fetch_rss function not working properly

ok, about a month ago I tried installing wordpress 2.0.2 and it was installed but I could never login to the dashboard. I would always get a blank screen.

Today I checked out the site again and saw that 2.0.3 was released so I tried installing that and hadthe same problem happen. I then went to the index file in the wp-admin directory and started editing it up and taking some things out. What I’ve come to realize that it was the fetch_rss function that was causing the error within the dashboard’s index page. Is there another way I could try to get that function to work properly so I can get the latest updates with wordpress and whatever else it was gettiing?