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He's here, where are you?

At 2:00 a.m. on Saturday—about eight hours before he allegedly killed six people and wounded 14, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), in Tucson—Jared Lee Loughner phoned an old and close friend with whom he had gone to high school and college. The friend, Bryce Tierney, was up late watching TV, but he didn't answer the call. When he later checked his voice mail, he heard a simple message from Loughner: "Hey man, it's Jared. Me and you had good times. Peace out. Later." That was it. But later in the day, when Tierney first heard about the Tucson massacre, he...

A magnitude 4.2 earthquake struck north-central Indiana on Thursday, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The quake struck just before 8 a.m. ET and was three miles deep, according to the USGS. The epicenter was located about 15 miles east-southeast of Kokomo, 15 miles west-southwest from Marion and 50 miles north of Indianapolis.

Members of the Congressional Tea Party Caucus may tout their commitment to cutting government spending now, but they used the 111th Congress to request hundreds of earmarks that, taken cumulatively, added more than $1 billion to the federal budget.

Call me lucky. I had a pre-scheduled interview this morning with NPR CEO Vivian Schiller this morning before her speech at the Atlanta Press Club Newsmakers luncheon at the 191 Club in downtown Atlanta. So lo and behold, the entire Juan Williams firing blew up the past 24 hours. I happen to be the first person to talk to her about it. Here is an abbreviated Q&A: Q: Okay. What happened? A: Let’s state a couple of facts. Juan is not an employee of NPR. He’s an independent contractor. He’s not NPR staff. He’s an NPR analyst. We have a...

Muslim residents hand out "Islam Explained" to fairgoers; want to show people they are "not terrorists." Despite the smells of fried dough and roasted meat wafting from the Minnesota State Fair, Salim and Zuleyha Ozonder were focused on the people who were leaving, not the food or festivities beckoning from across the street. Each time a new wave of people exited, the young Minneapolis residents — who hadn't eaten all day — tried to press into their hands a small, glossy card that read "Islam Explained" on one side. On the other, it had about 180 words of background on...

A college instructor who worked as senior elections clerk for the city and county of Honolulu in 2008 is making the stunning claim Barack Obama was definitely not born in Hawaii as the White House maintains, and that a long-form, hospital-generated birth certificate for Obama does not even exist in the Aloha State. Tim Adams, a former senior elections clerk for Honolulu, now teaches English at Western Kentucky University.

Small dots appear to "burn" through leaves Area affected is along Tipton and Shelby County line Farmers afraid they may lose their entire crop (Memphis 6/1/2010) A mystery is unfolding across MidSouth farms. Something is killing crops, trees, even weeds and nobody can explain why. Farmers are scratching their heads and some are worried their crops may be lost to the mysterious plague. It's happening along a large swath of land near the Shelby and Tipton county border along Herring Hill Road and elsewhere near the Mississippi River bottoms. Tiny dots appear to have burned onto leaves of all types...

utchman Joran van der Sloot, long the prime suspect in the 2005 disappearance of a U.S. teen in Aruba, has confessed to killing a young Peruvian woman in his Lima hotel room last week, a police spokesman said. Peru's chief police spokesman, Col. Abel Gamarra, told The Associated Press that Van der Sloot admitted under police questioning Monday that he killed 21-year-old Stephany Flores on May 30. According to La Republica newspaper, Van der Sloot told officials he broke Flores' neck in a rage after he discovered she had used his notebook computer without permission and learned he was involved...

Like many middle-class families, Cortney Munna and her mother began the college selection process with a grim determination. They would do whatever they could to get Cortney into the best possible college, and they maintained a blind faith that the investment would be worth it. Today, however, Ms. Munna, a 26-year-old graduate of New York University, has nearly $100,000 in student loan debt from her four years in college, and affording the full monthly payments would be a struggle. For much of the time since her 2005 graduation, she's been enrolled in night school, which allows her to defer loan...

CHARLOTTE - Even by President Obama's loquacious standards, an answer he gave here on health care Friday was a doozy. Toward the end of a question-and-answer session with workers at an advanced battery technology manufacturer, a woman named Doris stood to ask the president whether it was a "wise decision to add more taxes to us with the health care" package. "We are over-taxed as it is," Doris said bluntly. Obama started out feisty. "Well, let's talk about that, because this is an area where there's been just a whole lot of misinformation, and I'm going to have to work...

Like many young women in love, Colette Armand believes she was hit by a coup de foudre when she first saw her future husband. 'The attraction was instant,' she says. 'We had an immediate connection.' Photographs testify to the strength of their bond, showing a beaming young couple clearly delighted by each other's company. That, however, is where the conventional nature of their romance ends. For Colette's intended is a Masai warrior whose home is a mud hut on the vast African plains.

