Politics News

WASHINGTON - Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor who became a national hero for his response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, suggested Monday that a formal presidential announcement was a matter of when, not if.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who guided his city through the September 11 attacks, has thrown his hat into the 2008 presidential race, saying on television he was "in this to win."

CONCORD, N.H. - When it comes to the Iraq war, apparently there is more than one right answer.

WASHINGTON - Presidential candidate John Edwards is embracing a position that has been political suicide in the past — admitting he would raise taxes.

Former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, a declared candidate for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, is not yet familiar to most voters outside his home state. But the candidate has enjoyed some early success raising money from Democrats residing in other places.

WASHINGTON - President Bush issued orders Wednesday for how federal medical personnel should respond to a nuclear, radiological, biological or chemical attack, saying authorities should focus on threats that can be dealt with medically.

WASHINGTON - NBC newsman Tim Russert testified Wednesday he never discussed a CIA operative with vice presidential aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, contradicting Libby's version to a grand jury in the CIA leak investigation.

LURAY, Va. - President Bush came to the snow-topped Blue Ridge Mountains on Wednesday to rally public support for a plan to pump hundreds of millions of dollars into national parks.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration wants to impose a new user fee on commercial barges to help pay for the soaring cost of maintaining the nation's river channels.

WASHINGTON - Attorneys for former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby are backtracking on their plans to call Vice President Dick Cheney and Libby himself to testify in the CIA leak trial.

WASHINGTON - House Democrats plan to vote next week on a package of small-business tax breaks that could ease the way for final congressional action on legislation to raise the minimum wage.

WASHINGTON - Harlin McEwen says his grandchildren are able to communicate in a more technologically advanced way than are most of the nation's police and firefighters, and that concerns him.

WASHINGTON - Rep. Charlie Norwood is leaving Washington to receive hospice care at home in Georgia, forgoing further treatment for lung cancer that has spread to his liver.

WASHINGTON - While members of Congress fretted Wednesday about how to allocate federal aid to best counter the risk of a terrorist attack, one lawmaker chose to focus on cigarette lighters.

WASHINGTON - Four House Republicans on Wednesday urged the Bush administration to rethink its policy on opium production in Afghanistan, saying more needs to be done to counter the growing threat of narco-terrorism.

WASHINGTON - The Treasury Department, next door to the White House, was evacuated Wednesday after a pipe burst on the second floor of the building.

WASHINGTON - Three U.S. Army Reserve officers were indicted Wednesday, accused of taking part in a bid-rigging scam that steered millions of dollars for Iraq reconstruction projects to a contractor in exchange for cash, luxury cars and jewelry.

WASHINGTON - A long-awaited transcript of John F. Kennedy Jr.'s last conversation with air traffic control was released Wednesday but revealed little about the flight in which he was killed in July 1999.

WASHINGTON - A day before four of the company's security guards died in Iraq, a Blackwater USA employee wrote company officials that it was time to stop the "smoke and mirror show" and provide crucial equipment for the private army in the field.

WASHINGTON - Homeland Security officials slashed anti-terror funding to New York City and Washington last year after they decided to devote more attention and resources to the nation's suburbs, congressional investigators said Wednesday.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's chief nuclear negotiator said on Wednesday he planned to hold talks with Western officials in Germany, in the first such contacts since the United Nations imposed sanctions on Iran in December.

BELGRADE (AFP) - A high-level EU delegation pressed Belgrade to take part "positively" in UN talks on the future of its breakaway province of Kosovo and to speedily form a new government.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Robert Gates will press NATO allies this week for more troops and aid to relieve shortfalls in Afghanistan as commanders prepare a spring offensive against the Taliban, a senior U.S. defense official said.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The United Nations signed an agreement on Tuesday as a first step in creating a tribunal that would try suspects in the 2005 murder of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri and other anti-Syrian figures.

UNITED NATIONS - Security Council members expressed frustration and skepticism Tuesday at Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir's failure to give a green light to a joint United Nations-African Union force to help bring peace to conflict-wracked Darfur.

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. - The U.S. Supreme Court will eventually have at least as many female justices as it does male, Justice Samuel Alito told a university class Wednesday.

WASHINGTON - Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor has agreed to mediate a long-running dispute over government reimbursement for land that was taken during World War II.

WASHINGTON - Conservatives and liberals alike battered White House counsel Harriet Miers during her 24-day rise and fall as a Supreme Court nominee.

BOSTON - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said Friday that she dislikes being "all alone on the court" nearly a year after the retirement of Sandra Day O'Connor.

WASHINGTON - Three U.S. Army Reserve officers were indicted Wednesday, accused of taking part in a bid-rigging scam that steered millions of dollars for Iraq reconstruction projects to a contractor in exchange for cash, luxury cars and jewelry.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Wednesday she believed Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was destroying his country economically and politically.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - An Army officer who investigated possible abuse at Guantanamo Bay after some guards purportedly bragged about beating detainees found no evidence they mistreated the prisoners — although he did not interview any of the alleged victims, the U.S. military said Wednesday.

WASHINGTON - With home foreclosures surging, senators on Wednesday examined lending practices that especially hurt minorities and seniors and can heighten the risk of default.

WASHINGTON - NBC newsman Tim Russert testified Wednesday he never discussed a CIA operative with vice presidential aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, contradicting Libby's version to a grand jury in the CIA leak investigation.