By GARY GENTILE / AP Business Writer LOS ANGELES (AP) — Wal-Mart wants to offer its bargains in Inglewood, but many residents aren’t buying the pitch. Voters in this working class city were to decide Tuesday whether to allow the nation’s largest company to open a shopping development despite opponents who say it will skirt…

By BEN FELLER / AP Education Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — Eleven states will get less federal money for poor students next school year, while the 39 other states and the District of Columbia will get more, new figures show. The dollar changes come about for two reasons: the use of new estimates of where poor…

By PAULINE JELINEK / Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — The war on terror keeps rounding up terrorists, yet every day there appear to be more. Some 3,400 al-Qaida-linked operatives have been captured or killed in 100 countries since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on America, the State Department said last week. Now, officials believe,…

By H. JOSEF HEBERT / Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — A seven-month investigation into the nation’s worst blackout is putting new pressure on Congress to boost the reliability of power grids — but legislation addressing the problem remains in limbo. Nearly eight months after all or parts of eight states and sections of Canada…

By LAURAN NEERGAARD / AP Medical Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — Does a pregnant woman’s exposure to certain chemicals put her child at risk of learning disabilities? Do genetics and pollution interact to cause asthma? What’s the real impact of TV on toddlers? The government is preparing the largest study of U.S. children ever performed —…

By MARGARET STAFFORD / Associated Press Writer KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) — Bystanders who want to help a heart attack victim are increasingly being told by 911 dispatchers to skip the mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and concentrate on giving chest compressions until medical help arrives. Driven by medical surveys and continued public resistance to giving mouth-to-mouth, emergency…

CHATTANOOGA (AP) — Proposed changes in the Tennessee Valley Authority’s calendar for seasonal lake levels has some fishing advocates complaining while some lakefront property owners are voicing support. Over the next nine days, the water levels on Chickamauga, Watts Bar, Fort Loudon and Tellico lakes will rise nearly 5 feet to designated summertime levels. Some…

NASHVILLE (AP) — The Senate sent Gov. Phil Bredesen legislation Monday night that will stop smaller cigarette manufacturers from getting back most of the money they put into a state fund each year in lieu of participating in a national tobacco settlement. The state is losing about $10 million each year to those companies, which…

NASHVILLE (AP) — The Senate sent Gov. Phil Bredesen legislation Monday night that would require university police to notify local law enforcement of any campus deaths or rapes, which would be jointly investigated. Called the “Robert ‘Robbie’ Nottingham Campus Crime Scene Investigation Act of 2004,” the bill is named in honor of an East Tennessee…

By AMBER McDOWELL / Associated Press Writer Jim Murphy, chairman of the University of Tennessee Presidential Seach Advisory Committee talks about the list of 47 candidates that has to be narrowed during the meeting, as Andrea Loughry looks on, in Nashville Monday. (AP Photo/John Russell) NASHVILLE (AP) — Seven people with Tennessee ties were among…