Mark Twain’s 180th birthday to be celebrated in Hannibal
HANNIBAL, Mo. (AP) — Mark Twain's 180th birthday is being celebrated this weekend in his boyhood hometown. The Hannibal Courier-Post reports that a mustache competition and a masquerade mask art show are among the activities planned for Saturday at the Mark Twain Boyhood Home & Museum. The attraction is located in the northeast Missouri town…
Read MoreMeet John Howland, a lucky Pilgrim, and maybe your ancestor
BOSTON (AP) — As Americans sit down for Thanksgiving dinner, they should give thanks to one of the original Pilgrims for their very existence. John Howland may not be as famous as William Bradford, John Carver or Myles Standish, yet he probably had a greater impact. And he almost never made it. Howland fell off…
Read MoreObama: No credible intelligence about plot against US
WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama says there's currently no specific, credible intelligence that would indicate a potential terrorist plot in the U.S. during the holidays. Obama says his administration is taking "every possible step" to keep the country safe. He says that if there were to be a credible threat, the public will be…
Read MoreRubio finesses abortion stance criticized by Democrats
WASHINGTON (AP) - When Republican presidential candidate Marco Rubio staked out a hard-line position on abortion in the first GOP debate, Hillary Rodham Clinton took notice. The Democratic front-runner quickly blasted Rubio's assertion that he did not support abortion exceptions for victims of rape and incest as "offensive and troubling." At Clinton's Brooklyn campaign headquarters,…
Read MoreEPA nixes approval of new weed killer for engineered crops
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Environmental Protection Agency has withdrawn approval of a controversial new weed killer to be used on genetically modified corn and soybeans. The EPA announced the decision after receiving new information from manufacturer Dow AgroSciences that a weed killer called Enlist Duo, a combination of two popular older herbicides, is probably more…
Read More