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The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) became the first medical society to sue to overturn the newly enacted health care bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). AAPS sued Friday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (AAPS v. Sebelius et al.).

Washington (CNN) -- A 33-year-old Pennsylvania man has been arrested and charged with threatening to kill House Minority Whip Eric Cantor of Virginia, the No. 2 Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives, the Justice Department said Monday.

The East Toledo woman who punched through a McDonald's drive-thru window after being told chicken McNuggets were not available pleaded not guilty in court Thursday. Melodi Dushane, 24, stopped at the fast-food restaurant at Front and Main Streets in East Toledo in the early morning hours of Jan. 1 and asked for chicken nuggets. When the drive-thru attendant told her the restaurant was only serving breakfast and that the item was not available, Dushane reached through the window and punched the attendant in the mouth. In court Thursday, Dushane pleaded not guilty to one count of vandalism and two counts...

House Democratic leaders said yesterday that they will seek a change in House rules to thwart President Bush's push on a free-trade agreement with Colombia, drawing charges of "cheating" from Republicans. Democrats, who control the chamber, say the pact could cost U.S. jobs, harm the economy and reward a government in the South American country that has not curbed violence against workers and union activists. The administration brokered the free-trade agrement in late 2006. Most Capitol Hill Republicans and big businesses support the deal, saying it would reduce unfairly high tariffs on U.S. goods exported to Colombia.

Deborah Lefler had accused her husband of pointing his police service weapon at her head and chest and threatening to kill her during a dispute over money. Substitute Judge Matthew Crawford of Lexington acquitted Lefler of the charges Thursday following a five-hour hearing in Alleghany County General District Court. “I believe he did it, but I cannot say that proof is there beyond a reasonable doubt,” Crawford said. Crawford said that he found evidence presented against Lefler during the hearing as “most disturbing.” Several witnesses, including Clifton Forge police officers, said they had heard Lefler make statements about killing his...

HARRISONBURG — Cargill’s firing of a Broadway man in a dispute over a sign he had on his vehicle supporting the proposed marriage amendment has spurred outrage and action by several state legislators. Sen. Mark Obenshain, R-Harrisonburg, sent a written request to the company’s chief executive officer seeking the reinstatement of Luis Padilla with back pay. "It would shock me if this reflects a corporate position," Obenshain said on Friday. "If this is the position of the company, I find it outrageous." Also on Friday, an incensed Del. Bob Marshall, R-Manassas, called for a boycott of Cargill food products because...

Padilla had marked the rear window of his black pickup truck with white letters spelling out the political message and drove it to work during the first week of October. Cargill and Padilla, with representatives of the Valley Family Forum, issued the statement that includes an acknowledgement that the firing was about the sign. "Mr. Padilla," the statement said, "was terminated on October 5th because his personal vehicle bore a sign that read, ‘Please Vote for Marriage on November 7th.’" An earlier statement from the company’s attorney said Padilla was dismissed because of insubordination. Padilla, the attorney said, had ignored...

The Senator, Sons, Lawyers,Son in-law,

"Manipulated intelligence, selective leaks, no plan on what to do after we took out Saddam Hussein; he didn't listen to our military leaders, he had no real effort to try to form an international coalition," Mr. Warner said. The line that earned him the most enthusiastic applause with hoots and hollers was his call for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to be fired. But seconds later, Mr. Warner said that "we are all glad to see the end of" terrorist Abu Musab Zarqawi. That line was followed by silence.

A conference geared to help Democrats infuse God into their politics begins tomorrow at All Souls Unitarian Church in the District with the unveiling of a "spiritual covenant with America." The guest list for the conference, posted at www.tikkun.org, includes anti-war activists such as Cindy Sheehan, who will help lead a "pray-in for peace" outside the White House on Thursday afternoon. A range of Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim and Hindu speakers are also slated. The list did not include liberals who oppose abortion, such as Village Voice columnist Nat Hentoff, the group Democrats for Life and Pennsylvania Senate candidate Bob...

A.N.S.W.E.R. organizers, volunteers and activists will continue to participate in all levels of the mass movement in defense of immigrant rights and the defeat of the Sensenbrenner Bill (HR 4437). A.N.S.W.E.R. says to Congress and all the anti-immigrant racists that "No Human Being is Illegal!" The A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition provided logistical support and mobilized for the demonstration in Los Angeles. Thousands of A.N.S.W.E.R.'s yellow and black placards reading "Amnistía, Full Rights for All Immigrants" were held throughout the march. A.N.S.W.E.R. also distributed tens of thousands of leaflets, gathered thousands of signatures on a petition demanding "Full Rights for All Immigrants" and...

