AP - Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin claims President Barack Obama is making light of concerns over what she has called 'death panels' determining or denying care in the Democratic health care proposal.

AP - Edward Wayne Edwards' days of hitchhiking across the country, stealing cars, robbing gas stations and forging checks were behind him when he was released early from the federal prison in Lewisburg, Pa., in 1967.

AP - Thousands are expected to attend the public wake for Eunice Kennedy Shriver at a Cape Cod church.

AP - It's hard to picture the crystal-clear Illinois River that Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson remembers from his youth, how he could look to the bottom and spot a dime, no matter how deep the water.

AP - To mark the Civil War's centennial 50 years ago, some whites donned Confederate uniforms or hoop skirts and paraded to sentimental notions of the Old South, partly in answer to the civil rights struggle exploding around them. Blacks quietly met apart to celebrate the Emancipation Proclamation.

AP - Authorities say one person has died after a fiery crash in Detroit in which police were chasing a stolen pickup truck when it collided with a minivan, struck a utility pole and then burst into flames.

AP - A southern Utah newspaper has rejected a California gay couple's wedding announcement, saying its policy is to publish announcements only for marriages legal under state law.

AP - Following stints as a sitcom star, talk show host and Broadway leading man, Tony Danza is going back to school — to teach.

AP - Authorities say the driver of a stolen pickup truck fleeing from police has died in a fiery crash after colliding with a minivan and hitting another truck before striking a utility pole and bursting into flames.

AP - A 9-month-old baby was left alone at a locked Rhode Island daycare center for nearly an hour when workers shut the place down for the night, apparently forgetting the child was there.

AP - Brad Pitt is laughing off the idea he should run for mayor of New Orleans.

AP - The Secret Service is investigating a man who authorities said held a sign reading 'Death to Obama' outside a town hall meeting on health care reform in western Maryland.

AP - Andy Kessler, a skateboarding pioneer and designer of New York City skate parks, has died. He was 48.

AP - A Florida museum dedicated to Navy SEAL history will receive the lifeboat where a sea captain captured by Somali pirates was held and eventually rescued.

AP - Federal officials visited a maximum-security prison in rural Michigan on Thursday to assess its suitability to house Guantanamo Bay inmates.

AP - The remains of Navy pilot Michael Scott Speicher were headed back to his Florida home Thursday, 18 years after his FA-18 Hornet was shot down on the first night of the Gulf War in 1991.

AP - Dozens of people, including some Special Olympians holding yellow flowers, lined up Thursday outside a white and gray clapboard church to take part in a six-hour public wake for Eunice Kennedy Shriver.

AP - Challenging a global aversion to guns aboard ships, France has put troops on tuna boats in the Indian Ocean, and Belgium is offering military units to its merchant vessels off the Horn of Africa. Now, U.S. lawmakers are weighing similar action to fight piracy.

AP - Alice Connors-Kellgren was surprised by her boyfriend's new Facebook profile picture a few weeks ago: He was kissing another girl on the cheek.

AP - Dr. Jason Newsom railed against burgers, french fries, fried chicken and sweet tea in his campaign to promote better eating in a part of the country known as the Redneck Riviera. He might still be leading the charge if he had only left the doughnuts alone.

AP - A New York City policeman who fatally shot another officer in a friendly fire incident will not face criminal charges.

AP - The Rev. Greg Boyle has walked through gunfire to quell gang violence, gotten sworn enemies to work peacefully together and redeemed hardcore criminals. But he never thought money would be the downfall of the nation's largest anti-gang program.

AP - Abraham Lincoln got a present for his 200th birthday — a brand-new penny.

AP - California's top financial officers said Thursday they will stop issuing IOUs, ending a practice that became the most visible symbol of the state's fiscal crisis.

AP - The remains of Navy pilot Michael Scott Speicher have returned to his Florida home, 18 years after his FA-18 Hornet was shot down on the first night of the 1991 Gulf War.

AP - Mourners are streaming into a Cape Cod church to pay their respects to Eunice Kennedy Shriver.

AP - The Hong Kong-based company that operates the cargo ship that caused a 2007 oil spill in San Francisco Bay pleaded guilty Thursday to criminal charges.

