Olson is Texas' only freshman in new Congress After years of working behind the scenes for U.S. senators, Pete Olson moved to the front and center as Texas' newest member of Congress on Tuesday.Olson, 46, was sworn in during a ceremony in which all members of the House took the oath. Olson is one of 56 freshmen in Congress this year, including, delegates for Puerto Rico and the Mariana Islands.    Read More ...

Passport cards proving popular in Texas and other border states Nearly 740,000 Americans have ordered passport cards, a new document being offered by the State Department to speed border crossings by U.S. citizens traveling to Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean.Beginning in June 2009, travelers will be required to present documents proving both citizenship and identity when entering the U.S. through a land or sea border. The card is especially popular with Americans who live in border states where it's not unusual to drive back and forth to Canada or Mexico. Residents of four border states — Texas, California, Michigan and New York — lead the country in the number of residents holding passport cards.    Read More ...

More Texas schools getting in tune with mariachi Jose Perez often butted heads with his grandfather, who emigrated from Mexico years ago and feared his American-born grandson didn't appreciate the sacrifices his family made. Then the teenager started playing the music of the elder's homeland.Perez, 14, took a mariachi music class at his Fort Worth high school, and gained a cultural connection to his grandfather as he learned how to strum the five-stringed vihuela (pronounced vee-way-la)."He used to always yell at me because I didn't want to do my chores," Jose said. "But as soon as I got into mariachi, I guess we developed a better relationship."Mariachi not only gave Perez closer ties with his family, it gave the North Side High School freshman one more reason to stay in school.    Read More ...

State officials scrap Trans-Texas Corridor State officials said Tuesday they are scrapping the proposed network of tolls roads known as the Trans-Texas Corridor, a massive transportation project that critics called an expensive boondoggle."The days of the Trans-Texas Corridor are over, it's finished up," said Gov. Rick Perry, who had proposed the idea as a way to relieve highway congestion in Texas. Speaking on a conference call from Iraq, Perry said, "The name 'Trans-Texas Corridor' is over with."  Read More ...

Dallas officer dies while serving warrant A veteran police officer was shot and killed Tuesday night when he and other gang-unit officers attempted to serve a felony warrant for aggravated assault at an apartment complex in southeast Dallas.Police Chief David Kunkle identified the officer as Sr. Cpl. Norman Smith, who he described as a great street officer with the "heart of a warrior."Kunkle said about five to six officers attempted to serve a warrant on an aggravated robbery suspect when they were "immediately met with gunfire."  Read More ...

Skilling convictions upheld; will get resentenced A federal appeals court Tuesday upheld former Enron Corp. CEO Jeff Skilling's convictions for his role in the once-mighty energy giant's collapse but vacated his 24-year prison term and ordered that he be resentenced.A three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans denied Skilling's request to overturn his convictions. Skilling argued his convictions were invalid because of what his lawyers argued were incorrect legal theory, faulty jury instructions, a biased jury and prosecutorial misconduct, including accusations of witness intimidation and withholding evidence.  Read More ...

Man's death ruled homicide 35 years after shooting Prosecutors in Denver where a man was shot 35 years ago might seek charges against the suspect — if they can determine his identity — since the man's death last week in Texas was ruled a homicide, a spokeswoman said Tuesday. So far police and prosecutors said they have been unable to find out who shot Craig Buford in the back and what charges he may have faced in 1973 because it was a time before records could be filed on computers and may have been a juvenile case. Both Buford, who recovered from his injuries, and the suspect were teens at the time.  Read More ...

Fire danger warning issued for parts of Texas Sunny skies were expected throughout the state on Wednesday with a higher fire danger throughout West Central Texas and portions of West Texas, according to the National Weather Service.Forecasters issued the warnings because of the anticipated combination of low humidity and westerly winds and said the fire danger could remain the rest of the week.  Read More ...

