According to aides who were present when Trump discussed the issue, but who choose to remain anonymous for fear of retribution, Trump said he was sick of Vance and wanted to fire him. “I wanted him to be my attack dog,” said Trump, “but he appears foolish on television. He dropped the college football trophy. He met with Pope Francis and the next day the pope died. Vance is toxic, and I don’t want him to come near me. He just doesn’t look as good on television as I thought he would.”   read more

The Remote Sensing System temperature data, promoted by many who reject mainstream climate science and especially most recently by Sen. Ted Cruz, now shows a slight warming of about 0.18 degrees Fahrenheit since 1998. "There are people that like to claim there was no warming; they really can't claim that anymore," said Carl Mears, the scientist who runs the Remote Sensing System temperature data tracking.   read more

The issue shows the real-world consequences of the current impasse between President Obama and the Republican-controlled Senate. The number of vacancies at federal agencies is growing, and congressional action on nominees has slowed in the final year of the administration. The Justice Dept. said the court decision “threatens to permanently impair an important presidential power,” to make temporary appointments to vacant positions throughout the government.   read more

“By the time the curtain closes on the Obama administration, we are on track to have delisted more species due to recovery than all previous administrations combined,” said Fish & Wildlife Service's Dan Ashe. “We’ve done that because of several decades of hard work, like with the grizzly bear.” Thursday’s announcement came as conflicts between humans and grizzly bears have been on the rise, including six people fatally mauled since 2010. A record 59 bears were killed by humans last year.   read more

Rep. Gallagher is a sponsor of a bill that would make it a misdemeanor for women to show their breasts or nipples in public with "reckless disregard" for whether it would offend someone. Gallagher and Rep. Spanos said New Hampshire could lose tourism dollars if women are wandering public places with their breasts uncovered. The bill drew national attention after a male lawmaker said if women want to show their breasts in public they should be OK with men wanting to "grab" them.   read more

A referendum to rename Katie Crotch Road to Cadie Road is being considered in Embden in Somerset County. Residents are sorting out the matter with a vote Friday and a town meeting Saturday. Board of Selectman Chairman Charles Taylor says the thefts occur so frequently that "you would think every dorm room in the state of Maine should have one by now."   read more

U.S. efforts to stop the illegal slaughter of elephants, rhinos and other wildlife brought has slowed but not stopped the worldwide smuggling trade that threatens the survival of species, according to a federal progress report released Thursday. Twenty percent of African elephants have died in the past decade and one of every 20 wild rhinos was killed by a poacher in the last year alone.   read more

The opening prayer by Democrat Juan Mendez included a call to work to help the state and its residents flourish and to “honor the Constitution and the secular equality it brings.” But he didn’t pray to any deity, which infuriated some Republicans who are Christians. After his prayer, House Majority Leader Steve Montenegro said Mendez’s decision not to pray to God didn’t meet House rules. Speaker David Gowan then called on a Baptist minister on hand in an apparently planned response.   read more

A man who spent 20 years in jail for a murder he didn’t commit cannot put San Francisco on trial for violating his due-process rights, a federal magistrate judge ruled Wednesday. Although Maurice “Twone” Caldwell raised legitimate questions about a police officer’s motive to frame him for murder, a prosecutor “broke the chain of causation” by reviewing all the evidence before he brought the case to trial, U.S. Magistrate Judge Elizabeth Laporte found.   read more

A right-wing conspiracy theorist who claims President Obama worked as a gay prostitute in his twenties is the favorite for a spot on the Texas Board of Education, which approves curriculum and textbooks. Mary Lou Bruner, a 68-year-old retired schoolteacher, has said climate change is a Marxist hoax, evolution is atheist propaganda, and that baby dinosaurs rode on Noah’s Ark and became extinct after the flood cleared out their vegetation.   read more

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Canadians would appreciate it if Americans paid more attention to what's going on around the globe.“Having a little more of an awareness of what’s going on in the rest of the world, I think is, is what many Canadians would hope for Americans,” he said.   read more

Chief Justice John Roberts on Thursday refused to block an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulation limiting emissions of mercury and other toxic pollutants from coal-fired power plants. Roberts rejected an application from 20 states that said a federal appeals court in Washington had effectively thwarted their victory in the Supreme Court in June, when the high court ruled that the EPA had failed to take into account the punishing costs its mercury regulation would impose.   read more

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter assured an audience of computer security experts Wednesday that he was not in favor of a “back door” that would give the government access to data that is protected by encryption. “Just to cut to the chase, I’m not a believer in back doors or a single technical approach,” Carter said to loud applause during a panel discussion at the conference. “I don’t think it’s realistic. I don’t think that’s technically accurate.”   read more

While GOP task forces are talking about national security, jobs and health care, the House floor has largely been turned over to the obscure and the arcane. Instead of wrapping up a typical day’s work at suppertime, early afternoon getaways are the norm. And it could remain that way for much of the year. “There’s not a single priority issue,” said No. 2 House Democrat Steny Hoyer of Maryland, citing issues such as aid to Flint, Michigan, as it grapples with tainted drinking water.   read more

When South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard vetoed a bill this week that would have required transgender students to use bathrooms and locker rooms that match their sex at birth, it wasn’t his first break with members of his Republican Party. Daugaard — who says he has no aspirations to remain in politics once his second term expires — said he waited until after the vote on the tax bill before revealing his decision to veto the transgender bathroom measure, so that it wouldn’t affect the outcome.   read more

A woman found out the hard way at the Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport that you can't dress to kill while going through airport security. Officials say she was stopped Sunday at a security checkpoint with a pair of gun-shaped stiletto heels. The woman was told she had to put the shoes in her checked baggage.   read more

Almost 1 million U.S. physicians can write a prescription for opioid painkillers such as Vicodin and OxyContin — one pathway to opioid addiction. But, because of regulatory hurdles and other factors, fewer than 32,000 doctors are permitted to prescribe buprenorphine, a medication to treat such addiction. Less than half of the 2.5 million Americans who could benefit from medication-assisted treatment for opioid addiction receive it.   read more