AP - Victor Rozanski's wife gave him an ultimatum: It's either me or the bottle. He chose the bottle.

AP - What haunts Charlie Lough most is the man's eyes.

AP - An Illinois judge has freed a man who had been in jail for three weeks after letting loose a loud yawn during a sentencing hearing. Thirty-three-year-old Clifton Williams of Richton Park was found in contempt of court and jailed on July 23 after yawning in Will County Judge Daniel Rozak's court. He could have been jailed for six months.

AP - When a small plane collided with a sightseeing helicopter over the Hudson River last week, it was only the second time in decades that crowded skies near Manhattan led to a midair crash.

AP - Dr. Jason Newsom railed against burgers, french fries, fried chicken and sweet tea in his campaign to promote better eating in a part of the country known as the Redneck Riviera. He might still be leading the charge if he had only left the doughnuts alone.

AP - Church is out, at least temporarily, for a group that claims its jam band concerts are religious services.

AP - A 17-year-old girl who ran away from her Ohio home to Florida says she fears her parents will harm her for converting from Islam to Christianity, but her parents dismiss her claim and say she was brainwashed.

AP - The former dean of an exclusive boarding school has been charged with molesting three students, leading to a lawsuit, fears about additional victims and damage to the sterling reputation of the 159-year-old school.

AP - A woman set herself on fire at a Miami mall Thursday, then walked around engulfed in flames as shocked shoppers watched, authorities said.

AP - A college textbook publisher said Thursday it would become the first to rent titles directly to students, another option for students fed up with spending $100 or more to buy books they have little use for after a semester.

AP - A nursing supervisor enraged at two co-workers who accused him of sexual harassment and got him fired from successive jobs was convicted Thursday of killing a couple during a Valentine's Day rampage that left four people dead.

AP - The remains of Navy pilot Michael Scott Speicher returned to his Florida home on Thursday, 18 years after his FA-18 Hornet was shot down on the first night of the 1991 Gulf War.

AP - A 31-year-old Canadian man pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to stealing a plane in Canada and flying over three states before landing along a dark southern Missouri highway.

AP - A new military approach in Afghanistan may mean buzzing rather than bombing the enemy, according to the general taking over the air war there.

AP - A video shot by a New York City tourist shows a small plane and a sightseeing helicopter colliding over the Hudson River, killing nine people.

AP - The remains of Navy pilot Michael Scott Speicher returned to his Florida home on Thursday, 18 years after his FA-18 Hornet was shot down on the first night of the 1991 Gulf War.

AP - Among the steady stream of mourners who flowed into a white and gray clapboard church Thursday to pay their respects to Eunice Kennedy Shriver was Mike Rhodes, a 25-year-old mentally disabled man who left a handmade card for the founder of the Special Olympics.

AP - NEWARK, N.J. — When Taiwanese plastics magnate Wang Yung-ching died last year in New Jersey at age 91, he left behind a legacy as one of the world's 200 richest people, a wife and nine children born to other women — but no will.

AP - Church is out, at least temporarily, for a group that claims its jam band concerts are religious services.

AP - College students fed up with spending hundreds of dollars to buy textbooks they only use once are getting some new rental options.

AP - The union representing train operators and station agents for the San Francisco Bay area's commuter rail system says it's planning to call a strike at the close of business Sunday.

AP - Prosecutors said Thursday they plan to seek the death penalty against the leader of an anti-illegal immigrant group and two others charged in an Arizona home invasion that left a 9-year-old girl and her father dead.

AP - An animal behavior expert told jurors Thursday that it's possible a small dog could have severed an infant boy's genitals, something that prosecutors accuse the child's mother of doing.

AP - A video shot by a tourist shows a small plane soaring over the Hudson River before clipping a sightseeing helicopter, sending them both plummeting toward the water, killing nine people.

AP - The union representing train operators and station agents for the San Francisco Bay area's commuter rail system said Thursday it would go on strike Monday.

AP - A man suspected of making threats against the White House was pulled from his car Thursday after an hours-long standoff in the parking lot of the Federal Building in West Los Angeles.