FRESH LOOK

U.N. tired of having its weather data rained on

The United Nations was wise to ask the Inter-Academy Council, composed of scientists from 15 countries, to review the work of its beleaguered global warming panel. And it's reassuring that the council, one of the world's most credible scientific groups, has pledged to take on the job without preconceived notions.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon insists that there were only a few errors in the 3,000 pages of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's last major synthesis of climate data in 2007. But those errors gave ammunition to climate-change skeptics who oppose U.N.-led efforts to conclude a legal international agreement on global warming this year.

A thorough, unbiased review is exactly what's needed if public confidence is to be restored.

MEXICAN MOGUL

By a slim margin, Bill Gates falls to No. 2

Move over, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett —there's a new richest man in the world.

Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim is riding high in 2010, thanks to his surging telecom holdings, including giant mobile outfit America Movil, which buoyed Slim's fortune to $53.5 billion, up $18.5 billion in a year, says Forbes.com. That tops Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates, who was the world's richest man 14 of the past 15 years and now ranks No. 2 with $53 billion. Buffett is No. 3 with $47 billion.

The richest woman? Christy Walton, with $22.5 billion. Part of the family that owns Walmart, she's the richest of the Waltons, thanks also to late husband John's investment in First Solar, a successful alternative energy stock, according to Forbes.com.