WASHINGTON (AP) — Public angst about Iraq will reverberate in Congress in the weeks ahead as lawmakers start shaping a defense spending blueprint and debate President Bush’s Iraq policies. Hurricane Katrina has topped the agenda since the House and Senate returned to Washington last week. But debate over the costly war — complicated by the…

SAN DIEGO (AP) — The Bush administration said Wednesday it will fortify the westernmost stretch of the U.S.-Mexico border, despite concerns the project will harm a refuge for endangered birds. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff signed an environmental waiver that expedites the Border Patrol’s plans to fill in canyons and erect additional fencing along the…

WASHINGTON (AP) — Life won’t be all black robes and long meetings if John Roberts becomes the next chief justice. There are the soccer games and swim meets, too. Not his, but his kids’. Josie, 5, and Jack, 4, weren’t present in the Senate Judiciary Committee room Wednesday, but their father cited them when asked…

By RON FOURNIER / AP Political Writer WASHINGTON — It’s August in Crawford, Texas, and President Bush is on vacation. His poll ratings are slumping. He hears warnings of a looming crisis that will soon change the course of his presidency. Is this August 2001? Or August 2005? The answer is both. Historians will ultimately…

WASHINGTON (AP) — Surging costs for gasoline and other energy products fueled inflation at the wholesale level in August, pressure that is expected to become even more intense once the full impact of Hurricane Katrina is felt. The Labor Department said its Producer Price Index, which measures inflation before it reaches the consumer, jumped a…

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Alex Lam-Niemeyer could care less that Google can churn up millions of Web pages when he’s researching homework assignments. Typically, he researches his reports by scouring library stacks, just as students have done for generations. “There’s too much stuff on the Internet,” said the 12-year-old middle schooler in Berkeley, Calif. “I…

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Google Inc. is such an influential — and potentially scary — company that it deserves a book as comprehensive as the Internet search engine responsible for its whirlwind success. Veteran technology journalist John Battelle comes close with “The Search,” a 288-page exploration of the company whose dorm-room invention, initially spurned by…

WASHINGTON (AP) — The federal deficit, with one month left in the budget year, is running well below last year’s record pace, thanks to a surge in tax collections. In its monthly budget report, the Treasury Department said Tuesday that the August imbalance came in at $49.98 billion. For the first 11 months of the…

Play the Southern Standard’s Web Eye-D contest and you could win $25! Playing the game is simple. We display the eyes of a famous or noteworthy person at the Web Eye-D Contest link on our site. To win the game, and the $25, all you have to do is guess the name of the person…

McMinnville resident and White County native Robert Sidney (Bob) Swah Sr., 82, died Sept. 12 at River Park Hospital after an extended illness.A truck driver and a member of the Baptist Church, he served his country in the U.S. Navy and Air Force during World War II.The son of Bedford Cleveland and Annie Beatrice Powers…