AP - After the Boston Red Sox's 86-year span without a World Series championship, perhaps the most familiar streak in Massachusetts is the half-century that a Kennedy has represented the state in the U.S. Senate.

AP - The state of Alaska will sue to challenge the recent listing of polar bears as a threatened species, Gov. Sarah Palin announced Wednesday.

AP - Despite more than $22 million in repairs, a levee that broke with catastrophic effect during Hurricane Katrina is leaking again because of the mushy ground on which New Orleans was built, raising serious questions about the reliability of the city's flood defenses.

AP - The 5-year-old daughter of Grammy-winning Christian music star Steven Curtis Chapman was struck and killed Wednesday by a sport utility vehicle driven by her brother, authorities said.

AP - The military cannot automatically discharge people because they're gay, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday in the case of a decorated flight nurse who sued the Air Force over her dismissal.

AP - Child welfare authorities returned once again to a Texas polygamous sect's ranch, but this time they never made it past the gate.

AP - In a stroke of cosmic luck, astronomers for the first time witnessed the start of one of the universe's most fiery events: the end of a star's life as it exploded into a supernova.

AP - Child Protective Services workers have returned to the West Texas ranch of a polygamist sect after learning that there may be more children living there.

AP - Despite more than $22 million in repairs, a levee that broke with catastrophic effect during Hurricane Katrina is leaking again because of the mushy ground on which New Orleans was built, raising serious questions about the reliability of the city's flood defenses.

AP - Months after naming a former suburban Illinois police sergeant as a suspect in his wife's disappearance, authorities issued a warrant Wednesday for his arrest on an unrelated weapons charge, officials said.

AP - Sen. Edward M. Kennedy gave a thumbs up to well-wishers and kisses to relatives as he walked out of the hospital Wednesday, a day after learning he has a cancerous brain tumor.

AP - South Florida's smoky skies cleared slightly Tuesday despite a growing wildfire in Everglades National Park, but officials still advised children, the elderly and people with breathing problems to stay indoors.

AP - A melee that left two prison inmates dead was a battle between blacks and American Indians sparked by a spitting incident three days earlier, a prison official said Tuesday.