Confirmation battles are back  —  Prepare for the return of the confirmation fight.  —  If Republicans capture the Senate majority in November, their sway over prominent judgeships and Cabinet vacancies — potentially including a new attorney general — will become one of the GOP's primary leverage points …

Vatican Paedophilia Scandal: Archbishop Jozef Wesolowski Stored Over 100,000 Child Porn Videos  —  A former Vatican archbishop accused of paedophilia stored tens of thousands of child porn videos and photos on a computer in his office at the Holy See diplomatic compound in the Dominican Republic, it has emerged.

The Cult Deficit  —  LIKE most children of the Reagan era, I grew up with a steady diet of media warnings about the perils of religious cults — the gurus who lurked in wait for the unwary and confused, offering absolute certainty with the aftertaste of poisoned Kool-Aid.

Fired Oklahoma City nursing home worker threatened beheading, police say  —  Jacob Mugambi Muriithi, a native of Kenya, was arrested Friday in Oklahoma City on a terrorism complaint.  —  In a bizarre coincidence, a fired Oklahoma City nursing home employee was arrested Friday …

Woman is heard screaming from her coffin after being ‘buried alive’  —  Screaming could be heard coming from the coffin (not pictured) after it was buried (Picture: Getty)  —  A cemetery worker got the fright of his life when he heard a woman screaming from inside her buried coffin.

From Pen and Phone to Bombs and Drones  —  WASHINGTON — THE president was at the United Nations on Wednesday urging young people across the Muslim world to reject benighted values, even as America clambers into bed with a bunch of Middle East potentates who espouse benighted values.

‘This Week’ Transcript: House Speaker John Boehner  —  Below is the rush transcript of “This Week” on September 28th, 2014.  It may contain errors.  —  STEPHANOPOULOS: It's an aggressive swing through deep blue territory—  BOEHNER: We've got 41 more days and we're going to get it finished.

We need a new constitution: Here's how we save American democracy from charlatans, loudmouths and the 1 percent  —  The most recent NBC/Wall Street Journal poll says that a clear-cut majority is disgusted with the present political scene and retains little hope that future generations will fare as well as we have.

Who Had It Easier, Reagan or Obama?  —  OVER the past few weeks I've been reading Ken Adelman's fascinating history “Reagan at Reykjavik: Forty-Eight Hours That Ended the Cold War.”  Adelman, who led Reagan's arms control agency, was an adviser at Reagan's 1986 Iceland summit meeting with Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev.

Obama: U.S. underestimated rise of ISIS in Iraq and Syria  —  The U.S. had expected the Iraqi army to do more against extremists, president says in acknowledgment of intelligence shortcomings  —  President Obama acknowledged that the U.S. underestimated the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria …

Ferguson police officer shot in arm after interrupting alleged attempted burglary  —  (KMOV.com) - Authorities responded to a call for an officer shot in north St. Louis County late Saturday night.  —  St. Louis County Police reported a male police officer from Ferguson …