The U.S. Justice Department has blocked South Carolina’s controversial voter ID law, saying it would prevent black people from voting.It was the first voter ID law to be refused by the federal agency in nearly 20 years.The decision means voters will not have to show a Department of Motor Vehicles-issued driver’s license or photo ID card, a U.S. military ID or a U.S. passport. And it mean...

U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, has called for a federal investigation into “whether Gov. Nikki Haley exploited taxpayer dollars for political purposes” by allegedly dictating the findings of a nonpartisan health care panel, according to a news release.Harkin cited a report last week from the (Charleston) Post and Courier in which Haley told leaders of the S.C. Health Planning Committe...

U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, has called for a federal investigation into “whether Gov. Nikki Haley exploited taxpayer dollars for political purposes” by allegedly dictating the findings of a nonpartisan health care panel, according to a news release.Harkin cited a report last week from the (Charleston) Post and Courier that Haley told the South Carolina Health Planning Committee in an e...

Surveillance videos publicly aired for the first time Thursday show Dominique Strauss-Kahn leisurely checking out of a New York hotel where he was accused of committing sexual assault and show his accuser appearing to act out the alleged attack.It was not immediately clear how France's BFM television acquired the minutes-long segments. The clips were the basis of recent news reports suggesting Str...

The University of South Carolina’s winter graduates will hear from longtime NBC news anchor Tom Brokaw, who will receive an honorary doctorate of humane letters from the university.A projected 1,771 students from all eight university campuses will receive degrees at 3:30 p.m. Dec. 12 at the Colonial Life Arena. Doctoral hoods will be conferred earlier, at 1:30 p.m. at the Koger Center of th...

ROCHESTER, Mich. — Republican presidential candidates will debate Wednesday night for the first time since Herman Cain became controversial, Rick Perry unveiled his optional flat-tax plan and Mitt Romney explained in detail how he'd reduce budget deficits. Cain, who scheduled a news conference Tuesday to defend himself against accusations of aggressive sexual behavior by several women, w...

Premier Silvio Berlusconi says his decision to resign after parliament passes economic reforms is for the good of the country, and to settle financial markets that have lost confidence in Italy's ability to rein in debt and spur growth.Berlusconi said late Tuesday that he would prefer to call early elections, but that the decision rests with Italian President Giorgio Napolitano.In comments that ma...

Responding to his insurgent campaign’s first crisis, Herman Cain was upbeat and defiant. “To quote my chief of staff and all the people around this country, ‘Let Herman be Herman,’“ he said Monday. “And Herman is gonna stay Herman.” I was afraid of that. Cain’s policy positions range from the ignorant to the unworkable to the just plain goofy...

It's one of the starkest tests of viability for any presidential candidate: crisis management, the ability to step past an explosive charge and re-direct the news. Republican presidential hopeful Herman Cain, a relative newcomer to national politics, had trouble passing Monday during a whirlwind of speeches and interviews in the shadow of sexual harassment allegations."I'll never know why Jesus ca...

European leaders clinched a deal Thursday they hope will mark a turning point in their two-year debt crisis, agreeing after a night of tense negotiations to have banks take bigger losses on Greece's debts and to boost the region's weapons against the market turmoil.After months of dawdling and half-baked solutions, the leaders had been under immense pressure to finalize their plan to prevent the c...

Republican Presidential candidate Rick Perry will bring his struggling campaign to the Palmetto State Tuesday for two public events and a fundraiser.Perry will speak Tuesday morning at ISO Poly Films, a plastics manufacturer, in Gray Court. He is expected to outline the second part of his economic plan by advocating a flat tax, a tax policy where everyone pays the same tax rate regardless of incom...

A federal judge is allowing opponents and supporters of South Carolina's open primary system to make more arguments.The Greenville News reported ( http://grnol.co/qN5LoB) that U.S. District Judge Michelle Childs says the Republican Party and the attorney general have until Dec. 15 to file additional arguments in the case she decided in March.Closing a primary to only people who have registered by ...

Asian stock markets overcame early losses to mostly gain Wednesday as investors hoped for good news from the slew of corporate earnings reports due soon in the U.S.Oil prices fell to near $85 a barrel while the dollar was stronger against the euro and the yen.Asian stocks initially slipped after Slovakia, one of the smallest members of the 17-nation grouping that uses the euro, blocked a measure t...

Reacting to news that Arizona will defy Republican Party rules and hold its primary Feb. 28, the chairman of the S.C. GOP said Tuesday that his party will hold its primary even earlier that month.Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer said Monday she plans to keep her state’s primary date of Feb. 28, a move that defies rules set by the Republican National Committee. As a result, Arizona will lose half of ...

Former Vice President Dick Cheney writes in his new memoir that President George W. Bush rejected his advice in 2007 to bomb a suspected nuclear reactor site in Syria.The New York Times reported Wednesday that Cheney says he was "a lone voice" for military action against Syria. Other advisers were reluctant, Cheney says, because of "the bad intelligence we had received about Iraq's stockpiles of w...

