Republican Governors Association Chairman Haley Barbour says the GOP is lucky that the "tea party" movement didn't form a third party, and describes Democrats as running from President Obama like "scalded dogs."

The Mississippi governor also is confident in his party's gubernatorial candidates and their ability to get out the ...

It was Africa's longest war, a horrific conflict between north and south Sudan that spanned some five decades and claimed millions of lives until a 2005 agreement brokered by the United States brought a semblance of peace.

Now, as southern Sudanese prepare to vote in January on whether they will ...

Late-18th-century notions of unreasonable search and seizure are clashing with the capabilities of 21st-century surveillance technology as U.S. courts struggle to define a reasonable expectation of legal privacy in the age of global positioning satellites.

The Constitution's Fourth Amendment protections are getting a legal workout as defendants challenge law enforcement's ...

Made popular by the "If it fits, it ships" slogan in television ads, the Priority Mail initiative is seen as a bright spot during otherwise tough economic times for the U.S. Postal Service, where multibillion-dollar deficits and declining mail volume have officials moving to cut a day of delivery.

But ...

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel might want to return to Chicago to become mayor, but his connection to a presidency with a sinking approval rating and his association to convicted former Illinois Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich could have voters thinking otherwise.

He also faces a crowded field of ...

From Alaska to Florida, the swelling "tea party" front catapulted underdog candidates in Republican primaries this year, but one of its greatest forces has been a highly organized California-based group initially formed to defeat Barack Obama's presidential bid.

The Tea Party Express has donated at least $2.1 million to candidates ...

ARLINGTON, Texas — The remnants of Tropical Storm Hermine swept northward through Texas and into Oklahoma on Wednesday, forcing more than 100 high-water rescues, swamping city neighborhoods, spawning tornadoes and killing at least two people.

Hermine packed a relatively light punch when it made landfall Monday night, and many residents said they ...

The Washington Legal Foundation asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco on Wednesday to reject a challenge by the Obama administration to Arizona's new immigration law, calling it a "well-designed effort" to provide enforcement assistance to federal immigration officials.

"State and local governments have ...

NEW YORK | The Florida pastor who plans to burn the Koran on Saturday's anniversary of 9/11 is rooted in Pentecostal tradition that believes Christians are engaged in a modern-day spiritual battle with evil.

But for Terry Jones and his Dove World Outreach Center, Islam is that evil, a worldview ...

NEW ORLEANS | BP took some of the blame for the Gulf oil disaster in an internal report issued Wednesday, acknowledging that it misread a key pressure test of the well. But in a possible preview of its legal strategy, the oil giant also pointed the finger at its partners ...

District of Columbia Mayor Adrian M. Fenty is calling in a favor - he wants an endorsement from the other chief executive in town, President Obama.

Mr. Fenty, who trails in the polls as District voters prepare for Tuesday's primary, made the appeal during a radio interview on WTOP, acknowledging ...

A former CIA officer accused of revving an electric drill near the head of an imprisoned terror suspect has returned to U.S. intelligence as a contractor, training CIA operatives after leaving the agency, the Associated Press has learned.

The CIA officer wielded the bitless drill and an unloaded handgun — ...

JOHANNESBURG | Congolese community leaders said they begged local U.N. officials and army commanders to protect villagers days before rebels gang-raped scores of people, from a month-old baby boy to a 110-year-old great-great-grandmother.

The rapes occurred in and around Luvungi, a village of about 2,200 people that is a half-hour ...

Mayor Adrian Fenty is calling in a favor from the White House: He wants an endorsement from the other chief executive in town, President Barack Obama.

Mr. Fenty, who is down in the polls, made the appeal during a radio interview on WTOP, acknowledging he is personally seeking an endorsement ...

The U.S. government's financial commitment to Afghanistan is likely to linger and reach into the billions long after it pulls combat troops from the country, newly disclosed spending estimates show.

The United States expects to spend about $6 billion a year training and supporting Afghan troops and police after it ...

LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister David Cameron's father died in France on Wednesday after suffering a stroke while on vacation, the leader's office said.

The prime minister flew to a hospital in Toulon in southern France to be at his 77-year-old father's side, spokesman Steve Field told reporters.

"It is with deep ...

Accusing Republicans of calculating that "if I fail, they win," President Obama said Wednesday that Congress must let tax cuts for the wealthy expire at the end of this year, arguing the government cannot balance its books without that revenue.

In a stump-style speech in Cleveland, Mr. Obama blasted the ...

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Sen. Charles E. Grassley, Iowa Republican, has asked Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to address accusations that federal workers ignored complaints about conditions at an Iowa farm involved in a recall of salmonella-tainted eggs.

Mr. Grassley sent a letter to Mr. Vilsack on Tuesday, asking whether ...

COSTESTI, Romania (AP) — A Romanian Gypsy leader on Wednesday compared French President Nicolas Sarkozy to Romania's pro-Nazi wartime leader, following the expulsion of hundreds of Gypsies from France.

Speaking during an annual Gypsy feast held on a hill at the foots of the Carpathian Mountains, Iulian Radulescu told the ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — An accused Somali pirate has pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy from a November 2008 attack in the Gulf of Aden on a Danish ship carrying cargo from a U.S. company.

Speaking through an interpreter, Jama Idle Ibrahim entered his guilty plea in U.S. District Court ...