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The quality of "Saturday Night Live" season premieres is almost always on the shaky side, and the 34th season debut was no exception. It took off, however, like a skyrocket. Saturday's "cold open" sketch — a "Nonpartisan Message From Sarah Palin & Hillary Clinton" — rose to the occasion and then kept rising, right into the stratosphere. Former writer and cast member Tina Fey, making a brief return to the show, played the Republican vice presidential candidate, with pregnant cast member Amy Poehler doing her surefire, time-tested Clinton beside her. In the parlance of the show, they "killed." With CNN...

Mickey Mouse is a corrupting influence and must die, a Muslim cleric has declared. Sheikh Muhammad Munajid claimed the mouse is "one of Satan's soldiers" and makes everything it touches impure. But he warned that depictions of the creature in cartoons such as Tom and Jerry, and Disney's Mickey Mouse, had taught children that it was in fact loveable. The cleric, a former diplomat at the Saudi embassy in Washington DC, said that under Sharia, both household mice and their cartoon counterparts must be killed.

(AP / WASHINGTON) — Democrat Barack Obama says he would delay rescinding President Bush's tax cuts on wealthy Americans if he becomes the next president and the economy is in a recession, suggesting such an increase would further hurt the economy. Nevertheless, Obama has no plans to extend the Bush tax cuts beyond their expiration date, as Republican John McCain advocates. Instead, Obama wants to push for his promised tax cuts for the middle class, he said in a broadcast interview aired Sunday. "Even if we're still in a recession, I'm going to go through with my tax cuts," Obama...

A San Francisco radio host billed by his station as the "Lion of the Left" was sentenced yesterday to seven years of prison on a charge of e-mailing images of child pornography. Bernie Ward, a former Catholic priest who is now married with four children, hosted a Sunday radio program called "God Talk" on San Francisco-area radio station KGO-AM 810 and another program on weeknights devoted to news and politics. According to several reports, Ward earned his "Lion of the Left" nickname for his outspoken and staunchly liberal viewpoints. Ward came under FBI investigation last year after a woman with...

Denver, CO (LifeNews.com) -- During the Democratic convention in Denver where pro-abortion presidential candidate Barack Obama will be coronated as the party's nominee, a leading pro-abortion group will put on a big shindig. Emily's List will unite failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and Obama's wife Michelle. That Barack Obama's wife would attend a gala for a pro-abortion group that supports partial-birth abortions and taxpayer-funded abortions is no surprise. Michelle Obama came under fire in May for a letter she wrote defending partial-birth abortions. The 2004 letter, written to help Obama in his campaign for his U.S. Senate seat, opposes the...

The Greenest Show on Earth: Democrats Gear Up for Denver From Organic Fanny Packs to 'Pure' Trash, Party Planners Face Logistical Nightmare By STEPHANIE SIMON June 25, 2008; Page A1 DENVER -- As the Mile High City gears up to host a Democratic bash for 50,000, organizers are discovering the perils of trying to stage a political spectacle that's also politically correct. Consider the fanny packs.

Bob Beckel Seems Very Worried.

SANAA (AFP) — A Yemeni court on Tuesday granted a divorce to an eight-year-old girl whose unemployed father forced her into an arranged marriage this year, saying he feared she might be kidnapped. "I am happy that I am divorced now. I will be able to go back to school," Nojud Mohammed Ali said, after a public hearing in Sanaa's court of first instance. Her former husband, 28-year-old Faez Ali Thameur, said he married the child "with her consent and that of her parents" but that he did not object to her divorce petition. In response to a question from...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Wal-Mart Stores Inc, the world's largest retailer, unveiled plans on Monday to film its gun sales in the United States and create a computerized log of purchases in a bid to stop guns falling into the wrong hands. Wal-Mart, which is the largest seller of firearms in the United States, agreed a 10-point code, which also includes rigid inventory controls, with a bipartisan coalition of Mayors Against Illegal Guns led by New York's Michael Bloomberg.

