoes sitting on 42nd Street. DePrimo, 25, left and then returned with a pair of $100 boots he bought at a nearby Skechers store, knelt down and gave them to Hillman.

The random act of kindness was captured on camera by an Arizona tourist, who emailed the photo to the NYPD. It was then posted on the NYPD's Facebook page and soon went viral, generating more than 600,000 "likes," 47,000 comments and countless warmed hearts.

Hillman--an army veteran and estranged father of two who said he's spent about 10 years homeless in New York--told the Times he did not remember the photo being taken, but was aware of the attention it's received.

"I was put on YouTube," he told the paper. "I was put on everything without permission. What do I get? This went around the world and I want a piece of the pie."

The 'fiscal cliff' remains the hottest topic in Washington, although there are no publicly scheduled meetings Monday or press conferences on the topic. Still, the White House and Republicans are certain to be considering their next move in what increasingly looks like a classic Washington stalemate.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said Sunday he thought the two sides were coming closer together, but House Speaker John Boehner didn't sound that way.

The fiscal cliff is the combination of tax increases and spending cuts that automatically goes into effect on the first two days of January. Economists have warned that the economy could be pushed back into recession if a deal is not reached.

[Want to get a daily update of what's happening in politics delivered right to your inbox? Sign up for our Daily Ticket newsletter]

More action, or at least more posturing, is certain this week. One thing that's on the agenda: President Barack Obama meets with a group of Democratic and Republican

An extracted wisdom tooth. (Thinkstock)Dr. Jay Friedman relishes his role as dental outcast. Like a pesky younger brother who enjoys watching his siblings squirm, the 86-year-old dentist and public health advocate has for decades been poking and prodding at the oral health community over his personal obsession: wisdom teeth.

Friedman has argued for more than 30 years that the practice of removing a young person's healthy wisdom teeth -- called "third molars" by professionals -- is an unnecessary and irresponsible practice. While many dentists and oral surgeons have dismissed him as a traitor and a zealot, in 2007, people in the public health arena began to listen.

That's when Friedman published an article in the American Journal of Public Health claiming at least two-thirds of the millions of wisdom teeth extracted each year at a cost of billions of dollars were removed for no good reason. In pointed terms, Friedman accused his colleagues of ignoring the lack of evidence supporting the need for such surgery in order to line their own pockets.

Friedman has compared the practice to prophylactic tonsillectomies, which were routinely performed on healthy children to prevent future throat problems in the first part of the 20th century, before the medical community denounced them as unnecessary.

"There can be no excuse for tolerating so many unnecessary extractions on millions of unsuspecting and misled people and putting them at risk of so much ... nerve injury. This is a public health hazard," Friedman wrote.

The next year, the American Public Health Association adopted a recommendation opposing the prophylactic removal of wisdom teeth and a few insurance plans decided they would no longer cover such extractions.

It's hard to overstate how much these developments have angered oral surgeons.

Dr. Lou Rafetto, a practitioner in Delaware, paused during a phone interview to apologize as he wound down a tirade. "Sometimes I get emotional when it comes to Jay Friedman," Rafetto said.

(BBC)

A dog at a Russian zoo has adopted three tiger cubs after their birth mother deserted them.

The tiger cubs--two male and one female--were born on Nov. 14 at Oktyabrsky Zoo in Sochi and soon abandoned by their tigress mother, Bagira, who had done the same thing with a different litter earlier this year.

Zoo officials posted an ad online seeking a temporary tiger mom, but a white Swiss Shepherd named Tallim was chosen to fill the surrogate role.

The tiger cubs initially resisted the setup, baring their claws and hissing at Tallim, according to London's Telegraph. But the pooch eventually won them over, "lavishing her new brood with attention and nudging them playfully."

Video from the zoo shows Tallim licking the trio, allowing them to climb over her and, importantly, feed.

It's not terribly unusual for dogs to adopt tiger cubs as their own--particularly in Russia.

Boehner, Geithner (AP/Getty)

With the fiscal cliff looming--and Republicans, like House Speaker John Boehner, slamming the White House's latest proposal--U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner hit the Sunday morning talk show circuit, saying the partisan posturing is a necessary part of "political theater" but that he's hopeful a deal will get done before the end of the year.

"I actually think that we're gonna get there," Geithner said on ABC's "This Week With George Stephanopoulos." "I mean, inevitably [there is] gonna be a little political theater in this context--sometimes that's a sign of progress. I think we're actually making a little bit of progress, but we're still some distance apart."

Geithner said the GOP lawmakers need to realize that the burden is now on them to work with Democrats--and that the ball is in their court.

"There's just no reason why 98 percent of Americans have to see their taxes go up because some members of Congress on the Republican side want to block tax rate increases for 2 percent of the wealthiest Americans," the treasury secretary said.

"They really are in a difficult position," he added. "And they're going to have to figure out their politics of what they do next."

On CNN's "State of the Union With Candy Crowley," Geithner dismissed Boehner's contention that debt talks were at a "stalemate."

"I think we're far apart still, but I think we're moving closer together," Geithner said. "Republicans have said for the first time in decades, if I'm not mistaken, that they are prepared to raise taxes as part of a deal that helps reduce our long-term deficits. Now, what they haven't said to us is how far they're willing to go both on rates and revenues. And that's something we're going to need to see from them if we're going to have an agreement."

He added: "There's going to be a lot of political theater between now and when we get there."

The spirit of Lassie is alive and well in a dog named Ashapoo. The trusty canine was always at the side of his owner's two-year-old grandson, Peyton.

And that was a good thing when Peyton's grandfather turned his back for a minute as he was planning to take the boy on a trip on the family land in Clover, South Carolina, to find a Christmas tree.

When he turned around, the energetic kid was gone. But so was Ashapoo.

By the time Peyton's parents showed up to join the hunt for their missing son on the 300 acres of woods, they took solace knowing the boy was with his faithful friend.

Said dad Rich Myrick to local station WBTV, "In the back of your mind, you know the dog is going to be with him."

Still, four and a half hours of a missing child takes a lot of faith. It was getting dark and cold. Mom Carmen Myrick noted to WCNC that she took in the hundreds of volunteers, ambulances, the media, and police cars. She says she remembers thinking, "'This is not going to end good.'"

When

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON—House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi will try to force a vote on the House floor to extend current tax rates for the middle class next week if Republicans do not act, the California Democrat announced on Friday.

During a press conference on Capitol Hill, Pelosi called on House Republicans, who control the chamber, to hold another floor vote on whether to extend current tax rates for individuals who earn $200,000 or less and families making $250,000 or less. If they don't, Pelosi vowed to file a "discharge petition" that would force a vote if 218 House members sign it, which is unlikely.

The bill Pelosi wants to see put to a vote is identical to a measure passed in the Democrat-controlled Senate in July that extends the rates for middle-income earners for one year. House Republicans responded by rejecting the bill and passing their own measure that extends current tax rates for all income brackets.

"We're calling upon the Republican leadership in the House to bring this