In a historic early morning ceremony in the Yellow Oval Room, attended only by Michelle Obama and pajama-clad White House dog Bo, and recorded for posterity by White Hose photographer Pete Souza, President Obama -- also pajama-clad -- signed the mother of all executive orders: An order giving him Constitutional authority to issue executive orders.

GENEVA -- As 2015 begins, the values enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are under threat. Around the world, personal liberty, human rights, and democracy are at risk -- even in countries that have embraced democratic ideals.

It seems like a relatively obvious equation: The weaker the gun laws and the higher the rate of gun ownership in a given state, the more deaths from gun violence that state will see.

Good morning, everyone, I come before you today bearing a distant early warning of incoming 2016 speculation and hype. Secure your stocks of bread and toilet paper right now, because a blizzard of breathlessness may be moving into your area.

Here's how a young New York State Assemblyman from Manhattan described his colleagues in Albany:

One, he said, was "entirely unprincipled, and with the same idea of public life and the civil service that a vulture has of a dead sheep.

WASHINGTON (AP) — South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham on Thursday said he has set up a committee to explore running for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016, portraying himself as a proven winner and a conservative willing to work with Democrats.

Technology dictated many major events in 2014. It was a year bookended by airline disasters, with three planes linked to Malaysian Airlines involved in catastrophes. It was a year of unrest -- abroad and within the U.S.

MILFORD, Pa. (AP) — A survivalist who spent more than a month on the run after authorities say he killed one Pennsylvania State Police trooper and wounded another in a late-night ambush pleaded not guilty Thursday, setting the stage for a trial at which prosecutors will seek to put him on death row.

The former senator who nearly blocked Obamacare in Congress may have just helped save it from the Supreme Court.

By now, you may have heard about King v. Burwell, the lawsuit brought by some of the Affordable Care Act’s conservative and libertarian critics.

ATLANTA (AP) — The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s children are trying to resolve a legal dispute over their father's traveling Bible and Nobel Peace Prize without going to trial.

The slain civil rights icon's estate, which is controlled by his sons, last year asked a judge to order their sister to turn over the two items.

Although we all know the real reasons the Right opposes pay-check equity for women -- their corporate paymasters do not want it, just like they opposed the Family Medical Leave Act, the Lily Ledbetter Act, and so forth, and many believe women should only be housewives anyhow -- they have created a series of arguments opposing it that have been rebutted.

When Reggie, a former Marine, had grown intolerably disgusted with the "terrible person" he'd become, he felt that taking his life by fire was his only escape.

"This is what I thought would be the best thing for me -- to leave this earth," the 58-year-old said in a documentary produced by Sasha Leahovcenco.

A Republican state legislator who generally opposes abortion said he is concerned about a controversial anti-abortion bill introduced by one of his colleagues because it would infringe on a woman's bodily autonomy.

WASHINGTON -- With less than a month to go until the Department of Homeland Security runs out of funding and no clear end in sight to the gridlock that's preventing Congress from approving more, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson warned lawmakers Thursday not to threaten his agency's budget over immigration disputes.

As lifelong pro-choice Republicans who have supported GOP candidates for decades, we are dismayed by activists on the right and the left attacking the GOP leaders who spoke out against House Resolution 36 last week.