Clinton has declared on the campaign trail that a welcoming ceremony for the March 25, 1996, arrival in Tuzla was canceled, and she had to run from the airplane into an airport building for safety. The then-first lady's traveling party included 15-year-old daughter Chelsea, the comedian Sinbad and singer Sheryl Crow. "I remember landing under sniper fire," Clinton recounted. "There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base." But the Post's Michael Dobbs says that "as...

Gazans celebrated a “victory” over departing IDF forces today, but Israel warns that the operation has not yet concluded — and probably will not for the foreseeable future. After destroying a number of suspected rocket-manufacturing sites, the Israelis pulled back out of Gaza to consider options and targets. Meanwhile, rockets still landed in Sderot and Ashkelon: A government spokesman said after the troops pulled back on the ground: “We will continue with our defensive actions against those who fire lethal rockets at our civilians.”Another Israeli official said Hamas should view the latest operation as a hint of future Israeli action...

A human tongue has been served up in a hospital canteen's chicken risotto — and bosses reckon it was accidentally dropped into the food by a doctor.

The Democrats are trying to give away an election they should win in a walk by nominating someone with real problems -- like, for example, a first-term senator with a 100 percent rating from Americans for Democratic Action and whose middle name is "Hussein." But we won't let them. The bright side of the Florida debacle is that I no longer fear Hillary Clinton. (I mean in terms of her becoming president -- on a personal level, she's still a little creepy.) I'd rather deal with President Hillary than with President McCain. With Hillary, we'll get the same ruinous liberal...

Another factor might be contributing to the thinning of some of the Antarctica's glaciers -- volcanoes, according to the authors of an article published on the Web site of the journal Nature Geoscience. According to Hugh Corr and David Vaughan of the British Antarctic Survey: Volcanically, Antarctica is a fairly quiet place; but sometime around 325 B.C., a hidden and still active volcano erupted, puncturing several hundred yards of ice above it. Ash and shards from the volcano carried through the air and settled onto the surrounding landscape; that layer is now out of sight, hidden beneath the snows that...

A conservative Christian pastor plans to launch a high-profile campaign Tuesday urging religious followers to load up on Microsoft Corp. stock, in an attempt to force the company to "stop financing ungodly ventures." The Rev. Ken Hutcherson, who leads Antioch Bible Church in Microsoft's hometown of Redmond, says that he will create a global and powerful group to promote traditional family values, including marriage exclusively between a man and a woman. Hutcherson, joined by some of the country's most influential Christian leaders, has created a new organization, AGN Financial Network, to finance the effort. The worldwide venture asks people to...

Secessionists meeting in Tennessee By BILL POOVEY, Associated Press Writer Wed Oct 3, 3:15 AM ET CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. - In an unlikely marriage of desire to secede from the United States, two advocacy groups from opposite political traditions — New England and the South — are sitting down to talk. ADVERTISEMENT Tired of foreign wars and what they consider right-wing courts, the Middlebury Institute wants liberal states like Vermont to be able to secede peacefully. That sounds just fine to the League of the South, a conservative group that refuses to give up on Southern independence. "We believe that an...

LONDON (AFP) — Iranian engineers were among those killed in a blast at a secret Syrian military installation two months ago, defence group Jane's said Wednesday after claiming that the base was being used to develop chemical weapons. The July 26 explosion in Aleppo, northern Syria, was reported at the time. The official Sana news agency said 15 Syrian military personnel were killed and 50 people were injured, most of them slightly from flying glass. The agency said only that "very explosive products" blew up after fire broke out at the facility and that the blaze was not an act...

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki hit back on Sunday at Democratic presidential hopeful Senator Hillary Clinton and other U.S. critics who have called for him to be replaced, telling them "to come to their senses." Maliki is under mounting pressure from officials in Washington to show political progress towards reconciling his majority Shi'ite Muslim sect and minority Sunni Arabs. U.S. officials are frustrated by the negligible progress so far. Clinton and fellow Democratic Senator Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, have called for Maliki to be voted out because of his failure to find a...