MSNBC is replacing Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews as co-anchors of political night coverage with David Gregory, and will use the two newsmen as commentators. The change reflects tensions between the freewheeling, opinionated MSNBC and the impartial newsgatherers at NBC News. Throughout the primaries and summer, MSNBC argued that Olbermann and Matthews could serve as dispassionate anchors on political news nights and that viewers would accept them in that role, but things fell apart during the conventions. Gregory, the veteran Washington hand, will anchor MSNBC's coverage of the presidential and vice presidential debates and election night, network spokesman Jeremy Gaines...

Stirring up hatred against homosexuals is to become a serious crime punishable with a seven-year jail sentence under a law announced last night. The legislation - similar to laws already in force outlawing persecution on religious or racial grounds - will make criminals of those who express their views in ways that could lead to the bullying or harassment of gays. The maximum sentence is longer than the average of around five years handed to rapists. Christian groups condemned it as "a law to allow Christiansto be locked up for what they believe". But the gay pressure group Stonewall said...

OMAHA, Neb. — Supervisors at a meatpacking plant have fired or harassed dozens of Somali Muslim employees for trying to pray at sunset, violating civil rights laws, the workers and their advocates say. The five- to 10-minute prayer, known as the maghrib, must be done within a 45-minute window around sunset, according to Muslim rules. The workers at the Swift & Co. plant in Grand Island say they quit, were fired or were verbally and physically harassed over the issue. The Council on American-Islamic Relations has drafted a complaint to be filed with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The...

Bay Area immigrant rights advocates say radio host Michael Savage should be fired for using hateful language when suggesting supporters of an immigration reform bill who fasted in San Francisco's Civic Center Plaza last week should starve to death. During a July 5 broadcast of "The Savage Nation," his nationally syndicated talk show, Savage said, "I would say let them fast till they starve to death ... because then we won't have a problem about giving them green cards because they're illegal aliens." More than 30 protesters publicly denounced Savage and the on-air remarks outside San Jose City Hall on...

Titusville police say they have arrested Florida State Rep. Robert "Bob" Allen, of Merrit Island, on second degree misdemeanor charges for soliciation for prostiution. Officers say they noticed Allen acting suspicious as he went in and out of the men's restroom 3 times. Minutes later, he solicited an undercover male officer inside the restroom, offering to perform oral sex for $20. Officers realized he was a public figure after the arrest. Allen, a Republican, represents District 32 of the State House of Representatives.

House Republicans yesterday unveiled a resolution expressing their disapproval of the Senate immigration bill. It was offered by Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.), and simply read: “resolved the House GOP Conference disapproves of the Senate immigration bill.” The move puts the House Republican Conference at odds with President Bush, who has endorsed the Senate bill. Hoekstra said that while he preferred not to break with the president, the language and content of the Senate bill compelled him to vocalize his opposition. It is the second time this year that members of the House Republican Conference have publicly vocalized opposition to Bush...

IRANIAN forces are being choppered over the Iraqi border to bomb Our Boys, intelligence chiefs say. Military experts claim this worrying move means we are at WAR with Iran in all but name. Last night an intelligence source told The Sun: “It is an extremely alarming development and raises the stakes considerably. In effect, it means we are in a full on war with Iran — but nobody has officially declared it.

The House of Representatives has fast-tracked new legislation to "improve" the National Instant Criminal Background Check System by allowing doctors to now decide who can own firearms.

Despite President Bush’s rock-bottom poll numbers, a horrendously mismanaged war and a growing awareness that the President has betrayed them on a host of issues from immigration to government spending, conservatives seem unwilling to recognize their own role as “enablers” of a failed President. And even worse, they seem ready to repeat their mistake in selecting a 2008 champion. It is worth remembering that before he became president, then-Governor George Bush had to convince the Republican elders that he was their man: solidly conservative, more reliable than John McCain and an easy sell to the voters by virtue of his...

Maxim Features Models From Israeli Army Maxim Features Models From Israeli Army; Many in Israel Call It Inappropriate By MATTI FRIEDMAN The Associated Press JERUSALEM A new public relations effort by Israel's New York consulate wants the country known less for its conflict with the Palestinians or for its myriad holy sites than for its beautiful women in uniform. Or, more accurately, out of uniform. A spread in the upcoming July issue of Maxim features a roster of Israeli models, all ex-soldiers, photographed wearing very little in the cause of their country. Headlined "Women of the Israel Defense Forces," the...

