AP - A Senate panel is poised to approve a budget blueprint awarding near-term spending boosts for Democratic favorites such as education and veterans programs, while putting off difficult decisions on taxes, Social Security and Medicare.

AP - Every time President Bush makes an overture to Democrats — and he makes plenty these days — conservative Republicans get edgy. They fear he might be so willing to cross the aisle that he will end up crossing them.

AP - A liberal political group formed to hold Democrats in line is airing its first ad, urging a Senate Democrat to oppose giving President Bush renewed power to try to speed trade deals through Congress.

AP - Openness in federal contracting, a major issue in tracking the billions of dollars spent in Iraq, is on the agenda as House Democrats wrap up a week dedicated to providing the public with more information on the workings of government.

AP - The campaign headquarters of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards reopened Thursday after authorities determined the white substance found in an envelope wasn't dangerous, campaign officials said.

AP - Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama vowed Thursday not to make the marital and other personal troubles of political rivals a campaign issue.

AP - An Iraqi leader told President Bush on Thursday that the latest security crackdown in his country is working, but cautioned it will take more time. He thanked the American people for supporting Iraq.

AP - House Democrats, saying billions have been wasted in contracts for Katrina reconstruction and Iraq, offered legislation Thursday to clean up government contracting practices.

AP - The government's spring weather outlook raises concerns for flooding in the Midwest and continued drought in the Southwest.

AP - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday moved California's presidential primary from June to February, giving the nation's most populous state a greater stake in selecting nominees and shaking up the 2008 political calendar.

AP - This winter was the warmest on record worldwide, the government said Thursday in the latest worrisome report focusing on changing climate.

AP - A Senate panel Thursday approved a budget blueprint that awards near-term spending boosts for Democratic favorites such as education and veterans programs, but postpones difficult decisions on taxes, Social Security and Medicare.

AP - The House voted to limit no-bid federal contracts Thursday, alleging abuses and citing huge losses in contracts for Katrina recovery and Iraq reconstruction.

AP - Republican presidential candidate Sam Brownback is backing the Pentagon's top general over his remarks that homosexuality is immoral.

AP - A government insurance backstop for floods, hurricanes and other natural disasters would be created under a proposal promoted Thursday by lawmakers. They said rising insurance rates are forcing many people to go without homeowners' coverage.

AP - A Senate panel authorized subpoenas for Justice Department officials Thursday in a probe of the prosecutor firings that have jeopardized Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' job and raised questions about White House involvement. A second Republican senator urged Gonzales' departure.

AP - President Bush's signature No Child Left Behind education law is headed for fundamental changes as Congress rewrites it this year, including a likely softening of do-or-die deadlines.

AP - An Iraqi leader told President Bush on Thursday that the latest security crackdown in his country is working, but cautioned it will take more time. He thanked the American people for supporting Iraq.

AP - He has been the top Bush administration diplomat in Iraq — point man for policies Democrats and some Republicans say are wrongheaded or futile — but there was nothing but praise in the room Thursday when Zalmay Khalilzad went before senators to interview for a new job.

AP - Faced with a $2.5 billion budget shortfall, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is eliminating hundreds of jobs, cutting back programs and leaving more than 200 national wildlife refuges unstaffed.

Reuters - The U.S. negotiator on North Korea, Chris Hill, will be in Beijing on Wednesday for meetings aimed at working out details of a February deal to end Pyongyang's nuclear ambitions, the State Department said on Monday.

AP - Valerie Plame's life changed the day her name appeared in a newspaper column, her job as a CIA officer exposed in black and white. She goes before a House committee Friday as both a shadowy figure and a celebrity, with lucrative book and movie deals in the works, a magazine cover in her past and her unceremonious unmasking four years ago the subject of persistent intrigue.

AFP - The United Nations mission in Nepal said Tuesday it was concerned about media reports quoting the Maoist leader as saying that thousands of former rebel fighters and weapons remained outside UN monitored camps.

AP - President Bush on Thursday challenged lawmakers to prove their support for troops in Iraq by agreeing to more war spending without attaching a timeline for withdrawal or any other conditions.

AFP - Democrats failed to ram an Iraq troop withdrawal plan through the Senate Thursday after first making headway on a similar move in the House of Representatives to force an end to the war four years after the US invasion.