The U.S. Census Bureau has just published estimates of population and poverty for most U.S. school districts, as well as income and poverty estimates for states and counties. Included are ... Read More

One of the hardest parts of applying for a patent or trademark is answering the killer question, “Has somebody already done this?” To answer the question, inventors look for “evidence ... Read More

U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R – California, 50th) resigned his office on Monday after pleading guilty to taking $2.4 million in bribes in exchange for help in securing Defense ... Read More

You have to wonder why, but National Institutes of Health researchers have discovered that knocking out a specific gene in the brains of mice creates mice that are basically fearless ... Read More

Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark has joined Saddam Hussein's legal defense team. After leaving his Attorney General post, Clark stirred controversy in the late 1960s by becoming an anti-Vietnam ... Read More

The National Security Archives has posted recently unclassified documents associated with and leading to the historic Geneva Summit, headed by President Ronald Reagan of the U.S. and Mikhail Gorbachev of ... Read More

Afghanistan's farmers continue to raise a substantial crop of opium poppies destined for the global heroin trade. The Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) reports that approximately 107,400 hectares ... Read More

Recent product safety recalls issued by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC): International Playthings Inc. -- 1,900 Viking Chubbies toy cars International Playthings Inc. -- 6,000 Flexitoys Monster-size toy cars Wal-Mart Stores Inc. ... Read More

Both the House and Senate are adjourned for the Thanksgiving break. The House returns to work on Dec. 6, while the Senate comes back on Dec. 12. The remainder of ... Read More

The creative juices really flowed in 2005, as the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) reported receiving a record number of patent and trademark applications. The agency received 406,302 patent ... Read More

In a recent editorial, USA Today's Ross K. Baker asks, "Is our faith in government dying?" Citing scandals, indictments and suspicions afflicting the current and past administrations, Baker suggests that ... Read More

The Energy Information Agency (EIA) warns consumers that the average residential price of natural gas during the 2005 heating season will be more than 43 percent higher than last winter. ... Read More

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) reports that spammers who sent millions of illegal email messages – including sexually explicit messages – have paid $621,000 to settle charges that their practices ... Read More

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) urges holiday air travelers to bring plenty of patience to the airport and to plan ahead to avoid unnecessary delays at the security checkpoints. During the ... Read More

Speaking from South Korea on Saturday, President Bush again vowed to keep U.S. troops in Iraq, "until we have achieved the victory that our brave troops have fought for." So, ... Read More

On Friday, Republicans in the House of Representatives introduce for consideration a resolution requiring the nearly immediate withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Iraq. The resolution, after a heated debate, ... Read More

Representatives of the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) on Nov. 17 testified before Congress about the increasing danger to rangers and visitors, financial costs, and environmental damage caused by marijuana ... Read More

Turkeys throughout the United States have increased their average weight by 4 percent, according to the USDA. In its latest “Poultry Slaughter” report, USDA reports that the average weight of ... Read More

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has just unveiled an upgraded version of its “My Family Health Portrait,” an easy to use, Web-based tool that allows users to ... Read More

Older workers require more days away from work to recover from a workplace injury or illness than do their younger counterparts, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The median number ... Read More

Who controls the Internet, particularly the Internet’s wide ranging social and political aspects? As Globalization Guide Keith Porter reports in his article Internet Control is on the Agenda, the World ... Read More

A bill now before the Senate would create a new executive branch agency that would become the first-ever government agency granted

Enrollment in the new Medicare prescription drug program opens on Tuesday, Nov. 15. The Medicare coverage is insurance that covers both brand-name and generic prescription drugs at participating pharmacies across ... Read More

The U. S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) reports setting several records in consumer product safety areas during fiscal 2005. Problem is, they were records for bad things, including: Most recalls ... Read More

You've probably heard the buzz about blogs and blogging. Well, this a blog and we are blogging. The underlying premise of blogs is that they are more like a conversation ... Read More

Calling the benefit "the greatest advance in health care for seniors and Americans with disabilities since the creation of Medicare 40 years ago," President Bush, in his nationwide radio address, ... Read More

The U.S. Census Bureau has announced the release of three new reports on mothers and motherhood in the United States. Participation of Mothers in Government Assistance Programs: 2001 (.pdf) reveals that ... Read More

Speaking at a Veterans Day ceremony, President Bush today lambasted critics of the Iraq war, accusing them of purposely distorting the events that led to the U.S. invasion. Quoted in this ... Read More

Today is Veterans Day. On Oct. 30, 2001, President Bush said, "We must remember that many who served in our military never lived to be called veterans. We must remember ... Read More

In an unexpected bonus of the FBI’s "Smoking Dragon" investigation, a federal grand jury in Los Angeles has indicted two California men on charges of conspiring with foreign nations to ... Read More

Citing a need to consider the legal status of a recently passed law baring such claims, a federal judge in Brooklyn on Monday stayed New York City's lawsuit against gun ... Read More

Median annual earnings for women who worked full-time, year-round in 2003 declined by 0.6 percent from 2002, to $30,700, according to data just released by the U.S. Census Bureau. The ... Read More

The Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) advocacy group is protesting a decision by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to allow local farmers to grow genetically modified soybeans and ... Read More

How many veterans are there in the United States? How many veterans are women? How many are black? How old are America's veterans? The U.S. Census provides answers to these ... Read More

With Karl Rove, his top political aid under intense investigation and Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, "Scooter" Libby, facing indictments in connection with the exposure of former CIA operative ... Read More

President Bush today in his nationwide radio address praised Judge Samuel Alito, his current nominee to replace Sandra Day O'Connor as an Associate Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court. "I ... Read More

A provision of the FY2006 Federal Budget, A.K.A. the Deficit Reduction Omnibus Reconciliation Act of 2005 (S. 1932), passed Thursday by the Senate on a party line 52-47 vote, would ... Read More

Muhammad Ali, Carol Burnett, Alan Greenspan, Aretha Franklin and Jack Nicklaus are among the 14 recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, just announced by President Bush. Established by Executive Order ... Read More

"We want the world to love us more..." When you put 49 recognize visionaries together for two days in a windowless room, in the middle of the New Mexico desert, and ... Read More

HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt has released his agency’s Pandemic Influenza Plan, “a detailed guide for how our nation's health care system can prepare and respond to an influenza pandemic.” Says Sec. ... Read More

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS), which is really sort of a private business, has to make a $3.1 billion escrow payment in 2006. So, sometime in early 2006; the cost ... Read More

In 1996, Judge Samuel Alito cast the lone dissenting vote among his fellow Third Circuit Court of Appeals judges when they upheld the authority of Congress to ban fully automatic ... Read More

On a motion by Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid (NV), and a second from Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), the U.S. Senate today went into a rare closed session to, as ... Read More

President Bush’s fellow conservatives roundly criticized his choice of Harriet Miers to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court. “Not conservative enough,” they said. So, Miers withdrew ... Read More

During her service on the Supreme Court, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor was considered to be the “swing” vote. That is, the justice considered most unlikely to always vote with either ... Read More