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<p>INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Freshman Democratic Sen. Joe Donnelly is opposing a ban on assault weapons sought by President Barack Obama.</p> <p>A Donnelly spokesman told The Associated Press Wednesday that the Indiana lawmaker will vote against the ban but has not decided whether he would support universal background checks.</p>

Is America exceptional among nations? Are we, as a country and a people and a culture, set apart and better than others? Are we, indeed, the “shining city upon a hill” that Ronald Reagan described? Are we “chosen by God and commissioned by history to be a model to the world” as George W. Bush said? According to a report issued on Thursday by the Pew Research Center’s Global Attitudes Project, when Americans were asked if they agreed with the statement “our people are not perfect but our culture is superior to others,” only 49 percent agreed. That’s down from...

The stress was overwhelming. For years, this veteran teacher had received exemplary evaluations but now was feeling pressured to raise her students' test scores. Her principal criticized her teaching and would show up to take notes on her class. She knew the material would be used against her one day. "My principal told me right to my face that she — she was feeling sorry for me because I don't know how to teach," the instructor said. The Los Angeles educator, who did not want to be identified, is one of about three dozen in the state accused this year...

The morning plenary panel at the Federalist Society's annual lawyers' convention concerns "the Constitution & American Exceptionalism: Citation of Foreign Law." First up is Georgetown University law professor Nicholas Rosencranz who lays out the basic case against relying upon foreign or international law in constitutional interpretation. Rosencranz makes several points (and my summary us unlikely to do justice to his remarks). The Constitution, he notes, draws its legitimacy from the consent of the governed and the American Revolution was motivated, in part, in opposition to the imposition of foreign rule on the colonies. Thus it would be quite incongruous for...

Director Brian De Palma's latest film Redacted is scheduled to open tomorrow (Friday) in limited release as theater owners brace for possible protests. The film, inspired by the case of the rape and murder of a 14-year-old Iraqi girl by U.S. soldiers, has been condemned by Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly, who called on his audience to bring signs to theaters reading "Support Our Troops" and predicted that the movie "will incite anti-American hatred around the world." He also called the film's executive producer, Mark Cuban, an "anti-American" and encouraged fans of the Dallas Mavericks, which Cuban owns, to protest...

RICHMOND, Va. - A South Boston mother and daughter have joined the Virginia Army National Guard together--recruited by their brother and uncle. Wanda Seate, 40, and her daughter, Ashley Elliott, 21, will leave for Army basic training at Fort Jackson, S.C., Thursday. Their recruiter was Staff Sgt. Jonathan Rhew, Wanda's brother and Ashley's uncle. Last spring, Rhew was explaining to Elliott how the Guard could help her realize her dream of going to college. When Seate heard his pitch, "I told Jon, if I was young enough, I'd go in right away," Seate recalled Tuesday. "You know, they just raised...

The GSM Association (GSMA) and Western Union announced that they have begun development of a global money transfer service, which is expected to be supported by 35 of the world's more than 700 GSM carriers. First commercial services based on the 'Mobile Wallet' technology are expected to be rolled out in the second quarter of next year: According to the GSMA cellphone users will be able to send other users "small money amounts" to another via cellphone nationally and internationally. Western Union claims that it has covered about 17% of all worldwide money transfers in 2006 and intends to connect...

A WEEK’S worth of dinners for young Fiona Jacobson looks like this: Noodles. Noodles. Noodles. Noodles. French fries. Noodles. On the seventh day, the 5-year-old from Forest Hills, Queens, might indulge in a piece of pizza crust, with no sauce or cheese. Over in New Jersey, the Bakers changed their November family vacation to accommodate Sasha, an 11-year-old so averse to fruits and vegetables that the smell of orange juice once made him faint. Instead of flying to Prague, Sasha’s parents decided to go to Barcelona, where they hope the food will be more to his liking. And at the...

The Divine Darleen catches fave arch-Lefty Jane Hamster in some steamy, grrrl-on-grrrl, bodice ripping action with Dem Truth to Powerer Liz Edwards. Oh, do tell! Hamsher’s Discipline thread is generating a lot of salivating, high-fives and further inanities. “The way I see it, we can discipline people like Mrs. Edwards into following a consistent dialogue and line of attack, but how do we get the Corporate Media to change their ways?” “I think I will write Elizabeth a letter of my own. Civility does not work in DC anymore. ” Grrrrlfriend! How many ways can you say, schooled! Call...

The age-old business of breaking up has taken a decidedly Orwellian turn, with digital evidence like e-mail messages, traces of Web site visits and mobile telephone records now permeating many contentious divorce cases. Spurned lovers steal each other’s BlackBerrys. Suspicious spouses hack into each other’s e-mail accounts. They load surveillance software onto the family PC, sometimes discovering shocking infidelities. Divorce lawyers routinely set out to find every bit of private data about their clients’ adversaries, often hiring investigators with sophisticated digital forensic tools to snoop into household computers. “In just about every case now, to some extent, there is some...

