AP - Rep. Charles Rangel wrote six checks for about $10,800 in back taxes, and then penned an open letter to New Yorkers Friday, saying he has done nothing dishonorable and is the target of a GOP "guerrilla war."

AP - Since before statehood, Ted Stevens has believed in Alaska. In a Senate career that has spanned five decades, he has championed Alaska's oil and fishing industries and delivered billions of dollars to its cities and far-flung villages.

AP - Experts at an early August international AIDS conference in Mexico City were full of praise for the United States for having reversed a 15-year-old law banning HIV-positive people from entering the country.

AP - Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd says the United States may be "days away from a complete meltdown of our financial system" and Congress is working quickly to prevent that.

AP - Sen. Edward Kennedy has added a new high-tech wrinkle to his push for national health care legislation: videoconferencing.

AP - Ignoring a presidential veto threat, the House on Thursday approved measures aimed at curbing speculation in oil and other commodity markets. It said federal regulators now don't have the tools or manpower to track trading abuses.

Reuters - The meltdown on Wall Street rattling investors big and small is the centerpiece of a new election-year blame game in the Democratic-led U.S. Congress and in the race for the White House.