Georgia Republicans Johnny Isakson and Saxby Chambliss will vote against moving the Senate’s immigration overhaul measure forward, the senators said today. “I think everybody did a noble effort to try to deal with the problem in a comprehensive way,” Isakson said. “But it became apparent that the confidence level was not there.” Isakson said he and Chambliss had heard from voters back home that they didn’t have faith in another measure that promises border action because past promises have yet to be fulfilled. Neither senator was viewed as a must-have vote by bill supporters, but losing them makes the task...

JERUSALEM – Christians can continue living safely in the Gaza Strip only if they accept Islamic law, including a ban on alcohol and on women roaming publicly without proper head coverings, an Islamist militant leader in Gaza told WND in an exclusive interview. The militant leader said Christians in Gaza who engage in "missionary activity" will be "dealt with harshly." The threats come two days after a church and Christian school in Gaza was attacked following the seizure of power in the territory by the Hamas terror group. "I expect our Christian neighbors to understand the new Hamas rule means...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The new Democratic-led Congress is drawing the ire of voters upset with its failure to quickly deliver on a promise to end the Iraq war. This is reflected in polls that show Congress -- plagued by partisan bickering mostly about the war -- at one of its lowest approval ratings in a decade. Surveys find only about one in four Americans approves of it. "I understand their disappointment," said Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid (news, bio, voting record) of Nevada. "We raised the bar too high."

A thief handed a note demanding Oxycontin over the counter of a Murray pharmacy, but the pharmacist had a surprise under the counter. "I just pulled a gun on him and said 'get out of here," Rod Dunn tells KSL. Pharmacist Rod Dunn is tired of getting robbed for pills and he's not going to take it anymore, so he used a gun to protect his pharmacy and employees. It happened at Millcreek Pharmacy, a family-owned and run business. The man who tried to rob them quickly learned not to mess with this pharmacy. Rod Dunn has been robbed before,...

ST. LOUIS -- St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Josh Hancock was drunk and talking on his cell phone at the time of his fatal accident, and marijuana was found in the sport utility vehicle he was driving. Medical examiner Michael Graham said at a news conference Friday that the 29-year-old reliever was dead "within seconds" from head injuries in the crash early Sunday on Interstate 64 in St. Louis. His vehicle hit the back of a tow truck parked on the highway to assist a driver from a previous accident. "There is nothing at all that could have been done for...

<p>April 23, 2007 -- He's running for president, but some of Rudy Giuliani's campaign-trail hotels have been fit for a king.</p> <p>Giuliani, whose campaign boasts of having spent the least cash of all the Republican White House candidates, rented rooms at a string of high-end hotels as he stumped around the country over the last three months, his campaign filings show.</p>

By striking down the District of Columbia's extraordinarily strict gun control law, which essentially bans guns, a federal appeals court may have revived gun control as a political issue. It has been mostly dormant since autumn 2000, when Al Gore decided he was less interested in it than in carrying states such as Michigan and Pennsylvania: "Gore Tables Gun Issue as He Courts Midwest" [New York Times, Sept. 20, 2000]. The appeals court ruling appalls advocates of gun control laws and should alarm the Democratic Party. The court ruled 2 to 1 that the D.C. law, which allows only current...

MIKE MALLOY FIRED BY AIR AMERICA RADIO There will be no Mike Malloy program on Air America Radio as we have been terminated as of 8/30/06. We are as shocked as you are, especially since as recently as last Tuesday we were told we had the go-ahead to announce our return to NY airwaves and that our contract was "on the way." We are told it's a financial decision. More details to follow as we hear them ourselves. Members of the press can contact malloyproducer@aol.com to schedule interviews.

Aug. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Chairman Charles Rangel and Chairman -- again -- John Dingell. Those titles will soon sound familiar. Whiney Bloomberg copyright link

LINCOLN, Neb. -- Lincoln police on Monday morning arrested a man for the 226th time after, police said, he was breaking into vehicles. Kevin Holder, 41, has a 43-page criminal history that stretches back to 1980. Lincoln police have his mug shot on file 16 different times. "He's very well known to Lincoln police officers. He's a prolific career criminal," said Lincoln Police Chief Tom Casady.

By SAMANTHA GROSS, Associated Press Writer 44 minutes ago NEW YORK - With a city-issued broom in his hand, Boy George started his court-ordered community service early Monday, sweeping leaves and trash off the sidewalks of New York. It took less than an hour for the former Culture Club frontman to get into a spat with the media. "You think you're better than me?" he yelled. "Go home. Let me do my community service." Boy George took to the streets of Manhattan as a Department of Sanitation worker wearing an orange vest, dark capri pants, shoes without socks, and without...

