WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Under pressure from Sen. John McCain, the U.S. Air Force on Wednesday withdrew a request for information from companies interested in a multibillion-dollar competition to replace KC-135 aerial refueling tankers.

SACRAMENTO, California (Reuters) - California high schools will ban carbonated soda under legislation approved by the state assembly on Thursday as part of an effort to combat teen obesity.

AP - The Iraqi insurgency is in its last throes. The economy is booming. Anybody who leaks a CIA agent's identity will be fired. Add another piece of White House rhetoric that doesn't match the public's view of reality: Help is on the way, Gulf Coast.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who died on Saturday after a battle with thyroid cancer, carved out a record as one of the most conservative jurists in U.S. history during more than 33 years on the Supreme Court.

AP - Gov. Mark R. Warner was back on the campaign trail Sunday, this time supporting a fellow Democrat vying to replace him on a Labor Day weekend campaign swing through the backyard of his Republican foe.

AP - President Bush chose the path of least resistance in nominating John Roberts as chief justice, acting with unusual haste as the war in Iraq and Hurricane Katrina sap his political strength. He was the safest choice Bush could make.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - China will be increasingly in conflict with the United States if it continues to pursue energy deals with countries like Iran and is unlikely to gain the energy security it seeks, a senior U.S. official said on Tuesday.

AP - No strangers to bureaucratic bungling and turf wars, the nation's governors watched in horror as government agencies handled Hurricane Katrina with glaring incompetence — and now worry that the next disaster could deal their states the same ugly fate.

HOUSTON (Reuters) - A Texas grand jury has indicted a political action committee formed by U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay as well as a powerful business group on charges they violated the state's campaign finance laws, officials said on Thursday.

AP - The deployment of thousands of National Guard troops from Mississippi and Louisiana in Iraq when Hurricane Katrina struck hindered those states' initial storm response, military and civilian officials said Friday.

AP - Vice President Dick Cheney toured Hurricane Katrina shelter operations in Texas' capital Saturday, praising the state's efforts to assist evacuees from the Gulf Coast.

AP - Population shifts caused by the exodus of hurricane victims from the Gulf Coast could have ripple effects for years to come in Louisiana political races and perhaps beyond.

AP - Congress agreed Monday to increase the borrowing authority of the federal program overseeing flood insurance to cope with the huge expected costs of claims from Hurricane Katrina.

AP - Former Bronx borough President Fernando Ferrer teetered on the edge of victory Tuesday over three other Democrats competing in their party's primary for the chance to wage an underdog campaign against Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a billionaire Republican who enjoys broad support in this overwhelmingly Democratic city.

AP - A Louisiana congressman being escorted by National Guard troops removed personal items from his home in flooded New Orleans while military helicopters and emergency workers raced to save thousands of victims.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Declaring 'I'm not an ideologue,' John Roberts finished a four-day Senate committee appearance on Thursday with Democrats and Republicans predicting he will be confirmed to head the Supreme Court as the 17th U.S. chief justice.

AP - Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, starting a two-day visit to Iowa, said Friday night that he's pondering a run for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination and that he will make a decision in about a year.

AP - Vermont's Republican lieutenant governor has established a committee to consider running for the U.S. Senate against a self-described socialist, filling the void created when the GOP governor opted out of the race.

AP - A woman accused of making anti-Semitic remarks was removed Sunday from the executive committee of New York's small but politically influential Independence Party.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The two Democrats who challenged President George W. Bush for the White House last year said on Monday the devastation of Hurricane Katrina provided a historic chance to reevaluate government priorities and address long-neglected issues including endemic poverty.

AP - Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a potential presidential candidate in 2008, sold all his stock in his family's hospital corporation about two weeks before it issued a disappointing earnings report and the price fell nearly 15 percent.

AP - Chief Justice-nominee John Roberts, his confirmation secure, picked up support from fractured Senate Democrats on Wednesday as President Bush met lawmakers to discuss a second vacancy on the Supreme Court.

AP - Labor leaders said Thursday they would work to defeat any efforts to pay for rebuilding the Gulf Coast by cutting important federal programs.

AP - Want to buy a national park? Get a deal to drill for oil off the coastline? Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif., is proposing to sell off such assets to make a point about worse alternatives to drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, his spokesman said Friday.

AP - Sen. Hillary Clinton is opposing a freedom museum planned for ground zero, citing concerns raised by the families of the World Trade Center victims who say the proposed museum would dishonor the dead.

AP - The mayor of Baltimore is expected to announce his bid later this week for the Democratic nomination to challenge Republican Gov. Robert Ehrlich after spending several months considering a run for higher office.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court said on Tuesday that it would decide the constitutionality of a Vermont law that limits how much candidates for public office can spend, an important campaign-finance issue that it last addressed nearly 30 years ago.

AP - First lady Laura Bush made her reality TV debut Tuesday, helping with a taping of "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" in a sweltering community building as she toured hurricane relief sites on the Mississippi coast.

AP - Most frogs settle for lily pads. Kermit the Frog has hopped onto a U.S. postage stamp.

AP - The economic fallout from the twin hurricanes that hit Gulf Coast may be less severe than first estimated, the Congressional Budget Office said Thursday.