Former hot dog eating champ arrested  —  New York (CNN) — He didn't compete for the hot dog eating title this year, but he did cause a scene at the contest.  —  Takeru Kobayashi was arrested at Coney Island after his rival, Joey Chestnut, won the annual Nathan's International Hot Dog Eating Contest.

Dying Lockerbie bomber ‘could survive for 10 years or more’  —  The Lockerbie bomber could survive for 10 years or longer, according to a cancer specialist who last year said he would be dead within three months of his release.  —  Professor Karol Sikora, who assessed Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi …

Petraeus Urged to Change Rules of Engagement for U.S. Troops in Afghanistan  —  Gen. David Petraeus, the new commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, speaks during a ceremony July 4 in Kabul.  (AP Photo)  —  Sen. Joe Lieberman on Sunday urged Gen. David Petraeus to change the rules of engagement …

Obama tasks NASA with building Muslim self-esteem  —  In the video below, Charles Bolden, head of NASA, tells Al Jazeera that the “foremost” task President Obama has given him is “to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with predominantly Muslim nations to help …

Declaration of Independence: A Fisking  —  This post was originally published July 4, 2006.  —  Today marks the 230th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.  Jim Lynch sent out an email to several of us asking us to blog the event as if we were there.

Islamist leader Burhan Hanif tells Aussie Muslims to ‘shun democracy’  —  Briton Salim Atchia from global Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir addresses the conference yesterday.  Picture: Amos Aikman  —  The Australian Protectionist Party said Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir have no place in society.

Strike warning over redundancies  —  Ministers will meet unions later to head off strike threats over changes to public sector redundancy terms.  —  Treasury figures suggest 600,000 public sector jobs could go over the next five years, as the coalition tries to slash the record budget deficit.

Conservatives Are More Than Twice as Likely as Liberals to Be Strongly Patriotic, Says Gallup Poll  —  (CNSNews.com) - Conservatives are more than twice as likely as liberals to express very strong patriotism, according to a new USA Today/Gallup poll in which 48 percent of conservatives said they were …

Beck plans ‘university’, hires Dr. Stoner and 'the right's favorite pseudo-historian' to teach  —  Only “extreme” insiders are cool enough for this school.  —  That's apparently the one requirement to get new media content directly from a few individuals who Fox News opinion host Glenn Beck …

Teachers' Union Shuns Obama Aides at Convention  —  NEW ORLEANS — For the last two years, Barack Obama addressed educators gathered for the summer conventions of the two national teachers unions, and last year both groups rolled out the welcome mat for federal Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.

Big Peace  —  A little less than a year after announcing it, in front of Vice President Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and many other American foreign policy elites at Frank Gaffney's “Keeper of the Flame” Award Dinner in October 2009, we are finally launching Big Peace.

Companies Find Ways to Bypass Ban on Earmarks  —  TOLEDO, Ohio — Just one day after leaders of the House of Representatives announced a ban on earmarks to profit-making companies, Victoria Kurtz, the vice president for marketing of a small Ohio defense contracting firm, hit on a creative way around it.

Ron Paul endorses Michael Steele's Afghanistan comments  —  Washington (CNN) - Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, is praising Michael Steele for suggesting last week the war in Afghanistan is unwinnable, a statement that prompted some influential GOP voices to call on him to step down as chairman of the Republican National Committee.