Republicans Halt Ethics Legislation  —  Senate Republicans scuttled broad legislation last night to curtail lobbyists' influence and tighten congressional ethics rules, refusing to let the bill pass without a vote on an unrelated measure that would give President Bush virtual line-item-veto power.

An American in Paris  —  Buchwald launched his career as a columnist in 1949 in Paris, where he wrote about the light side of Paris nightlife in the European edition of the New York Herald Tribune.  He returned to the United States around 1962 and moved to Washington, where he began writing columns filled …

McCain no longer rocks in Granite State  —  As Mitt, Hillary, Barack and a dozen others jump into the presidential stampede, something interesting is happening in New Hampshire.  —  For seven years, conventional wisdom has said that the state's pivotal independent voters would line …

Give us guns - and troops can go, says Iraqi leader  —  Listen to the interview with Nouri al-Maliki  —  America's refusal to give Baghdad's security forces sufficient guns and equipment has cost a great number of lives, the Iraqi Prime Minister said yesterday.

The Grave and Epic War — Spending time with Alberto Gonzales, Orrin Hatch and Russ Feingold  —  The inanities one observes when watching Congress in action exceed those which one finds anywhere else on the planet outside of the right-wing blogosphere.  At today's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing …

Iraq resolution exposes GOP divisions  —  WASHINGTON - A Democratic resolution on Iraq has attracted the support of at least two Republicans and is exposing fissures within the GOP over the unpopular war.  —  Congressional Republicans are struggling to come up with a united response …

BRANDEIS UNIVERSITY TO ALLOW REBUTTAL AFTER CARTER SPEECH  —  WASHINGTON — Former President Jimmy Carter won't go unchallenged after his appearance next week at Brandeis University, where he is lecturing on his latest book about what he terms the Palestinian apartheid by Israel.

Cancer Deaths Decline For Second Straight Year  —  The number of Americans who died of cancer has dropped for a second straight year, marking a milestone in the war on the disease, officials said yesterday.  —  More than 3,000 fewer Americans died from cancer in 2004 than in 2003 …

Speaking Chic to Power  —  LAUDING someone for their style on Capitol Hill is a lot like celebrating the best surfer on Florida's Gulf Coast — it's all relative, and some would argue irrelevant.  Washington has never embraced fashion (nor, for that matter, has the fashion world embraced Washington), and for understandable reasons.

Bush Faces Deepening War Opposition, Demand for Congress to Act  —  Jan. 18 (Bloomberg) — President George W. Bush failed to rally public support with his nationally televised speech announcing plans to send more soldiers to Iraq, as most Americans say they want Congress to find a way to stop the troop increase.

FOX NEWS POLL: MOST THINK TROOP SURGE IS BUSH'S LAST CHANCE IN IRAQ  —  NEW YORK — A majority of Americans consider President Bush's plan to send more troops to Iraq his last chance for victory there, according to a new FOX News poll.  —  Overall, the president's plan receives only minority support …

DEBRA J. SAUNDERS  —  Free the Border Patrol 2  —  PRISON DOORS clanged shut last night, leaving two Border Patrol agents locked up among the very types of felons they once helped put away.  The agents' families have been wiped out financially, their kids will grow up without a father watching over them …

Mao was cruel - but also laid the ground for today's China  —  The crimes of communist China's founder shouldn't blind us to achievements which paved the way for its current modernisation  —  Nobody wants to be an apologist for Mao.  Even the Communist party, five years after his death …

Time Inc. Lays Off More Than 250  —  Time Inc. began laying off more than 250 people today at its top magazines, including its most profitable title, People, which said it was shutting down its Washington, Miami and Chicago bureaus entirely.  —  Employees in those bureaus said they were …

Iran's discontent with Ahmadinejad grows  —  TEHRAN, Iran - Prices for vegetables have tripled in the past month, housing prices have doubled since last summer — and as costs have gone up, so has Iranians' discontent with hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his focus on confrontation with the West.

Aztecs vs. Greeks  —  Those with superior intelligence need to learn to be wise.  —  If "intellectually gifted" is defined to mean people who can become theoretical physicists, then we're talking about no more than a few people per thousand and perhaps many fewer.

Clinton Remains the Front-runner Among Democrats  —  McCain and Giuliani are front-runners among Republicans  —  PRINCETON, NJ — Although the first primaries and caucuses of the 2008 presidential race are still one year away, there has already been a great deal of focus on the election.

Gates Backs Generals' Afghan Distress Call  —  Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said Wednesday that American and NATO military commanders in Afghanistan, worried about a resurgent Taliban insurgency, had asked for additional troops and that he was sympathetic to the request.

Arab World Outraged Over Hangings in Iraq  —  Beirut's daily an-Nahar newspaper ran a caricature Tuesday of the Iraqi flag adorned with three nooses.  At the center of the red, white and black banner, the outline of the coiled ropes appears similar to the word "Allah" in Arabic script.

O'Reilly: Abducted child "liked ... his circumstances," had "a lot more fun" than usual  —  On the January 15 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly said of Shawn Hornbeck — who was abducted at the age of 11, held for four years, and recently found in Missouri — that …