Walter Cronkite created Fox News. This aspect of Mr. Cronkite's long and distinguished career as a journalist was not mentioned in this week's showing of the PBS series American Masters that saluted the veteran CBS newsman. The show, which is designed to examine "the lives, works, and creative processes of our most outstanding cultural artists," dug deep into Mr. Cronkite's life and career. He was praised (one might even say worshiped!) for his coverage of the Kennedy assassination, political conventions, Vietnam and Watergate. He was cited as a television pioneer, which he most certainly was.

While promoters of "The Da Vinci Code" have tried to downplay the film's challenge to Christianity, actor Ian McKellen took a shot at the Bible in an interview with the "Today" show, saying Scripture should carry a disclaimer that it is "fiction." McKellen, who played Gandalf in "The Lord of the Rings" triology, was responding to a question from host Matt Lauer about the requests by some Christian groups to insert a "fiction" disclaimer at the beginning of the controversial film, which suggests Jesus and Mary Magdalene were man and wife and that the divinity of Jesus was an invention...

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration has banned arms sales to Venezuela -- which has been on a buying spree to prepare for an alleged U.S. invasion -- accusing President Hugo Chávez of failing to cooperate in the war on terrorism and maintaining close ties to Cuba and Iran. The decision announced Monday may be largely symbolic because Chávez has been buying the bulk of his weapons, including attack and transport helicopters, patrol boats and military transport airplanes, from Russia and Spain. The first batch of 33 Russian helicopters arrived in Venezuela last month, and 33,000 of the 100,000 Russian Kalashnikov...

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran's leader has written to President Bush proposing "new solutions" to their differences in the first letter from an Iranian head of state to an American president in 27 years, a government spokesman said Monday. Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki delivered the letter to the Swiss ambassador on Monday, ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told The Associated Press. The Swiss Embassy in Tehran houses a U.S. interests section. In the letter, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad proposes "new solutions for getting out of international problems and the current fragile situation of the world," spokesman Gholam-Hossein Elham told a news...

In an effort to "ratchet down" the level of hostility between police and lawbreakers, officers have been instructed to be less critical and more understanding when confronting miscreants. Under the new rules, police are to let burglars off with a "caution," rapists will be required to apologize, and murderers will be subjected to abusive and derogatory chastisement. "Incarceration is so barbaric," said Horace Bottomly of the Home Office. "We're striving for a more tolerant live-and-let-live attitude." Bottomly cited anticipated budgetary savings and safety gains expected from the new policy. "With fewer arrests we will save quite a bit on prisons,"...

Actor Chris Penn Found Dead at Residence By PAUL CHAVEZ, Associated Press Writer 36 minutes ago LOS ANGELES - Actor Chris Penn, brother of Sean Penn, was found dead Tuesday at his condominium near the beach in Santa Monica, police said. Police said they discovered the 40-year-old actor's body around 4 p.m. Lt. Frank Fabrega said there were no obvious signs of foul play. Sean Penn's publicist, Mara Buxbaum, issued a statement saying that "the Penn family would appreciate the media's respect of their privacy during this difficult time." Chris Penn's body was found inside the four-story condominium complex after...

LOS ANGELES - Former teen idol Leif Garrett is hooked on heroin, his mom says - and she blames hard-partying rock 'n' roll legends like the Rolling Stones for steering her son toward drugs. "Leif idolized rock stars ... that whole life of rock 'n' roll and drugs ... the Rolling Stones. He figured if they could do it, so could he," Garrett's distraught mother, Carolyn Stellar, told the Daily News yesterday.

After 10 years and $23 million, Independent Counsel David Barrett's report on an investigation of Henry Cisneros, a former Bill Clinton housing secretary, will reveal additional details of the particularly slimy nature of Slick Willie & Co. According to The New York Sun, citing specifics from a report set to be released Thursday, "there was a coordinated effort by Clinton administration officials to first block and then limit the probe as a way of taking pressure off an administration that was already beset by scandals." Among those said to be implicated -- then-Attorney General Janet Reno.