Lawmakers await comptroller's revenue announcement When the state comptroller estimates the state's revenue next week, lawmakers will get their first glimpse of how much the national recession has hit Texas.The biennial announcement from Comptroller Susan Combs — coming as the Legislature convenes for its 140-day session — will tell state budget writers how much money they have to spend on things like public schools, courts and health care services for the 2010-11 spending cycle. And it will show for the first time if Texas shoppers have tightened their belts so much that it put a dent in sales tax revenue.  Read More ...

Boyfriend in Texas family ambush sentenced to life Four friends have been sent to prison for the bloody ambush of a Texas family in a massacre plotted by a lovesick 16-year-old girl.Charlie James Wilkinson and Charles Allen Waid were sentenced in Emory on Tuesday to life in prison without parole for the March 2007 killings of Penny Caffey and her two sons in their rural East Texas home.Authorities say Caffey's teenage daughter, Erin, and the 20-year-old Wilkinson spent weeks planning to kill the girl's family because they were forbidden to date.  Read More ...

Judge indicted on additional sex charges A grand jury has added additional sex charges to last year's indictment of U.S. District Judge Samuel Kent, who is being accused of fondling a second former court employee and lying about it.Late Tuesday, the federal grand jury in Houston added three new charges to the indictment it issued in August that accuses Kent of making unwanted sexual advances against a former court case manager.  Read More ...

Austin woman sentenced in mothball in soup case An Austin woman who put mothballs in soup at a store's self-serve kiosk in 2007 has been ordered to undergo mental health treatment and to stay away from the grocery chain unless escorted by another adult.Lea Suzan Sechler, 45, pleaded guilty to tampering with a consumer product, a second-degree felony.State District Judge Julie Kocurek sentenced Sechler on Monday to 10 years deferred adjudication, a form of probation, and 30 days of inpatient treatment.  Read More ...

Fire deaths confirmed at Texas homeless shelter Fire tore through a Paris, Texas homeless shelter early Monday, partially collapsing the building and killing five men, the founder of the shelter said.The cause of the blaze had not been determined.Fire Chief Ronnie Grooms said there were multiple fatalities but would not give a number. Police referred questions to Grooms.However, Don Walker, who runs the group See Sowers Christians in Action, said a fire official told him five men had died.  Read More ...

Price dip adjusts Bush's gas legacy A once-popular bumper sticker says simply, "When Bush took office, gas was $1.46." It was meant to be a slam, but as the end of his eight years approaches, President Bush is seeing gas prices that, adjusted for inflation, are lower than when he was inaugurated. Last week's $1.59 - the average for a gallon of regular on Dec. 29, according to the Energy Information Administration - works out to $1.33 in 2001 dollars, or 9 percent less than it was the day Mr. Bush took office. The tumble in prices, from a high of more than $4.05 in early July, has meant incredible savings. John B. Townsend II, spokesman for AAA Mid-Atlantic, said the inflation comparison doesn't mean much to consumers paying at the pump, but the drop in prices has put real money in consumers' pockets.    Read More ...

Study: Deep brain stimulation more effective than drugs for treating Parkinson's Patients with advanced Parkinson's disease who received deep brain stimulation showed greater improvement in movement and quality of life after six months than those treated with medication, a new study shows. But the deep brain stimulation patients also had an almost four times greater risk of suffering a serious adverse event like depression, infections, falls or heart problems. While most side effects could be treated, one patient suffered a brain hemorrhage and died. With deep brain stimulation, doctors surgically implant electrodes that send electrical stimulation to specific parts of the brain to reduce involuntary movements and tremors. It is a widely accepted treatment for advanced Parkinson's disease, but few randomized trials have been conducted comparing different treatments.    Read More ...

