USADA to strip Lance Armstrong of 7 Tour de France titles, ban star from cycling for life
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency said Thursday night it will strip Lance Armstrong of his unprecedented seven Tour de France titles after he declared he was finished fighting the drug charges that threaten his legacy as one of the greatest cyclists of all time.
Travis Tygart, USADA's chief executive, said Armstrong would also be hit with a lifetime ban on Friday.
Still to be heard from was the sport's governing body, the International Cycling Union, which had backed Armstrong's legal challenge to USADA's authority.
Armstrong, who retired last year, declined to enter USADA's arbitration process -- his last option -- because he said he was weary of fighting accusations that have dogged him for years. He has consistently pointed to the hundreds of drug tests that he has passed as proof of his innocence during his extraordinary run of Tour titles stretchingfrom1999-2005.
"There comes a point in every man's life when he has to say, "Enough is enough." For me, that time is now," Armstrong said in a statement sent to The Associated Press. He called the USADA investigation an "unconstitutional witch hunt."
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Romney says North American energy independence achievable; calls for more offshore drilling
HOBBS, N.M. (AP) -- Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney promised on Thursday to aggressively expand offshore oil drilling along Virginia, North Carolina and the Gulf of Mexico, changing the subject from social issues like abortion and Medicare that have dominated the debate in the days before the critical Republican National Convention.
Speaking to voters in the heart of New Mexico's oil and gas industry, Romney declared that his energy plans -- which include drilling for oil in a federal Alaskan wildlife reserve -- would create 3 million jobs and more than $1 trillion in new revenue. And he predicted complete "North American energy independence by 2020," a never-realized goal claimed by presidential candidates for decades.
"That means we produce all the energy we use in North America," Romney said, emphasizing an expansion of oil and gas over wind and solar production. "This is not some pie-in-the-sky kind of thing. This is a real achievable objective."
President Barack Obama did not face voters on Thursday. Instead, he deployed a popular former president, Bill Clinton, to help convince a divided electorate that he simply needs more time to fix the nation's struggling economy. Clinton is expected to speak at the Democratic National Convention next month and play a prominent role in the final months before Election Day.
"We need to keep going with his plan," Clinton says of Obama in a new television ad set to run in eight battleground states.
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Tropical Storm Isaac heads for Hispaniola, and causes worries for GOP convention planners
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) -- Tropical Storm Isaac churned toward the Dominican Republic and Haiti late Thursday, although forecasters said it now appeared less likely to become a hurricane while in the Caribbean. It still posed a potential threat to take a shot at Florida as a hurricane just as the Republicans gather for their national convention.
Isaac dumped heavy rain across eastern and southern Puerto Rico and whipped up waves as high as 10 feet (3 meters) in the Caribbean as it moved through the region Thursday.
U.S. forecasters said Isaac probably wouldn't become a hurricane Friday as it approached the island of Hispaniola, which is shared by the Dominican Republic and Haiti. It was expected to weaken a little while crossing over Haiti and the eastern two-thirds of Cuba.
The storm was projected to head northwestward into the Gulf of Mexico and possibly be a hurricane by Monday. The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said the forecast path was shifting westward, possibly to a track that could take the storm to a landfall near the Alabama-Mississippi border Tuesday night.
But hurricane center forecaster Eric Blake stressed that it was "too early to know" just what path the storm would follow this far in advance, and said Florida's Gulf Coast, including Tampa, the site of the Republican National Convention, was very much in the picture.
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Tropical Storm Isaac could shake up security plan for GOP convention in Tampa
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) -- Tropical Storm Isaac could force a shakeup of the security plans for the GOP convention in Tampa, because about half of the expected officers come from other parts of Florida and some could be forced to stay home for the storm, authorities said Thursday.
But Gov. Rick Scott said the Florida National Guard is ready to step in if needed to fill the gap.
More than 3,500 officers from 59 law enforcement agencies from around the state are scheduled to come to Tampa to patrol the streets as the convention opens Monday. About half would come from outside Hillsborough County and the city of Tampa.
About 1,700 National Guard troops were already expected to help with patrols.
"We have a process where we can call up more National Guard as quickly as we need them," Scott said. "If we know now that some individuals are not going to show up we have plenty of time to add more National Guard, but at this time we don't see that we're going to have a problem."
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France signals support for partial no-fly zone in Syria, fighting rages in Damascus
BEIRUT (AP) -- France signaled Thursday that it was prepared to take part in enforcing a partial no-fly zone over Syria, piling pressure on President Bashar Assad's embattled regime as it widens a major offensive against rebels in Damascus and surrounding areas.
French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian urged the international community to consider backing a no-fly zone over parts of Syria, but cautioned that closing the Arab nation's entire air space would be tantamount to "going to war" and require a willing international coalition that does not yet exist.
He told France 24 television that Paris would participate in a full no-fly operation if it followed international legal principles. But for now, he suggested that a partial closure -- which U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Washington was considering -- should be studied.
Syria's chief backer, Russia, meanwhile, said it was working closely with the Damascus government to ensure that its arsenal of chemical weapons stays under firm control and has won promises that it will not be used or moved.