The Silicon Valley Young Republicans Federated would like for you to attend this event this August.This is a funraiser to help raise funds for many Pro Troop causes. SVYRF Club Socials SVYRFC Annual BBQ Location: Sanborn Skyline County Park, Saratoga When: August 12, 2006 Registration: starts at 3pm Food: 4pm Program/Speakers: 5pm Clean-up: 8pm Confirmed Speakers: Claude Parrish, BOE member and Republican candidate for State Treasurer Mike Wasserman, Los Gatos town councilman, former Los Gatos mayor Elsie Gufler, Republican candidate for CA Assembly District 19 Larry Hileman, Republican candidate for CA Assembly District 24 Rob Smith, Republican candidate for CA...

HILLARY CLINTON, MCCAIN HELD VODKA-DRINKING CONTEST Fri Jul 28 2006 19:19:50 ET On a congressional trip to Estonia, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton astonished her traveling companions by suggesting the group do what one does in the Baltics: hold a vodka-drinking contest! Delighted, the leader of the overseas delegation, Sen. John McCain, quickly agreed, the NEW YORK TIMES is planning to report on Saturday. The after-dinner game went so well -- memories are a bit hazy on who drank how much. McCain later told people how unexpectedly fun he found Hillary to be. TIMES reporter Anne Kornblut has filed a story...

The Polish navy says it is almost certain that it has located the wreck of Nazi Germany's only aircraft carrier, the Graf Zeppelin. A Polish firm searching for oil first detected the wreck in the Baltic Sea, 55km (34 miles) offshore. The ship's whereabouts had been a mystery since the end of World War II. The navy investigated and said it was 99% certain that the wreck was the Graf Zeppelin. The ship, built in 1938, never saw action in the war. The navy said it was unlikely that the 250-metre (820-foot) wreck would be recovered from the seabed, as...

CAIRO, Egypt — One of Saudi Arabia's leading Wahhabi sheiks, Abdullah bin Jabreen has issued a strongly worded religious edict, or fatwa, declaring it unlawful to support, join or pray for Hezbollah, the Shiite militias lobbing missiles into northern Israel. The day after Hezbollah abducted two Israeli soldiers on July 12, Sheik Hamid al-Ali issued an informal statement titled "The Sharia position on what is going on." In it, the Kuwaiti based cleric condemned the imperial ambitions of Iran regarding Hezbollah's cross border raid. The surprising move demonstrates that Sunni Muslim fundamentalists in the Middle East are deeply divided over...

A few days before war broke out there last week, I was standing on the so-called Blue Line that divides Israel from Lebanon. Looking across the border from Kibbutz Manara, my colleagues and I—who were visiting on a trip sponsored by the pro-Israel group AIPAC—could see Hezbollah fighters standing atop one of their concrete bunkers. They were separated from Israel only by some unimposing barbed-wire fences and by a United Nations deployment even less daunting than the fencing. As we peered through binoculars, an Israeli military officer described the fragile balance of terror that had kept the border relatively calm...

Today: July 12, 2006 at 12:5:39 PDT Novak Confirms Rove Was Plame Source By PETE YOST ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON (AP) - Now that Karl Rove won't be indicted, now that the president won't fire him, now that it really doesn't matter anymore, more details of the Valerie Plame leak investigation trickle out. In his latest syndicated column, released Wednesday, columnist Robert Novak revealed his side of the story in the Plame affair, saying Rove was a confirming source for Novak's story outing the CIA officer, underscoring Rove's role in a leak that President Bush once promised to punish. As Rove's...

Putin slaps down 'Russia is back' warning to west Mark Franchetti in Moscow and Sarah Baxter in Washington THE kindly grandmother seemed unlikely to be plotting a violent street demonstration, but police in St Petersburg, where the G8 summit of world leaders takes place next weekend, were taking no chances. They marched into Anna Shashokina’s flat, claimed it was being used as the headquarters of an opposition group and demanded to know her political views. “I became so agitated and worried I had a mild heart attack,” Shashokina, 67, said. “These things used to happen under communism in the 1970s...

WASHINGTON - George W. Bush isn't the first Republican president to face a full-blown immigration crisis on the US-Mexican border. Fifty-three years ago, when newly elected Dwight Eisenhower moved into the White House, America's southern frontier was as porous as a spaghetti sieve. As many as 3 million illegal migrants had walked and waded northward over a period of several years for jobs in California, Arizona, Texas, and points beyond. President Eisenhower cut off this illegal traffic. He did it quickly and decisively with only 1,075 United States Border Patrol agents – less than one-tenth of today's force. The operation...