Ex-refugee now 1st Vietnamese-American congressman When Anh "Joseph" Cao was 8 and Saigon was about to fall, his mother asked if he wanted to take a trip to the beach."I said, 'Mom, we're not going to the beach. We're going to America," Cao recalled recently. "And she said, 'Yes. Yes, you are going to America.'"On Tuesday, more than 30 years after that refugee child escaped aboard a U.S. military transport plane with his uncle, brother and sister, leaving their parents behind, Cao was sworn in as the first Vietnamese-American to serve in Congress.The slender 5-foot-2 Republican attorney's history-making victory came against an 18-year incumbent — the first black congressman from Louisiana since Reconstruction — who was considered invincible despite being hobbled by scandal.  Read More ...

Father of Palin grandchild quits oil field job; governor denies she helped him get it Levi Johnston, the boyfriend of Gov. Sarah Palin's daughter Bristol, has quit his North Slope oil field job over questions about his eligibility to work in an electrical apprenticeship program, Johnston's father said Monday. Johnston, 18, began working this fall in the Milne Point oil field with ASRC Energy Services Inc., a major Slope contractor. In a Sunday newspaper column, Anchorage radio talk show host Dan Fagan questioned how Johnston could take part in ASRC's apprenticeship program without a high school diploma. Fagan said he understood federal regulations require all members of apprenticeship programs to have a diploma. He also questioned whether the governor might have had a hand in getting Johnston into the program. Palin adamantly denied that Monday.  Read More ...

Safety experts cite crosswinds in Denver air crash Aviation safety experts said Tuesday strong crosswinds likely were a factor in an accident last month that sent a Continental Airlines jet into a bone-jarring veer off a Denver runway and across open, snowy fields before it came to a halt and caught fire.Several safety experts raised the possibility that the Boeing 757-500 airliner, carrying 110 passengers, may have experienced "weather vaning," where a strong crosswind pushes a plane's tail and turns the aircraft's nose into the wind, much like it turns a weather vane.  Read More ...

Blackwater guards plead not guilty to Iraqi deaths Five Blackwater Worldwide security guards have pleaded not guilty to manslaughter charges in the 2007 shooting deaths of 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad.The Blackwater guards were arraigned in front of U.S. District Judge Ricardo M. Urbina on Tuesday.The not guilty pleas were entered by former Marines Donald Ball of West Valley City, Utah; Dustin Heard of Knoxville, Tenn.; Evan Liberty of Rochester, N.H.; and Army veterans Nick Slatten of Sparta, Tenn., and Paul Slough of Keller, Texas.  Read More ...

Army officials say force is ready to shift The Army's top three officials said Monday the mammoth force is ready to shift its combat focus from Iraq to Afghanistan.Army Chief of Staff Gen. George W. Casey Jr. told reporters Monday the fight in Afghanistan won't be very different from what many soldiers have already seen in Iraq. The largest difference, Casey said, will likely be the mountainous and rural terrain that many soldiers haven't seen in Iraq, where urban combat has become the norm. Cultural and historical differences between the Arab and Afghan communities will also be significant, he said.  Read More ...

Falling crude prices squeeze Chavez oil diplomacy Venezuela's slumping oil earnings are starting to squeeze President Hugo Chavez's public spending spree and curb the international aid he uses to counter U.S. influence.State-owned Citgo Petroleum Corp., which is based in Houston and distributes Venezuelan oil in the U.S., suspended a free heating oil program for poor Americans this week, according to Citgo's nonprofit partner Citizens Energy.Some are now predicting a drastic pullback in Chavez's oil-fueled largesse elsewhere.  Read More ...

Diplomats say Gaza agreement could take several days With more civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip, diplomats accelerated efforts on two tracks Tuesday in search of a formula to end the fighting between Israel and the militant Palestinian group Hamas. International support appeared to be growing for a cease-fire that would be accompanied by an international monitoring force and other measures intended to stop the flow of smuggled weapons into Gaza, as Israel has demanded. U.S., European and Middle Eastern diplomats cautioned, however, that the details are far from settled, and it could be several days or longer before a cease-fire is reached.  Read More ...

