End of primary challenge marks smoother sailing for NY Sen. Gillibrand in 2010 election

ALBANY, N.Y. —Kirsten Gillibrand didn’t have the pedigree of a Kennedy, Clinton or a Cuomo. She was not, her critics said, up to the challenge of winning a tough, New York brawl for the U.S. Senate seat Gov. David Paterson handed her.

Good at breaking down barriers, Sotomayor now must learn to open the door, other court rituals

WASHINGTON —Sonia Sotomayor has gained admission to the Marble Palace. Now she has to figure out how the Supreme Court works.

Senate roll vote: Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation as a Supreme Court associate justice

The 68-31 roll call Thursday by which the Senate confirmed Sonia Sotomayor, of New York, to be a Supreme Court associate justice.

Sotomayor watches Senate’s confirmation vote among colleagues at US courthouse in NYC

NEW YORK — Sonia Sotomayor bathed in applause from friends and colleagues at a federal courthouse in lower Manhattan Thursday as the Senate voted to confirm her appointment to the Supreme Court.

Sotomayor confirmed as first Hispanic Supreme Court justice in historic Senate vote

WASHINGTON — Sonia Sotomayor won confirmation Thursday as the nation’s first Hispanic Supreme Court justice, a history-making Senate vote that capped a summer-long debate heavy with ethnic politics and hints of high court fights to come.

Obama hails confirmation of Sotomayor as Supreme Court justice

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is lauding the barrier-breaking confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor to be the first Hispanic justice on the Supreme Court.

Senate confirms Sotomayor, first Hispanic Supreme Court justice, in historic vote

WASHINGTON — The Senate confirmed Sonia Sotomayor Thursday as the first Hispanic justice on the Supreme Court.

Kolkata commuters suffer as vehicle ban is implemented

KOLKATA - Commuters here had a tough time as a large number of buses, auto rickshaws and taxis kept off the roads Saturday and authorities seized over-15-year-old commercial vehicles following a ban by the Calcutta High Court.

Budget-balancing paradox: States spending big to hold special sessions aimed at saving money

ATLANTA — States are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars apiece on special legislative sessions whose chief purpose, ironically, is to trim more funding from their eroding budgets.

Honduras negotiations snag on unity government proposal, but sides agree to more talks

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica — Honduras’ interim government rejected a mediator’s proposal to reinstate ousted President Manuel Zelaya and form a national unity government, throwing negotiations on settling the political crisis into doubt Saturday night.

Supreme court clears Pakistani opposition leader Sharif, lifts ban on running for office

ISLAMABAD — Pakistan’s top court has acquitted opposition leader Nawaz Sharif of hijacking charges stemming from the 1999 coup against his government. The ruling removes the final ban on Sharif running for public office.

State governments to get Rs.112 billion to restore forests

NEW DELHI - The Rs.11,200 crore (Rs.112 billion/$2.2 billion) released by the Supreme Court last week for compensatory afforestation will be used to improve the tree cover in six million hectares of degraded forest land all over India, Minister of State for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh said here Wednesday.

Senator looks for answers from Sotomayor on treatment of terror suspects

WASHINGTON — A member of the Senate Judiciary Committee appears to be trying to determine how Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor might rule in cases involving U.S. treatment of terror suspects.

Radio Pakistan’s Dalit propaganda exposed

ABOHAR - Radio Pakistan, in its recent Punjabi Durbar programme, has said Scheduled Castes (SCs) children are being denied admission in schools in India, but nothing can be further from the truth.

GOP to confront Sotomayor with her own words at Tuesday’s session

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans plan to confront Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor with her own words from speeches years ago and more recently decisions she rendered as appeals court judge that were later reversed by the Supreme Court.

Analysis: Republican Party uses Sotomayor hearings to define itself but treads carefully

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans came to praise Sonia Sotomayor, but not necessarily to vote for her.

Both sides in Honduran coup dispute in Costa Rica for negotiations, but refuse to budge

SAN JOSE, Costa Rica — Leaders of the government that ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya in a coup arrived in Costa Rica Thursday for talks aimed at resolving the crisis, but with both sides questioning the other’s claim to the presidency, there seemed to be very little common ground.

Judicial reforms will be initiated in two months, says Moily

NEW DELHI - The Government is working for a national consensus on judicial reforms, and within a couple of months the judicial reforms will be implemented, Union Law Minister M. Veerappa Moily said.

Comedian-turned-politician Franken sworn in as Democratic senators from Minnesota

WASHINGTON — Al Franken became a senator on Tuesday, completing the transformation from comedian to politician.

India’s top court refuses to replace hanging of convicts with lethal injections

NEW DELHI — India’s top court has refused to replace hanging with lethal injection as the country’s sole method of execution, saying there is no evidence it is less painful than other ways.

Ousted Honduran president vows to try again after plane blocked from landing in homeland

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Honduras’ interim government closed its main airport to all flights on Monday after blocking the runway to prevent the return of ousted President Manuel Zelaya. Clashes with his supporters caused the first death in a week of protests.

Honduran government’s international isolation grows; demonstrators demand return of president

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — Thousands of Hondurans demonstrated Wednesday for the return of ousted President Manuel Zelaya, who vowed to fly home this weekend despite a warrant for his arrest. Thousands more rallied in favor of the military-backed government.

Bush appointed Fed judges question Obama on terror policies

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama’s claims of broad executive authority to carry out the war on terror are drawing fire from an unexpected source: federal judges nominated by President George W. Bush, who asserted the sweeping powers in the first place.

Supreme Court won’t block Cablevision’s remote-storage digital video recording systems

WASHINGTON — Hollywood studios and television networks lost their bid Monday for the Supreme Court to block the use of a new digital video recorder system that could make it cheaper and easier for viewers to record shows and watch them when they want, without commercials.

Supreme Court says state attorneys general must go to court to investigate national banks

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court said Monday that state attorneys general can investigate national banks for discrimination and other crimes, but only with a court’s help.

Supreme Court won’t decide whether law making doctor’s prescription pad private constitutional

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court won’t stop the state of New Hampshire from making doctors’ prescription-writing habits confidential over the objection of companies who analyze and sell that information.

Walgreen, Bank of America, Discover, Valero Energy are among big market movers Monday

NEW YORK — Stocks that moved substantially or traded heavily Monday on the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq Stock Market:

Supreme Court upholds permit to dump waste from Alaska gold mine into lake

WASHINGTON — A mining company was given the go-ahead by the Supreme Court on Monday to dump waste from an Alaskan gold mine into a nearby 23-acre lake, although the material will kill all of the lake’s fish.

Suicide bomber detonates car, critically injuring president of Russian region of Ingushetia

NAZRAN, Russia — A suicide bomber badly wounded a provincial president in Russia’s North Caucasus on Monday, an assassination attempt that undermined the Kremlin’s claim that it has brought stability to the predominantly Muslim region.

Ghaziabad’s green lungs dying in face of garbage onslaught

GHAZIABAD - Green activists call it mass murder. Thousands of trees in a forest patch that serves as the green lungs of Ghaziabad are dying a slow death because of negligence of the very civic agency that had once helped create it painstakingly.