AP - The defense has rested without calling a single witness at the civilian trial in Southern California of a former Marine charged with killing unarmed detainees in Iraq.

AP - Democrats were poised to formally deliver the party's presidential nomination to Barack Obama on Wednesday, making him the first black nominee of a major party. While the historic outcome was certain, suspense remained over how a vote of delegates would proceed, and for how long.

AP - On the cusp of Hurricane Katrina's third anniversary, nervous Gulf Coast residents watched Wednesday as a storm threatened to strengthen and crash ashore, testing everything the city has rebuilt.

AP - Tropical Storm Gustav was losing steam early Wednesday as it moved through the Caribbean a day after hitting Haiti as a hurricane.

AP - Five inmates who broke out of a New Mexico jail — including a killer and a man accused of murder — remained on the loose Tuesday, and a prosecutor said investigators were focusing on the possibility that someone inside aided in the weekend escape.

AP - A new TV commercial shows kids eating hot dogs in a school cafeteria and one little boy's haunting lament: "I was dumbfounded when the doctor told me I have late-stage colon cancer."

AP - In air still thick with the smell of smoke, authorities and residents of a Boise subdivision assessed the damage Tuesday after a wind-whipped wildfire burned several homes. Officials tried to determine whether the blaze killed a Boise State University professor whose body was found in a damaged house.

AP - Mired in criminal charges for months, Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick now finds his political future strapped to a little-used provision in the Michigan Constitution that allows a governor to remove an elected official for misconduct.