Conservatives planning to attend Grover Norquist's popular Wednesday Group meeting tomorrow will be the target of a MoveOn.org protest outside Norquist's downtown Washington, D.C., office building. Tom Matzzie of MoveOn.org Political Action announced the protest in an e-mail to supporters Tuesday morning. Norquist's meeting is attended by a broad range of Republicans. It starts at 10 a.m. "The group hosting the meeting—Grover Norquist's Americans for Tax Reform—is at the center of the Republican power machine in Washington and has been implicated in the corruption scandals from lobbyist Jack Abramoff," Matzzie wrote in the e-mail. "But they still meet even after...

There will be a replay of the South Park episodes from the second half of Season 9, starting tonight (Wednesday) at 10:00 PM on Comedy Central.In looking over the replay schedule, you may notice that the controversial final episode of the season, Bloody Mary (Episode 914), is missing. 10:00 PM Two Days Before The Day After Tomorrow (Episode 908) A global warming state of emergency is declared in South Park. The world's largest beaver dam breaks and floods the adjacent town of Beaverton. As the victims wait for help to arrive, everyone in South Park tackles priority number one: who...

The Los Angeles Police Department has instructed its officers to stop using Glock 21 pistols because of concerns that the weapons could misfire. According to Assistant Chief Jim McDonnell, the LAPD's Armory discovered that there may be a mechanical flaw with about two percent of the guns. Officials with Austria-based Glock Inc. are expected to investigate the matter with the LAPD next week, he said. The moratorium is being taken as a safety precaution for officers. The lighter-weight, easier-to-shoot Glocks were approved in August 2003. About 70 percent of law enforcement agencies across the country use Glocks, a futuristic-looking plastic...

XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX TUE AUG 09, 2003 08:02:25 ET XXXXX JAGGER ROCKS BUSH, RICE: 'HOW COME YOU'RE SO WRONG, MY SWEET NEO-CON' "You call yourself a Christian, I call you a hypocrite/ You call yourself a patriot. Well, I think your are full of sh*t!... How come you're so wrong, my sweet neo-con." Ready to drop in the coming weeks, a new Bush-bashing tune from the ROLLING STONES: "Sweet Neo Con." "It is direct," Mick Jagger says with a laugh to fresh editions of NEWSWEEK. "Keith [Richards] said, 'It's not really metaphorical.' I think he's a bit worried because...

A featured speaker at Saturday's civil rights march in Atlanta said the Bush administration and Republican Party leaders are "thieves" who "need to be locked up" for stealing the past two presidential elections and presiding over federal budget deficits and the war in Iraq. "They all need to be locked up because they are all criminals and they are all thieves," said Judge Greg Mathis, the star of the syndicated television program "The Judge Mathis Show." Mathis made his remarks to an enthusiastic crowd assembled in Atlanta to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Participants...

WHAT'S LOVE got to do with it? Bill Dalrymple, 56, and best friend Bryan Pinn, 65, have decided to take the plunge and try out the new same-sex marriage legislation with a twist -- they're straight men. "I think it's a hoot," Pinn said. The proposal came last Monday at a Toronto bar amid shock and laughter from their friends. But the two -- both of whom were previously married and both of whom are looking for a good woman to love -- insist that after the humour subsided, a real issue lies at the heart of it all. "There...

BELFAST (Reuters) - The IRA admitted on Friday to the 1973 killing of a teenage girl that it had blamed on the British army and apologised to her family who had called on the paramilitaries to accept responsibility. Kathleen Feeney was shot dead near her home in Londonderry. At the time, the IRA, which put its violent, 30-year campaign against British rule on hold in 1997, blamed British soldiers for the 14-year-old's murder. "We wish to apologise unreservedly to the Feeney family for the death of Kathleen and all the grief that our actions have caused to them," the IRA...

U.S. counterterrorism officials rank Abu Farraj al-Libbi as Osama bin Laden's No. 3 man. He is now being held in Pakistani custody and officials hope he can lead them to the elusive Al Qaeda leader. The Lybian born terrorist has been a suspect in two attempts on the life of Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf and he was among six suspects identified as Pakistan's "Most Wanted Terrorists" in a poster campaign last year. Thank you Pakistan for your efforts in the war on terror.