40 feared dead in Israeli strike on Gaza school  In the deadliest attack of its intensifying war in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli military struck a United Nations-run school Tuesday where hundreds of Palestinians had sought refuge from the fighting. As many as 40 people were killed, many of them children, and 55 were wounded, U.N. officials said. Israel moved quickly to explain the attack, saying that its forces had been fired on first. Military officials said that fighters from the militant Islamic group Hamas had lobbed mortar rounds at Israeli forces from the school, in the Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza, and Israeli forces returned fire outside the school moments later. Two members of a Hamas mortar crew were among the dead, Israeli officials said.  Read More ...

10 countries cut off as Russia-Ukraine gas dispute spreads The Russian-Ukrainian dispute over natural-gas supplies took a dramatic turn for the worse Tuesday as supplies were reduced or cut off to at least 10 European countries. The countries involved include Greece, Austria, Turkey, Germany, Romania and Bulgaria, according to statements by energy officials and news accounts. If Russia, which supplies the gas, and the former Soviet republic, through whose territory it transits, don't come to terms soon, there could be serious consequences for Europe in the middle of winter. About a quarter of Europe's natural gas comes from Russia, and some 80 percent of that amount transits Ukraine.  Read More ...

Burris turned away by Senate, but gains support from Feinstein Democratic leaders seeking to bar Roland Burris from the Senate suffered a rift in their united front as they prepared to meet with him Wednesday to begin negotiations over whether he will be able to take the seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama. Hours after the Senate turned Burris away when he tried to claim the seat, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., the outgoing chairwoman of the committee that judges senators' credentials, urged that the Senate seat Burris, adding a new wrinkle to the struggle. She argued that his appointment by Gov. Rod Blagojevich was lawful regardless of the corruption allegations swirling around Illinois' Democratic governor.  Read More ...

Congress convenes with economic crisis to tackle and open seats to fill As the 111th Congress convened Tuesday with the biggest Democratic majorities since the early 1990s, the economy reeling and the vacant Illinois Senate seat commanding much of the attention, members were in a reserved, even somber mood. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., set the tone in a brief speech after colleagues elected her to a second two-year term as the speaker of the House of Representatives. "As we take the oath of office today, we accept a level of responsibility as daunting and demanding as any that previous generations of leadership have faced," she said.  Read More ...

Jeb Bush says he won't seek Senate seat Former Gov. Jeb Bush is taking a pass on Florida's up-for-grabs U.S. Senate seat in 2010, dashing the hopes of Republicans thirsting for a heavyweight champion and setting the stage for fiercely competitive primaries in both parties. Since Mel Martinez announced five weeks ago that he would step down in 2010, the possibility that Bush would run had stopped possible contenders in their tracks. Within minutes of Bush's e-mailed announcement, potential Republican and Democratic candidates were dialing donors. "Florida is now firmly in play, which, in all honesty, it would not have been with Jeb Bush," said Democratic consultant Jeff Garcia, who helped run nominee Betty Castor's unsuccessful campaign against Martinez in 2004. "It goes from being a foregone conclusion to a wide-open race."  Read More ...

Obama criticizes Bush over federal deficit, vows to make tough choices on spending President-elect Barack Obama Tuesday ripped outgoing President George W. Bush for "irresponsibly" doubling the federal debt, then warned that he could preside over trillion-dollar-a-year deficits for "years to come." Huddling with his budget team, Obama told reporters he would ban pork-barrel spending projects known as earmarks from his proposal to stimulate the economy. He also vowed to make the difficult choices necessary to curb runaway deficits and debt. He said, however, that he wouldn't propose his first federal budget until after the stimulus proposal, which itself could cost about $800 billion. And he cautioned that staggering annual deficits would continue even after that.  Read More ...

Coleman vows to fight outcome of Minn. Senate election in court Surrounded by cheering supporters, Republican Norm Coleman, who received 225 fewer votes than Democrat Al Franken in the U.S. Senate recount, vowed Tuesday to wage a court battle to challenge the outcome. "Not every valid vote has been counted, and some have been counted twice," Coleman said. "Let's take the time right now in this contested race to get it right."  Read More ...