Free Republic

GOLIAD, Texas (AP) — At least 11 people died Sunday and another 12 were injured after a pickup truck loaded with passengers left the highway and crashed into trees in rural South Texas, authorities said. State troopers and Goliad County sheriff's investigators were investigating what prompted the single-vehicle crash and did not immediately know the names and ages of the victims. Gerald Bryant, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, told The Associated Press they were various ages and that he personally saw two young children among the dead at the scene. "This is the most people I've...

Strong feelings on bill hard to explain By any measure, the Pittsburgh region isn't attracting significant numbers of immigrants -- legal or illegal. But that doesn't mean Pittsburghers have no opinion on one of the most controversial national issues of the day. "Everywhere I go, every meeting like this, that's the first question that's asked," U.S. Rep. Jason Altmire, D-McCandless, told a packed room at the Shaler municipal building Wednesday night. "In every town I visit, when I go to the street corner, somebody's going to come up to me and ask, 'What do you think about this immigration bill?'...

PALOMINO VALLEY, Nev. - Swarms of Mormon crickets are marching across the West, destroying rangeland and crops, slickening highways with their carcasses and leaving disgusted residents in their wake. AP Photo "It's yucky," said Amy Nisbet of Elko in northeast Nevada, where this year crickets made their first appearance in recent memory. "You drive down the street and they pop like bubble wrap." Mild winters and three years of drought have provided ideal conditions for the insects, which hatch in the spring and feed through the summer. Experts say this year's infestation in Nevada, Utah and Idaho could be the...