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (AP) - Ten years after a firefighter was left brain-damaged and mostly mute during a 1995 roof collapse, he did something that shocked his family and doctors: He perked up. "I want to talk to my wife," Donald Herbert said out of the blue Saturday. Staff members of the nursing home where he has lived for more than seven years raced to get Linda Herbert on the telephone. It was the first of many conversations the 44-year-old patient had with his wife, four sons and other family and friends during a 14-hour stretch, said Herbert's uncle, Simon...

Mr. Chris Matthews Host, MSNBC’s Hardball with Chris Matthews 400 North Capitol Street, Suite 850 Washington, DC 20001 Dear Chris, We understand that you will be airing tonight on Hardball, the famous segment from the Republican National Convention in which former Senator Zell Miller challenged you to a duel. It was a dramatic moment in television and we’re so pleased that you have been able to use the segment as a promo to boost the show’s ratings for the last 9 months. We are even more pleased that you will be playing it again tonight as it will be a...

An immigration activist group is drawing attention to a photograph showing a billboard ad for a Spanish-language TV newscast in L.A. on which the "CA" abbreviation after "Los Angeles" has been crossed out and the word "Mexico" added in its place.

A POWERFUL blast occurred near Iran's Gulf port of Daylam today and witnesses reported seeing a missile being fired from an unidentified plane, local television reported. The blast came at a time of high tensions between the US and Iran, which is under intense international pressure over its nuclear activities. Local officials have been dispatched to the site to identify the cause of the explosion in an uninhabited area in the south of the country, according to Arab-language television Al-Alam. A government source told the television the explosion could have been the result of a fuel tank falling from an...

By Linda Thomas SEATTLE (Reuters) - There's more to a kiss than meets the lips, as couples are learning at a kissing school in Seattle. Psychotherapist Cherie Byrd, 56, got the idea for teaching kissing classes while dating a man who was a horrible kisser. "Yuck. He was clumsy, unskilled and half-hearted," Byrd said. "I told him if he wanted the relationship to continue he had to let me teach him to kiss." The boyfriend didn't last, but Byrd, a self-described "luscious kisser," said that gave her the idea to teach the art and craft of kissing to other couples....

Rep. Charlie Rangel is blasting ex-President Bill Clinton as "a redneck" after New York Sen. Hillary Clinton refused for the second year in a row to support his bill to help the mother of police shooting victim Amadou Diallo stay in the country "I don't have the slightest clue who Hillary really is," the dismayed Harlem Democrat tells New York Magazine this week. "All I see is a gal who knew she was as good as anyone else, and she saw this guy she could make something of, so she forfeited Illinois and went to Arkansas." Rangel then added, "That's...

The American republic died at Appomattox in 1865, replaced by a national government that has gradually evolved into an empire in a permanent state of war. Most of us don't pay much attention to such stuff as history and perspective. Certainly the news media don't. Nevertheless, there are consequences of living in a war state, both to our own individual freedom and to our pocketbooks. This past week, President Bush made a big deal about signing a military authorization bill with a $30 billion increase. Here we are, 12 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and without a...

Some people just don't get it! Many of you remember my friend Jack Kelly from Kensington who was with me at the Santa FReep there last year and who delivered Doctor Raoul's lumps of coal to the Kensington Council. According to my good Kensington source, the Council is again planning to ban Santa Claus from the Christmas celebrations there. Apparently, they think no one will be paying attention this year. Guess again. It looks like they may need to be re-FReeped.

But Al Gore and his rivals already are campaigning like it's 2004. And then there's Tipper There were only about 40 people on hand to witness it last Tuesday night when Al Gore dipped a tentative toe back into politics. At a fund raiser for Massachusetts Representative Richard Neal at a downtown Washington steak house, Gore—still bearded and not yet back in fighting trim—tried out a few self-deprecating one-liners. He spends his days teaching a bit, he told the smallish room. "I'm a visiting professor—v.p. for short. It's a way of hanging on." Three days later, Gore was thinking about...