News you can use
News you can use
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WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who's leading the push to restore an assault weapon ban, acknowledged on Sunday that the effort faces tough odds to pass Congress and she blamed the nation's largest gun-rights group. Feinstein, D-Calif., on Thursday introduced a bill that would prohibit 157 specific weapons and ammunition magazines that have more than 10 rounds. The White House and fellow Democrats are skeptical the measure is going anywhere, given lawmakers who are looking toward re-election might fear pro-gun v... Full story
WASHINGTON — The Senate has voted to confirm Chuck Hagel to be the nation's next defense secretary. The vote Tuesday was 58-41, with four Republicans joining Democrats in backing President Barack Obama's nominee. The vote ended a contentious fight over the president's choice for his second-term national security team. Republicans opposed the former two-term Republican senator from Nebraska, casting him as out of the mainstream and overly critical of Israel. But Democrats stood together for Hagel, a twice-wounded Vietnam c...
C. Everett Koop, who raised the profile of the surgeon general by riveting America's attention on the then-emerging disease known as AIDS and by railing against smoking, has died in New Hampshire at age 96. An assistant at Koop's Dartmouth institute, Susan Wills, said he died Monday in Hanover, where he had a home. She didn't disclose his cause of death. Koop wielded the previously low-profile post of surgeon general as a bully pulpit for seven years during the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations. AP Photo/Jim... Full story
WASHINGTON (AP) — In an embarrassing setback for President Barack Obama, a federal appeals court panel ruled that he violated the Constitution in making recess appointments last year, a decision that would effectively curtail a president's ability to bypass the Senate to fill administration vacancies. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said that Obama did not have the power to make three recess appointments last year to the National Labor Relations Board because the Senate was officially i...
WASHINGTON — The Pentagon is lifting its ban on women serving in combat, opening hundreds of thousands of front-line positions and potentially elite commando jobs after generations of limits on their service, defense officials said Wednesday. AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File Defense Secretary Leon Panetta speaking during a news conference in London on Jan. 19. Panetta has removed US military ban on women in combat, opening thousands of front line positions. The changes, set to be announced Thursday by Defense Secretary Leon P...
LONDON — Prince Harry's admission that he killed Taliban fighters while working as a helicopter gunner in Afghanistan drew intense British media coverage Tuesday and sparked concerns about possible reprisals. The 28-year-old prince spoke in a pooled interview published late Monday after he was safely out of Afghanistan. He had spent the last 20 weeks deployed as a co-pilot and gunner in a heavily armed Apache attack helicopter. AP Photo/ John Stillwell, Pool In this photo taken Dec. 12, Britain's Prince Harry or just plain C...
WASHINGTON (AP) — Declaring "our journey is not complete," President Barack Obama took the oath of office for his second term before a crowd of hundreds of thousands Monday, urging the nation to set an unwavering course toward prosperity and freedom for all its citizens and protect the social safety net that has sheltered the poor, elderly and needy. AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais President Barack Obama waves after his speech while Vice President Joe Biden applauds at the ceremonial swearing-in at the U.S. Capitol d... Full story
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama was sworn in for four more years Sunday in a simple ceremony at the White House, embarking on a second-term quest to restore a still-shaky economy and combat terrorists overseas while swearing an age-old oath to "preserve, protect and defend" the Constitution. AP Photo/Brendan Smialowski, Pool President Barack Obama is officially sworn-in by Chief Justice John Roberts in the Blue Room of the White House during the 57th Presidential Inauguration in Washington, Sunday. "I did it," a s... Full story
WASHINGTON — Pressing toward his second term, President Barack Obama touted "the importance of giving back" as he kicked off three days of inaugural celebrations Saturday with a National Day of Service. AP Photo/Susan Walsh First lady Michelle Obama stains a bookshelf at Burrville Elementary School in Washington, Saturday, as the first family participated in a community service project for the National Day of Service as part of the 57th Presidential Inauguration. The president, along with first lady Michelle Obama and d... Full story
AUSTIN, Texas — Thousands of gun advocates gathered peacefully Saturday at state capitals around the U.S. to rally against stricter limits on firearms, with demonstrators carrying rifles and pistols in some places while those elsewhere settled for waving hand-scrawled signs or screaming themselves hoarse. The size of crowds at each location varied — from dozens of people in South Dakota to 2,000 in New York. Large crowds also turned out in Connecticut, Tennessee and Texas. Some demonstrators in Phoenix and Salem, Ore., came w...
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin was indicted Friday on charges that he used his office for personal gain, accepting payoffs, free trips and gratuities from contractors while the city was struggling to recover from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. The charges against Nagin are the outgrowth of a City Hall corruption investigation that already has resulted in guilty pleas by two former city officials and two businessmen and a prison sentence for a former city vendor. Ray Nagin The federal i...
TEUBENVILLE, Ohio (AP) — A judge on Sunday convicted two members of Steubenville's celebrated high school football team of raping a drunken 16-year-old girl, concluding a months-long ordeal for the victim and the accused, even though the case is far from over for the community. Ohio's attorney general immediately announced he's investigating whether coaches, parents or other students broke the law by refusing to speak up. Among those his office has interviewed: revered head coach Reno Saccoccia and the owners of one of the h...