When it comes to internet connections we are quick to appreciate the importance of speed. Whether we're shopping, job hunting, or doing just about anything else, we recognize that our opportunities expand when broadband connections let us zip around this global network quickly. We'd never want to return to dial-up now, but that's what we're doing with another network -- our roadway system. Fifty years ago today President Eisenhower signed legislation that created the Interstate Highway System. Many years prior a young Ike endured a long lesson on the importance of mobility when he participated in coast-to-coast military convoy. Much...

Supreme Court Blocks Bush, Gitmo War Trials Jun 29 10:21 AM US/Eastern Email this story By GINA HOLLAND Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that President Bush overstepped his authority in ordering military war crimes trials for Guantanamo Bay detainees. The ruling, a rebuke to the administration and its aggressive anti- terror policies, was written by Justice John Paul Stevens, who said the proposed trials were illegal under U.S. law and Geneva conventions. The case focused on Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni who worked as a bodyguard and driver for Osama bin Laden. Hamdan, 36, has spent...

Would Republicans regret the day they stood against amnesty for illegal immigrants? In the New York Times, columnist David Brooks asked of conservatives, "Do they think the GOP can have a future if it insults even the Hispanics who are already here [by opposing amnesty proposals]?" Mr. Brooks was echoing the sentiment of more than a few normally clear-sighted conservatives who suggest that unless the Republican Party gets behind liberal immigration reform plans it will alienate Hispanics and soon be relegated to minority status. Former Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie recently warned: "Anti-immigration rhetoric [read: border-security-first legislation] is a...

Pedophiles to launch political party AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Dutch pedophiles are launching a political party to push for a cut in the legal age for sexual relations to 12 from 16 and the legalization of child pornography and sex with animals, sparking widespread outrage. The Charity, Freedom and Diversity (NVD) party said on its Web site it would be officially registered Wednesday, proclaiming: "We are going to shake The Hague awake!" The party said it wanted to cut the legal age for sexual relations to 12 and eventually scrap the limit altogether. "A ban just makes children curious," Ad van...

<p>SIDNEY, Neb.  — A judge said a 5-foot-1 man convicted of sexually assaulting a child was too small to survive in prison, and gave him 10 years of probation instead.</p> <p>His crimes deserved a long sentence, said, but she worried that , 50, would be especially imperiled by prison dangers.</p>

WASHINGTON, DC (KNX) -- Congressman William Jefferson says he's staying put. Jefferson is the target of a federal bribery investigation after FBI agents found $90 thousand in cash hidden in his freezer. He denies any wrongdoing and says he has no intention of resigning his seat in the House. "There are two sides to every story. There are certainly two sides to this story,'' Rep. William Jefferson of Louisiana told reporters, adding that he could not discuss details of the pending federal investigation. "This is not the time, this is not the forum'' to discuss it, he said. Jefferson declared...

By MIKE KELLY VICTOR MANUEL CABALLERO says he only wanted a decent job when he sneaked across the border from Mexico five years ago. Thanks to a ruling last week by the state Supreme Court, he has achieved a special American status even though he still lives here illegally: He can collect damages for being hurt in an auto accident. We hear much these days about illegal immigrants -- how desperate they are for good jobs here, how many risk their lives to slip across the border, how so many now hope to pursue their lives in America with some...

Former Palestinian Authority chairman Yasser Arafat ordered millions of dollars, taken from international aid funds, tax money transferred by Israel and from Arab countries, to be used to purchase weapons and ammunition, it was revealed on Wednesday These weapons were then provided to Palestinian terrorists from the Tanzim and al Aksa Martyrs' Brigades. The information came from the interrogation of Fuad Shubaki, the Palestinian official who was arrested by the IDF two months ago in a raid on the Jericho prison where he was held together with the assassins of former tourism minister Rehavam Ze'evi. Prior to his imprisonment, Shubaki...

XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX MON MAY 15, 2006 20:37:17 ET XXXXX CNN AIRS FALSE-START LIVE; NETWORK CALLS MISTAKE CNN aired President Bush false-starting his immigration speech from the Oval Office on Monday night! The embarrassing images and audio [16 seconds total] captured the president starting and stopping his message, then looking at an unseen director for guidance. [Click for video capture] "The president is rehearsing and the network pool inadvertently went to the president as he is rehearsing," anchor Wolf Blitzer explained. FOXNEWS, MSNBC, CBS, ABC and other outlets did not air the 'rehearsal.' NBC NEWS, which was operating the...