JOHANNESBURG, July 3 — Zimbabwe’s week-old campaign to quell its rampant inflation by forcing merchants to lower prices is edging the nation close to chaos, some economists and merchants say. As the police and a pro-government youth militia swept into shops and factories, threatening arrest and worse unless prices were rolled back, staple foods vanished from store shelves and some merchants reported huge losses. News reports said that some shopkeepers who had refused to lower prices had been beaten by the youth militia, known as the Green Bombers for the color of their fatigues. In interviews, merchants said that crowds...

This was posted over at StrategyPage.com -- which is a great site, by the way. The video is quite entertaining. Just ignore his snarky comment about U.S. tanks, and enjoy!Click the link above, or click here.

A British import called The Dangerous Book for Boys has soared on American bestseller lists. Is it a new beacon for real boyhood—or a throwback to 1950s-style ideas of sex roles, "dangerous" in a different way than its title suggests? The book, by English brothers Conn and Hal Iggulden—already a big hit in England and Australia—revels in retro, conjuring up a pre-computer, pre-videogame idyll of hunting, skipping stones, making paper airplanes and bows and arrows, and stories of battlefield heroics. Unlike some works in the "boys will be boys" genre, such as The Big Book of Boy Stuff which treats...

In West Java, Islamic terrorists have forcibly closed another Christian church. Typically, a mob of Islamic militants will invade a church, during services, and desecrate the place, drive the worshipers out, and attack any clergy, all the time shouting Islamic slogans. When the police investigate, none of the known Islamic militant groups will take credit for the attack. In the last three years, at least 30 Christian churches have been forced to close in West Java.

A number of British personalities, including journalist John Pilger wrote the Guardian to announce their support for Chavez's shutdown of opposition TV stations. "We believe that the decision of the Venezuelan government not to renew the broadcasting licence of RCTV when it expires on May 27 ... is legitimate given that RCTV has used its access to the public airwaves to repeatedly call for the overthrow of the democratically elected government of President Hugo Chávez." It is signed by: Colin Burgon MP Dr Julia Buxton Jon Cruddas MP Tony Benn Billy Hayes General secretary, CWU John Pilger Professor Jonathan Rosenhead...

SACRAMENTO -- Larry Berman, a political science professor at the University of California at Davis, is in the middle of a hectic publicity schedule for the launch of his new book, "Perfect Spy: The Incredible Double Life of Pham Xuan An."An, who died in 2006, was a longtime spy for the Communist Party in Vietnam and is credited with playing a major role in Vietnam's victory over the United States. A gifted conversationalist, An worked for Time magazine in Vietnam, befriending many of the era's leading journalists. But before that, he went to college in California and had a brief...

On this Memorial Day, thousands of United States men and women are engaged in untold acts of bravery and drudgery on behalf of what our leaders have defined as vital American interests in Iraq and Afghanistan. But even as the flags wave to honor soldiers past, much of the current campaigns go on without notice, because while troop numbers are surging, the media that cover them are leaking away, worn out by the danger and expense of covering a war that refuses to end. Many of the journalists who are in Iraq have been backed into fortified corners, rarely venturing...

Note: This article is a preview of this weekend's Times Magazine. On a Thursday afternoon in early May, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton rose before a nearly empty Senate chamber and proposed that Congress undo one of the most significant acts in its recent history: the authorization of the Iraq war. In remarks lasting just two minutes, she spoke bluntly: The “authorization to use force has run its course, and it is time to reverse the failed policies of President Bush and to end this war as soon as possible.” She added, “If the president will not bring himself to accept...

The first-ever National Shooting Week was launched on Monday 21st May at the National Shooting Centre at Bisley, known as ‘the home of shooting’. From Saturday May 26th to Sunday June 3rd, thousands of people across the UK will try one of the most exciting Olympic sports during National Shooting Week. Shooting schools and clubs are putting on more than 200 open days across the country so the public can try shooting for the first time. A group of the UK’s finest Olympic, Paralympic, Commonwealth and international medal winning shooters were on hand at Bisley to lend their support to...

New York State spent $14,119 per student — more than any other state in the nation — in the 2005 fiscal year, according to a national analysis of public school spending that the Census Bureau released today. The analysis, Public Education Finances: 2005, placed New Jersey at No. 2 on the list, at $13,800, followed by the District of Columbia (which was treated as a state) at $12,979, Vermont at $11,835 and Connecticut at $11,572. Seven of the top 10 with the highest per-pupil expenditures were in the Northeast. Detailed tables [Excel] are available through the Census Bureau’s Web site....