(Editor's note: The entry list for the marathon listed several Montana residents, but no one from the Hi-Line.) BOSTON — The bombs that blew up seconds apart at the finish line of one of the world's most storied races left the streets spattered with blood and glass, three dead, including an 8-year-old boy, more than 140 wounded and gaping questions of who chose to attack at the Boston Marathon and why. AP Photo/MetroWest Daily News, Ken McGagh Injured people and debris lie on the sidewalk near the Boston Marathon finish l...
OXON HILL, Md. (AP) — Only months after President Barack Obama's re-election, an annual gathering of conservatives served as an audition for Republicans looking to court conservative activists and raise their profile, all with an eye toward greater political ambitions. It may seem early, but the activists who attended the three-day Conservative Political Action Conference are already picking favorites in what could be a crowded Republican presidential primary in 2016. AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker gestur...
BISMARCK, N.D — North Dakota on Friday moved closer to adopting what would be the most restrictive abortion laws in the country, with lawmakers sending the Republican governor measures that could set the state up for a costly legal battle over the U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized the procedure. The North Dakota Senate overwhelmingly approved two anti-abortion bills Friday, one banning abortions as early as six weeks into a pregnancy and another prohibiting women from having the procedure because a fetus has a g...
VATICAN CITY (AP) — Black smoke poured from the Sistine Chapel chimney on Tuesday, signaling that cardinals had failed on their first vote of the papal conclave to choose a new leader for the world's 1.2 billion Catholics and their troubled church. Surrounded by Michelangelo's imposing frescos imagining the beginning and the end of the world, cardinals locked themselves into the chapel following a final appeal for unity to heal the divisions that have been exposed by Pope Benedict XVI's shocking resignation and revelations of... Full story
DETROIT (AP) — Former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick was convicted Monday of corruption charges, ensuring a return to prison for a man once among the nation's youngest big-city leaders. Jurors convicted Kilpatrick of a raft of crimes, including racketeering conspiracy, which carries a maximum punishment of 20 years behind bars. He was portrayed during a five-month trial as an unscrupulous politician who took bribes, rigged contracts and lived far beyond his means while in office until fall 2008. AP Photo/Detroit News, D...
NICOLE WINFIELD, VICTOR L. SIMPSON,Associated Press VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI said Monday he lacks the strength to fulfill his duties and on Feb. 28 will become the first pontiff in 600 years to resign. The announcement sets the stage for a conclave in March to elect a new leader for world's 1 billion Catholics. AP Photo/L'Osservatore Romano, file In this April 28, 2009 photo provided then by the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, Pope Benedict XVI stands by the salvaged remains of Pope Celestine V, in the 1...
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Friday they have agreed to speed up slightly the schedule for moving Afghanistan's security forces into the lead across the country, with U.S. troops shifting fully to a support role. The leaders also said Obama agreed to place battlefield detainees under the control of the Afghan government. The capabilities of the Afghan army are "exceeding initial expectations," the two said in a joint statement released after their private White House meeting a...
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is announcing Treasury secretary nominee Jack Lew, pointing to his past work of balancing budgets during the Clinton administration. The president says he feels "bittersweet" about losing Lew as his White House chief of staff but says "my loss will be the nation's gain." He notes that Lew was budget director during the Clinton administration, when the budget ran a surplus for three years. Lew is taking over Treasury as the administration prepares for a new fight with congressional R...
TAFT, Calif. (AP) — A student was shot and wounded at a rural California high school Thursday and a student suspect was taken into custody, officials said. The shooting occurred about 9 a.m. at Taft Union High School in Taft, a community of fewer than 10,000 people amid oil and natural gas production fields about 120 miles northwest of Los Angeles. AP Photo/Taft Midway Driller, Doug Keeler Paramedics transport a student wounded during a shooting Thursda at San Joaquin Valley high school in Taft, Calif. Authorities said a s... Full story
BOSTON (AP) — A howling storm across the Northeast left the New York-to-Boston corridor shrouded in 1 to 3 feet of snow Saturday, stranding motorists on highways overnight and piling up drifts so high that some homeowners couldn't get their doors open. More than 650,000 homes and businesses were left without electricity. At least three deaths in the U.S. were blamed on the wind-whipped snowstorm, including that of a New York man killed when the tractor he was using to plow his driveway ran off the edge of the road. AP P...
hristopher Dorner sees himself as a crusader, a 6-foot, 270-pound whistleblower who confronted racism early in life and believes he suffered in his career and personal life for challenging injustices from bigotry to dishonesty. He fulfilled his lifelong dream of becoming a Los Angeles cop in 2005, but saw it unravel three years later when he was fired after a police review board decided he falsely accused his training officer of kicking a mentally ill man in the face and chest. The incident led Dorner to plot violent revenge...
PISCATAWAY, N.J. (AP) — Fueled by outrage from even the governor when the video went public, Rutgers fired basketball coach Mike Rice on Wednesday after deciding it didn't go far enough by suspending and fining him for shoving, kicking and throwing balls at players along with spewing gay slurs. AP Photo/Mel Evans, File Rutgers coach Mike Rice reacts to play during an NCAA college basketball game against Connecticut in Piscataway, N.J., on Jan. 7. Athletic director Tim Pernetti was given a copy of the tape by a former e... Full story
WASHINGTON — Millions of people who take advantage of government subsidies to help buy health insurance next year could get stung by surprise tax bills if they don't accurately project their income. AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File President Barack Obama signs the health care bill in the East Room of the White House on March 23, 2010. Millions of people who take advantage of government subsidies to help buy health insurance next year could get stung by surprise tax bills if they don't accurately project their income. P...