Virginia governor expected to sign legislation allowing police to hide radar evidence from motorists in speeding cases. Virginia copThe Virginia General Assembly voted last Tuesday to eliminate a state requirement for police, upon request, to show ticketed motorists their speed reading on a laser or radar speed gun. By a 33-7 vote in the Senate and a unanimous vote in the House, police officers will now have the option of suppressing this evidence. The bill was transmitted to Governor Tim Kaine (D) on Wednesday for his signature. Eric Skrum, communications director for the National Motorists Association, hopes Kaine rejects the...

Senate Democrats have mapped a political battle plan for the March congressional recess that calls on lawmakers to stage press events with active duty military personnel, veterans and emergency responders to bash President Bush on virtually every one of his national security policies. The game plan, devised by the office of Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, is contained in a six-page memo distributed to Democratic senators on Thursday at a closed-door meeting at the Capitol and provided to The Washington Times by a congressional staffer. Titled "Real Security," the political document calls for staged town hall events at...

Teaching about the slave trade "is the right thing to do," Wright said. "Absent South Carolina, the biggest importer of slaves was New York City." The New York Historical Society recently presented an exhibition on slavery in New York that featured documents, paintings, video and sculpture. In lower Manhattan, a long-lost burial ground where thousands of slaves and free blacks were laid to rest during the 18th century was recently declared a national monument by President Bush. Slavery was abolished in New York in 1827, but when the American Revolution began in 1776, the only city with more slaves than...

Although hardly new, by far the most effective name calling tactic currently being employed is to accuse anyone with a value system of being outside of the mainstream. Personally, I consider this not an assault on my character, but an affirmation of it. Many great people have been 'outside the mainstream'. A couple of millennium ago, a man named Christ walked this earth. He was outside of the mainstream, too. In fact, he was so outside of it that he was considered a dire threat to those who were in the mainstream. That fact eventually cost him his life, but...

A booster of the UAE port deal, Clinton is a paid senior adviser to a company known as Yucaipa, which recently set up a relationship with a group called the Yucaipa investment group called DIGL, Morris said on The O'Reilly Factor. “DIGL Inc. is in charge of managing the investments of the crown prince of Dubai throughout the world. Bill Clinton is paid by Yucaipa a percentage of the profits it makes, and Yucaipa said its profits have exceeded 40 percent in recent years.”

The United States cannot say for certain that North Korea possesses any nuclear weapons but believes Pyongyang has continued to produce plutonium from its 5-megawatt Yongbyon reactor, top intelligence officials said on Tuesday. In a marked departure from precedent, U.S. intelligence chief John Negroponte declined to estimate the number of nuclear devices North Korea might have assembled, despite repeated questioning by Democrats at a hearing by the Senate Committee on Armed Services. "I've been very reluctant to get into numbers," Negroponte told the panel's annual public hearing on worldwide threats.

"The governor, on his own, can't just make public policy," Marshall said. "First, there's been no demonstration that homosexuals, as a class, are subjected to discrimination," he said. "Second, I see it as a way to give legal status to sodomy and other practices homosexuals engage in." McDonnell, however, argued that the opinion was not about sexual orientation or practices but the scope of executive fiat.

The postings included news articles about President Bush's religious faith and a flier publicizing the National Day of Prayer. Several postings were left up, including a photo of Boy Scouts praying in memory of those killed in the Nine-Eleven attacks. Lee's attorneys argued that his bulletin boards were a limited public forum open for teachers' private expression and speech. But the judge ruled on Friday that Lee's posters were part of his instructional tools and school curriculum, and NOT protected by the First Amendment.

If an Ohio lawmaker's proposal becomes state law, Republicans would be barred from being adoptive parents. State Sen. Robert Hagan sent out e-mails to fellow lawmakers late Wednesday night, stating that he intends to "introduce legislation in the near future that would ban households with one or more Republican voters from adopting children or acting as foster parents." The e-mail ended with a request for co-sponsorship. On Thursday, the Youngstown Democrat said he had not yet found a co-sponsor.