As Bank of America Corp.’s stock has tumbled and clawed back in recent days, city leaders, business owners and others with a stake in the company are waiting to see what happens next.The stock market swings have delivered a familiar feeling of anxiety to a city pummeled by the financial crisis. Local leaders and business owners say they aren’t as fearful this time. But they acknowled...

U.S. District Judge Matthew J. Perry, a towering civil rights figure who used intellect, hard work and courage to end segregation in South Carolina and usher in a more just society, was found dead at his home on Sunday. He would have turned 90 this week.Perry, who went to work as usual on Friday at the courthouse that now bears his name, apparently died of natural causes Friday evening. His body w...

ABC News says a reporter trying to question GOP presidential candidate Michele Bachmann was pushed and shoved by members of her camp after a campaign event in South Carolina.Network news senior vice president Jeffrey Schneider said reporter Brian Ross was shoved Tuesday as security tried to block him from the Minnesota congresswoman while he asked whether she had to miss votes because of migraines...

A protester splattered Rupert Murdoch with white foam in a foil pie dish on Tuesday, interrupting a dramatic hearing in which the media baron told British lawmakers he was not responsible for a phone hacking scandal that has rocked his global empire.Murdoch appeared by turns vague, truculent, sharp and concise as he spoke alongside his son and deputy, James, calling the parliamentary inquisition "...

An intensifying voicemail hacking and police bribery scandal cut closer than ever to Rupert Murdoch and Scotland Yard on Sunday with the arrest of the media magnate's former British newspaper chief and the resignation of London's police commissioner.Though the former executive, Rebekah Brooks, and the police chief, Paul Stephenson, have denied wrongdoing, both developments are ominous not only for...

Rupert Murdoch accepted the resignations of The Wall Street Journal's publisher and the chief of his British operations on Friday as the once-defiant media mogul struggled to control an escalating phone hacking scandal, offering apologies to the public and the family of a murdered schoolgirl.The scandal has knocked billions off the value of Murdoch's News Corp., scuttled his ambitions to take cont...

Rupert Murdoch and his son James first refused, then agreed to appear before U.K. lawmakers investigating phone hacking and police bribery, while in the U.S., the FBI opened a review into allegations the Murdoch media empire sought to hack into the phones of Sept. 11 victims.Those two developments Thursday - and the arrest of another former editor of a Murdoch tabloid - deepened the crisis for New...

Rupert Murdoch touched down in London on Sunday to take charge of his media empire's phone-hacking crisis as his best-selling Sunday tabloid, the News of the World, published its last. The scandal lives on despite his sacrifice of the 168-year-old paper at the heart of it.The scrapping of the News of the World has not tempered British anger over improprieties by journalists working for Murdoch, an...

Newt Gingrich is running for president. The former House speaker disclosed his bid on Twitter and Facebook on Monday and urged followers to tune into Fox News on Wednesday."I will be on to talk about my run for president of the United States," Gingrich wrote after spending a year or more publicly laying the groundwork for a GOP presidential candidacy. "I have been humbled by all the encouragement ...

Lexington County leaders questioned the timing of an announcement Wednesday by Wal-Mart and S.C. Gov. Nikki Haley which promised dozens of new stores and 4,000 jobs over the next five years, with one politician calling it a “shell game.”Several said the announcement was a political favor for Haley, who opposed giving a sales tax break to Amazon.com for a planned distribution center in Ca...

The White House has released the long form of President Barack Obama's birth certificate in response to questions about whether he was really born in the U.S.The certificate, released Wednesday, says Obama was born in Hawaii, which makes him eligible to hold the office of president. Obama had earlier released a standard short form, but requested copies of his original birth certificate from Hawaii...

South Carolina political leaders used words such as "frivolous," "shameful" and "ludicrous" Thursday to describe a National Labor Relations Board complaint against Boeing, which is building a $750 million aircraft assembly plant in the state."We absolutely will not allow them to bully our businesses or mess with our employees. As governor, I absolutely will not stand for it," vowed Republican Gov....

A coalition of 100 Lexington County political and business leaders is championing a state tax incentive for Amazon to ensure the online retailer will open a distribution center near Cayce that is expected to bring more than 1,200 jobs to the Midlands.The group, which held a news conference Thursday, is working to persuade some of its own to back the proposal, since county lawmakers remain split.Th...

A Libyan opposition leader says the rebels will accept a U.N.-demanded cease-fire if Moammar Gadhafi pulls his forces from all cities and allows peaceful protests.Mustafa Abdul-Jalil spoke Friday during a joint press conference with U.N. envoy Abdelilah Al-Khatib. Al-Khatib is visiting the rebels' de-facto stronghold of Benghazi in hopes of reaching a cease-fire and political solution to the crisi...

Setbacks mounted Wednesday in the crisis over Japan's tsunami-damaged nuclear facility, with nearby seawater testing at its highest radiation levels yet and the president of the plant operator checking into a hospital with hypertension.Nearly three weeks after a March 11 tsunami engulfed the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant, knocking out power to the cooling system that keeps nuclear fuel rods from overhe...