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Tar balls recently washed up on the Alabama shoreline have now been linked to BP, according to preliminary tests performed by Auburn University. Via the Associated Press : Tests show the wave of tar balls that hit Alabama’s beaches after Tropical Storm Lee was from last year’s BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, a coastal mayor said Tuesday. Orange Beach Mayor Tony Kennon said the connection was found in preliminary tests performed by Auburn University, and additional tests will be conducted

“In today’s world, without question, we’ve learned two lessons,” FHA Commissioner David Stevens told reporters this winter. “One: homeownership is important to the sustainability of communities. And two: not everybody should own a home.”

MARION — When told by an audience member that he should tell Iowans urging other competitors to hop into the 2012 GOP presidential contest to read his book and take another look at his record, former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty brushed it off. Tim Pawlenty meets with Iowans at the Marion Public Library before beginning his opening remarks

The Iraqi government shows signs of increasing impatience with Blackwater guards getting hired by other private security firms: A top Iraqi official said

A pair of bills which would require public employers and contractors and subcontractors of public employers to register with and use the E-Verify system to ferret out undocumented workers are on their way to action on the House floor. The bills, HB 4024 and HB 4026 , were approved by the House Commerce Committee on Tuesday. While the bills’ sponsor, Rep.

Charging that the FBI probe of ACORN represents an unholy alliance between Republican operatives and potentially illegal conduct by law enforcement targeting

The U.S. Dept

The new administration has assumed the awkward position of arguing that the case against John Yoo -- whose opinions Obama administration officials have harshly criticized -- should be dismissed.

The Minnesota Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board voted Tuesday to maintain its current policies regarding disclosure for ballot campaigns. The board’s rulings have come under heightened scrutiny in recent months as the board works to adjust its policies to new laws passed in 2010. The board has been receiving feedback from both anti-gay marriage amendment supporters that want as little disclosure as possible and open government groups that favor full disclosure

After all the controversial distractions surrounding the health care debate to date -- the claims of death panels, pulling the plug on grandma, etc. -- it’s

Mike Allen at Politico reports that President Barack Obama will unveil the Reduce Unnecessary Spending Act of 2010, a presidential check on Congressional

After a pair of Sen. Barack Obama’s advisers published an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal today clarifying the presumed Democratic nominee’s tax policy, the

Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee have been patting themselves on the back for passing out a health reform proposal that both saves money over the next

This news may disappoint restrictionist groups and CNN’s Lou Dobbs, but the Pew Hispanic Center reports today that despite the poor economy, Mexican immigrants

If this Guardian piece is even 50 percent correct, al-Qaeda faces a recruiting crisis, ideological bankruptcy and capabilities deficit so severe that its entire

It’s hard to divine the Justice Department’s intentions on almost anything these days, given that Attorney General Eric Holder has barely been in office two

Despite being behind every packet of Domino sugar in every diner in the country, the name “Fanjul” is little-known outside of Florida. Alfy and Pepe Fanjul

Good data from Veronique de Rugy at the National Review: has a 14.3 percent unemployment rate, the highest in the country, and it has so far received $561.55

Check out this authentic-frontier-gibberish from Bernard Henri-Levy: From these three certainties, considered together, arises a clear obligation: aiding and

A new peer-reviewed study published by the National Academy of Sciences shows a link between hydrofracking wells to obtain natural gas and contamination of drinking water supplies — particularly with methane, which can even make drinking water flammable. ProPublica reports : For the first time, a scientific study has linked natural gas drilling and hydraulic fracturing with a pattern of drinking water contamination so severe that some faucets can be lit on fire… The research was conducted by four scientists at Duke University

Christine O’Donnell lost her U.S. Senate race in Delaware by seventeen points -- but she had $924,800 still left over in her campaign account after the election

An op-ed printed in The New York Times yesterday raised questions about the ethics of requiring doctors to advise minors to inform their parents of their medical care. # Perri Klass, a doctor, wrote that right and wrong is not “clear-cut” when forcing parental involvement in medical cases that involve “sensitive needs as contraception, pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases and mental health.” # Klass writes about his experience advising a young woman to tell her parents that she had contracted a sexually transmitted infection: ”So against her better judgment, she told her parents her diagnosis. Her father’s reaction was to inform her that once she got out of the hospital, she was no longer welcome to return home.” # He says that “juggling parental concern with an adolescent patient’s legal and ethical right to privacy opens up some tricky questions”: # Clinics for adolescents are keenly conscious that the promise of confidential care is essential to gain and hold their young patients’ trust.