Politics News

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - From behind an anchor desk ringed with empty Budweiser cans and Jack Daniel's bottles, the pundits of "Red State Update" dissect election politics from the good ol' boy point of view.

BOSTON (Reuters) - Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton's lead over rival Barack Obama in New Hampshire has narrowed a month before the state's nominating primary in the 2008 race for the White House, polls showed on Wednesday.

WASHINGTON - President Bush took heart Wednesday in Republican wins for House seats in Ohio and Virginia.

THE RACE: The presidential race for Democrats and Republicans in New Hampshire

DES MOINES, Iowa (AFP) - Republican White House hopefuls Wednesday meet in a last debate before the curtain rises on 2008 nominating contests, with fast-rising sensation Mike Huckabee ready for a grilling.

WASHINGTON - President Bush vetoed legislation Wednesday that would have expanded government-provided health insurance for children, his second slap-down of a bipartisan effort in Congress to dramatically increase funding for the popular program.

WASHINGTON - President Bush made an impromptu appearance at the State Department to bid farewell to one of his closest advisers, Karen Hughes, who left a top diplomatic position on Wednesday to return to Texas and private life.

WASHINGTON - Illicit drug use by teens continued to gradually decline overall this year, but the use of prescription painkillers remains popular among young people, according to a federally financed study released Tuesday at the White House.

WASHINGTON - Country singer Alan Jackson and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair make guest appearances in the newest White House doggie video on the Web.

WASHINGTON - President Bush on Wednesday signed into law a five-year renewal of Head Start, the federal preschool program for poor children.

DEMS CONCEDING: Congressional Democrats prepared Wednesday for major concessions on Iraq war funding, children's health insurance, tax policies, general spending and energy, because they could not overcome vetoes by President Bush.

WASHINGTON - The House's Democratic and Republican leaders ordered an investigation Wednesday into recent incidents involving teenage pages that led to two GOP lawmakers resigning from the House Page Board.

WASHINGTON - The fight over improved mile-per-gallon requirements, thought to be settled, threatened to resurface as Senate Democrats worked on a revised energy bill that could come for a vote as early as Thursday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - With time running out before the income tax filing season begins in January, the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a bill that would ensure millions of middle income taxpayers do not become ensnared by a tax meant for millionaires.

WASHINGTON - Confronting the Senate and White House, House Democrats for a second time passed tax relief for 21 million people, going after companies and hedge fund managers that shelter money offshore. The vote Wednesday was a near party-line 226-193.

WASHINGTON - Some Republicans in Congress are second-guessing a government intelligence report that Iran has abandoned its nuclear weapons program. They want a second opinion.

WASHINGTON - Negative news coverage may have cost former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales his job, but it won him a dubious honor Wednesday from a magazine published by the American Bar Association: Lawyer of the Year.

WASHINGTON - Federal courts had prohibited the Bush administration from discarding evidence of detainee torture and abuse months before the CIA destroyed videotapes that revealed some of its harshest interrogation tactics.

WASHINGTON - The White House pressured the Environmental Protection Agency to weaken requirements that companies annually disclose releases of toxic chemicals, congressional auditors said Wednesday.

WASHINGTON - U.S. officials on Wednesday suggested that any past nuclear cooperation between North Korea and Syria would not scuttle nuclear disarmament talks with Pyongyang, provided the Asian country proves no cooperation is happening now.

UNITED NATIONS - The U.N. chief vowed Wednesday to keep United Nations staff in Algeria, saying the bombing of its offices in the north African nation will not deter the world body from helping people in need.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - A push by Russia for more talks over the future of Serbia's Kosovo province ran into immediate opposition on Wednesday in the U.N. Security Council from Western countries who say such talks would be pointless.

Though European leaders are about to sign a new treaty, the event has been dubbed a diplomatic vanity trip and an environmental extravagance

GENEVA (Reuters) - A United Nations human rights investigator said his visit to the U.S. military facility in Guantanamo Bay last week left him wondering whether it would be possible for detainees' lawyers to mount an adequate defense.

Dec. 12 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. is resisting calls from the European Union and developing nations to commit to cutting greenhouse-gas emissions blamed for global warming, threatening progress on a new accord to fight climate change.

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Monday that federal judges can impose shorter sentences for crack cocaine crimes, making them more in line with those for powder cocaine — a decision with a strong racial dimension because the vast majority of crack offenders are black.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The US Supreme Court ruled Monday judges had greater leeway in handing down sentences, allowing courts to address the disparity in punishments for crack and powder cocaine trafficking.

WASHINGTON - A consumer-rights group's challenge to a deficit reduction law ended Monday when the Supreme Court let the law stand, even though the House and Senate never approved identical versions.

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court unanimously refused on Monday to broaden the impact of a law that adds extra prison time to the sentences of drug traffickers who use a gun in carrying out their crimes.

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court meets Monday morning to issue opinions and announce cases it has rejected.

WASHINGTON - Negative news coverage may have cost former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales his job, but it won him a dubious honor Wednesday from a magazine published by the American Bar Association: Lawyer of the Year.

WASHINGTON - President Bush vetoed legislation Wednesday that would have expanded government-provided health insurance for children, his second slap-down of a bipartisan effort in Congress to dramatically increase funding for the popular program.

JOHNSTON, Iowa - The subdued Republican debate Wednesday belied the fierce, increasingly negative battle in Iowa and elsewhere for the party's presidential nomination.

BOSTON - Republican Mitt Romney retorted to questions about his faith by surging rival Mike Huckabee on Wednesday, declaring that "attacking someone's religion is really going too far."

WASHINGTON - Federal courts had prohibited the Bush administration from discarding evidence of detainee torture and abuse months before the CIA destroyed videotapes that revealed some of its harshest interrogation tactics.