AP - At 9:38 a.m. on Friday, about 200 mourners rang handbells to mark the moment three years ago when New Orleans' levees were breached by high waters from Hurricane Katrina, flooding most of the city and leading to the deaths of about 1,600 people.

AP - Police with bullhorns plan to go street to street this weekend with a tough message about getting out ahead of Hurricane Gustav: This time there will be no shelter of last resort. The doors to the Superdome will be locked. Those who stay will be on their own.

AP - Gustav swelled to a Category 2 hurricane early Saturday with winds near 100 mph after plowing through the Cayman Islands toward Cuba, gathering strength on a journey that could take it to the U.S. Gulf Coast as a fearsome Category 3 storm three years after Hurricane Katrina.

AP - As city officials detailed plans for an evacuation that could be called over the weekend, some residents weren't waiting to be told to leave.

AP - In two short years, Sarah Palin moved from small-town mayor with a taste for mooseburgers to the governor's office and now — making history — to John McCain's side as the first female running mate on a Republican presidential ticket.

AP - Jurors wept and embraced former Marine Jose Luis Nazario Jr. after acquitting him of voluntary manslaughter in the killings of unarmed Iraqi detainees during a fierce 2004 battle.

AP - The focus of the presidential campaign shifts to Republicans on Friday as GOP candidate John McCain is set to introduce his running mate at a rally in Ohio.

AP - Katrina was a natural disaster that turned into a political one for the Bush administration. Gustav, now on course for the Gulf Coast almost three years to the day since that hurricane struck, could offer the chance for redemption or point-scoring in the presidential campaign.

AP - Republican John McCain shook up the presidential race with his surprise choice of little-known Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate on Friday. Democrat Barack Obama, entering a crucial stage of the campaign fresh off his historic nominating convention, began a tour of battleground states.

AP - You can feel it when this plane gets close to its destination. It dips, bumps and skips. The chatter on the radio turns from banter to business: barometric pressure, temperature, wind speed.

AP - A fourth inmate who escaped from an eastern New Mexico jail has been captured, authorities said.

AP - A lawyer for Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick asked a judge Friday to freeze next week's hearing that could remove him from office, accusing Gov. Jennifer Granholm of being too biased to preside over the case.