WASHINGTON – The Democrats captured the House and Senate last month largely by promising better strategies for ending the war in Iraq and shoring up U.S. defenses at home. Now comes the hard part: making it happen. As Congress prepares to turn over the reins of power on Jan. 4, …

LOS ANGELES – Jennifer Lopez has reportedly been offered the role of Sue Ellen in the “Dallas” movie. Variety says Lopez hasn’t signed a deal yet, but it’s likely. John Travolta has been offered the starring role of J.R., Luke Wilson is in talks to play Bobby and Shirley MacLaine …

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – Anna Benson, the actress, model and onetime topless dancer who once said she would sleep with every member of the New York Mets — including the groundskeepers — if her husband, pitcher Kris Benson, was unfaithful, has filed for divorce. In divorce papers filed Thursday in …

SELMER, Tenn. – A popular and charismatic Tennessee minister was found shot to death in his parsonage, and his wife and three young daughters were found safe in Alabama on Thursday after a daylong search. Church members went looking for 31-year-old Matthew Winkler when he did not show up for …

WASHINGTON – The Republican leading a Senate inquiry of the government’s botched response to Hurricane Katrina denied a Democratic request Wednesday to subpoena the White House for information. Even though she has criticized the Bush administration for stonewalling, Sen. Susan Collins said the administration generally has provided enough information for …

UTICA, N.Y. – Republican Rep. Sherwood Boehlert, chairman of the House Science Committee, announced plans to retire Friday after nearly 24 years in Congress. “It is time,” Boehlert told a crowd of hundreds of friends, colleagues and family members at Utica’s historic train station. “I feel like I’ve done it …

KARACHI, Pakistan – A suicide bomber who was blocked from driving into the U.S. Consulate slammed instead into an American diplomat’s car Thursday, killing the envoy. The force of the blast on the eve of President Bush’s trip to Pakistan blew the U.S. vehicle into the grounds of a hotel. …

WASHINGTON – The Bush administration has started an aggressive campaign to convince skeptical lawmakers of the merits of a landmark civilian nuclear cooperation agreement with India. Nicholas Burns, a top State Department official, told an audience Monday at the Heritage Foundation that a “very intensive debate” looms on the accord …

WASHINGTON – President Bush on Monday begins a series of speeches to convince Americans, worried about reports of daily bombings in Iraq, that the United States is on the right path to defeat terrorists and insurgents there. Bush’s first speech in the new campaign will focus on work that the …

NEW YORK – Stocks finished an erratic session lower Tuesday, with a conflicting report on wholesale inflation and questions about the Federal Reserve’s interest rate policy creating uncertainty for investors. The Labor Department‘s producer price index fell 1.4 percent, the sharpest decline in three years. However, so-called core PPI, with …