Plane Crashes into House in Suburban Buffalo, 50 Dead

A Continental commuter plane coming in for a landing nose-dived into a house in suburban Buffalo, sparking a fiery explosion that killed all 49 people aboard and a person in the home. It was the nation’s first fatal crash of a commercial airliner in 2 1/2 years. Witnesses heard the twin turboprop aircraft sputtering before it went down in light snow and fog around 10:20 p.m

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35 women, children killed near Iraq festival

A female suicide bomber detonated in a crowd of primarily women and children on their way to a religious festival Friday, killing at least 35 people and wounding 45 others, an Interior Ministry official said. Two children were also killed in a separate incident when an old and unexploded mortar round exploded Friday morning just south of Baghdad

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How Maine’s GOP Senators Are Key to Obama’s Agenda

The courtship of Senator Olympia Snowe started in December with a phone call from Joe Biden. The Vice President-elect made sure Snowe had his home telephone number in Delaware so she would know how to reach him on weekends. In the weeks that followed, the two traded memos back and forth about how an economic stimulus package should work.

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Kindness will help economy, homeless woman’s rescuer says

Acts of kindness will help pull the nation through its economic crisis, according to the woman who came to the rescue of a homeless Floridian who publicly appealed to President Obama. Chene Thompson, the wife of state Rep. Nicholas Thompson, R-Fort Myers, is letting Henrietta Hughes and her son stay in a house she owns in nearby La Belle rent free until they get back on their feet.

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Obama returns home for final stimulus plan push

President Obama took his economic stimulus proposal back on the road Thursday, urging final congressional passage of the now-$789 billion bill during a visit to a Caterpillar plant in the state that launched his political career. In an exclusive interview with CNN Thursday, Abhisit Vejjajiva said he could not pinpoint who in the government approved the practice, but said he was working on rectifying the problem. “It’s not exactly clear whose work it is,” Vejjajiva said.

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Stimulus Deal Shows Reach — and Limits — of Obama’s Power

Moving at lightning speed and, even more unexpectedly, ahead of their President’s Day deadline, House and Senate negotiators agreed on the details of a $789 billion stimulus package barely 30 hours after Senate passed their version. In the process, they handed President Barack Obama his first major legislative victory, though the deliberations that led up to its passage highlighted the enormous challenges Obama will face in more complicated endeavors like healthcare, entitlement and energy reform

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