Independence Day liftoff for Discovery  —  KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Florida (CNN) — The space shuttle Discovery and its seven-member crew roared into space Tuesday afternoon — NASA's first manned launch on Independence Day and its second shuttle flight since the Columbia accident of 2003.

A Dissident's Holiday  —  Have you ever noticed a certain hesitant quality to the expressions of patriotism by progressives or left-wingers?  —  The patriotism of the conservative goes unquestioned.  It's assumed that every politician on the right will wear a flag on his lapel …

US stars align in anti-Iraq war hunger strike  —  Star Hollywood actor-activists including Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon and anti-war campaigners led by bereaved mother Cindy Sheehan plan to launch a hunger strike, demanding the immediate return of US troops from Iraq.

Christopher Hitchens: This July Fourth, ignore polls on America's image  —  WASHINGTON - Here's what I want to know, and here's why I want to know it.  At what point in history, exactly, did the Pew Center decide that it knew how to measure world opinion?  —  I ask this because almost every week …

Ex-Soldier Charged in Killing of Iraqi Family  —  Coverup Is Alleged; Four Others Implicated  —  A former U.S. Army soldier was charged yesterday with the rape and murder of a young Iraqi woman and the slayings of three of her family members in their home south of Baghdad in March, federal prosecutors said.

C.I.A. Closes Unit Focused on Capture of bin Laden  —  WASHINGTON, July 3 — The Central Intelligence Agency has closed a unit that for a decade had the mission of hunting Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, intelligence officials confirmed Monday.  —  The unit, known as Alec Station …

House GOP leaders say vote on minimum wage now likely  —  Cite the pressure of Nov. elections  —  WASHINGTON — With Democrats plotting to make the minimum wage a major issue in this fall's congressional races, House Republican leaders are conceding that they may have to yield to pressure …

Senator's Plan B Creates Quandary for Democrats  —  Six years ago Joseph I. Lieberman came within a hairbreadth of the vice presidency after the Democratic Party chose him as a moderate face whose support for family values and a stronger military might attract Reagan Democrats and independents.

Al-Qaeda 'bid to infiltrate MI5'  —  Al-Qaeda sympathisers have been trying to infiltrate the British security service MI5, the BBC has learned.  —  Whitehall officials confirmed what some had long suspected, says BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner.  —  But those with al-Qaeda sympathies …

Ulysses Grant: Our Greatest President?  —  In 1854, abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison led a crowd celebrating Independence Day by burning the Constitution, denouncing it as "A Convenant With Death and an Agreement with Hell."  His worthy point was that the founding fathers of the nation …

Bush's foreign friends fading fast  —  WASHINGTON - President Bush's stalwart foreign friends are fading fast.  —  Most of the leaders who defied criticism at home to stand with him on Iraq and win his friendship are no longer players on the world stage, or are on their way out.

Dirty wars, dirty bombs  —  Plus, Slacker Friday letters  —  I am taking an extra day because I love my country, sooo much.  If people really miss me, I'll be on Al Franken's show around 1:30 p.m. ET.  —  I've got a new Think Again: The Best of Times . here.  —  We're not yet a police state.