In Syria, troops backed by tanks and helicopters broke into the Damascus suburb of Daraya, the scene of intense fighting over the last two days. At least 18 people were killed.
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Abandoned by big groups, Akin seeks small cash donations to carry on with Senate campaign
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) -- Abandoned by deep-pocketed national groups, Missouri Rep. Todd Akin is passing a collection plate among his remaining supporters, asking for a few dollars at a time in hopes of sustaining a Senate campaign jeopardized by his remarks about women's bodies and "legitimate rape."
Akin claimed Thursday to have taken in more than $100,000 during a two-day online fundraising drive that he portrayed as a grassroots effort to circumvent "party bosses" who demanded that he drop out. But the six-term congressman will need much more than that to replenish a campaign account already diminished by a hotly contested primary.
"It's very difficult, when you have the limited base we have in Missouri, to send emails out asking for $3 at a time," said Pat Thomas, secretary of the Missouri Republican State Committee who has worked as a coordinator for numerous candidates. "I don't know how to build a war chest to do that."
Akin now has to go forward without the firepower of well-funded political groups that had planned to pummel Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill with negative television ads.
If his money runs dry, Akin could confront a difficult choice: re-evaluate whether to remain in the race or adopt a bare-bones strategy relying on social media and socially conservative activists to counter the millions of dollars of mass media advertising expected from McCaskill and her allies.
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Police in southwestern Illinois say teenage girl held captive more than 2 years escapes
WASHINGTON PARK, Ill. (AP) -- A teenage girl reported missing more than two years ago escaped from a home in southwestern Illinois where she said she was held captive and repeatedly sexually assaulted, police said Thursday.
Police in Washington Park, a village next to East St. Louis, said the girl reported that she was raped by her captor, got pregnant and had a baby.
In April 2010, St. Louis, Mo., police listed the girl as a missing or runaway juvenile. She was 15 when she disappeared.
She escaped from the home in Washington Park earlier this week and went to police, saying her child was still in the house.
About two dozen members of a SWAT team wearing helmets and body armor swarmed the home Thursday afternoon with their assault rifles drawn. They recovered the child and arrested a 24-year-old man.
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Romney: Massachusetts health care plan better than Obama's insurance law
DENVER (AP) -- Claiming health care bragging rights, Mitt Romney said Thursday his plan to provide health insurance to everyone in Massachusetts was superior to the one it inspired, President Barack Obama's much-debated national law.
"My health care plan I put in place in my state has everyone insured, but we didn't go out and raise taxes on people and have a unelected board tell people what kind of health care they can have," Romney said in an interview with CBS' Denver affiliate, KCNC.
The law signed by Romney in 2006 sought to expand health care but did not guarantee coverage for all. Romney and Massachusetts lawmakers decided that rather than reinvent the entire health care system, they would instead close a series of holes, allowing the vast majority of residents to keep their existing plans.
Obama's law basically followed the same outline -- a private insurance system with an expanded government safety net. But there are some important differences.
The federal law is national, and most of its important provisions are binding even in states that oppose it. Romney's law was a state effort that enjoyed support from both political parties, and the Republican candidate argues that health care reform should remain a state prerogative.
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Michelle Obama meets with families of those killed and wounded in Wis. Sikh temple shooting
OAK CREEK, Wis. (AP) -- Mandeep Singh Khattra and his family received Michelle Obama with an embrace Thursday as the first lady consoled relatives of worshippers gunned down earlier this month at a Sikh temple in suburban Milwaukee.
"She gave us a hug and said, 'I'm sorry for what happened,'" said Khattra, 26, whose grandfather, Suveg Singh Khattra, was one of six people killed Aug. 5. "She asked what kind of person he was, and my dad told her he was always good-natured, always at the temple."
Obama spent nearly 90 minutes visiting with the Khattras and other families of Sikh worshippers who were killed or injured in the shooting at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin. She expressed her sympathies, offered support and listened to many stories about victims.
Relatives of the victims said afterward that Obama asked informed questions that showed she had read up on the plight of those killed and injured.
She especially seemed to know the story of Satwant Singh Kaleka, the temple president who tried to stab the gunman with a butter knife in an effort to stall him so women and children in the temple would have time to hide.
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SEAL author who wrote unauthorized account of bin Laden raid could face legal trouble, threats
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Navy SEAL who wrote an account of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden under a pseudonym was identified Thursday as Matt Bissonnette, who retired from the Navy last summer.
Bissonnette was first identified by Fox News. One current and one former U.S. military official confirmed the name, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss military personnel matters.
The book, "No Easy Day," is scheduled to be released Sept. 11, with the author listed under the pseudonym of Mark Owen. Penguin Group (USA)'s Dutton imprint, the publisher, asked news organizations Thursday to withhold his identity.
"Sharing the true story of his personal experience in 'No Easy Day' is a courageous act in the face of obvious risks to his personal security," Dutton spokeswoman Christine Ball said in a statement. "That personal security is the sole reason the book is being published under a pseudonym."
Bissonnette also changed the names of the other SEALs in the account, the publisher says.
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