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While answering questions at Kansas State University, Rummy didn't appreciate a question from an audience member and quite casually flipped him the bird. Q: If you were going to give yourself a letter grade for your performance as Secretary of Defense?what grade would that be? Rumsfeld: Oh, I'd let history worry about that?

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- This is probably not what President Bush had in mind when he stressed bipartisanship after the Democratic Party's midterm elections sweep. A key Senate Republican has joined Democrats in opposing one of Bush's initiatives for the lame-duck Congress: John Bolton's nomination as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. With leaders from both parties promising a new bipartisan Washington, Bush began efforts to get two of his most controversial decisions approved before the Democrats take over. . . . . But Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee, who was defeated in this week's election, said he would block Bolton's nomination....

WASHINGTON - Nobody likes a lame-duck session of Congress, particularly the election losers who won't be around for the next session. Republicans, who lost control of both the House and the Senate in Tuesday's election, would like nothing better than to wrap up their work for the year and go home. But there will probably be no quick escape this year. There are must-pass spending bills to complete, tax relief measures that have expired and a new defense secretary to confirm. It could keep lawmakers in Washington until just before Christmas. President Bush and the newly ascendant Democrats agreed that...

HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam - Three Americans were convicted by a Vietnamese court on terrorism charges Friday after being accused of trying to take over radio airwaves and call for an uprising against the communist government. A judge sentenced the Americans and four Vietnamese to 15 months in prison, with credit for time served. They all are expected to be freed within one month, and the Americans required to leave the country within 10 days of their release. The defendants, all of Vietnamese descent, had been jailed without charges for more than a year, prompting Washington to pressure Hanoi...

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's intelligence agency head was quoted on Friday as saying up to about 30 major terrorist plots were being planned in the country and that future threats could involve chemicals and nuclear technology. Eliza Manningham-Buller, director general of MI5, said young British Muslims were being groomed to become suicide bombers and that her agents were tracking some 1,600 suspects, most of whom were British-born and linked to al Qaeda. "We are aware of numerous plots to kill people and damage our economy. What do I mean by numerous? Five? Ten? No, nearer 30 ... that we know...

UFO sightings and alien visitors tend to be solely the reserve of sci-fi movies. So when a former MoD chief warns that the country could be attacked by extraterrestrials at any time, you may be forgiven for feeling a little alarmed. During his time as head of the Ministry of Defence UFO project, Nick Pope was persuaded into believing that other lifeforms may visit Earth and, more specifically, Britain. His concern is that "highly credible" sightings are simply dismissed. And he complains that the project he once ran is now "virtually closed" down, leaving the country "wide open" to aliens....

SYDNEY (AFP) - Australian Prime Minister John Howard has pledged to keep troops in Iraq despite opposition warnings that he faced the same backlash from voters as US President George W. Bush. Howard said the US strategy in Iraq would not change as a result of the dramatic swing against Bush's Republicans in mid-term Congressional elections, and nor would Australia's. Tuesday's vote saw Democrats make sweeping gains across the country to take control of the House of Representatives and squeak ahead in the Senate. Howard acknowledged that Bush's ousting of Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was a response to voter discontent...

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (AFP) - Clashes between insurgents and NATO-led and Afghan troops have left 34 Taliban and three policemen dead in the latest violence in Afghanistan. Eight policemen, eight Taliban and three civilians were also wounded during the fighting in volatile southern provinces of Kandahar, Zabul and southeastern Khost which erupted overnight and continued early Thursday, police said Thursday. Twenty-two Taliban were killed during a joint operation by Afghan army, police and NATO forces late Wednesday in the Pashmole area of Zahri district in Kandahar province, district police chief Ghulam Rasoul Aka told AFP. Most of the casualties occurred as...

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqis on Thursday cheered the resignation of U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, blaming him for policy failures and scandals they say helped spawn the daily sectarian carnage wracking their nation. "Rumsfeld's resignation shows the scale of the mess the U.S. has made in Iraq," said Ibrahim Ali, 44, who works at the Oil Ministry. "The efforts by American politicians to hide their failure are no longer working." Iraq's government has yet to comment on Rumsfeld's resignation, announced Wednesday after the Democratic Party won a sweeping victory in midterm elections in which voter discontent over the war in...

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Wednesday that his country would continue to acquire nuclear technology and challenge what he called "Western fabrications." Speaking to a crowd of thousands in Semnan, a city 155 miles east of Tehran, Khamenei said most countries believe that "nuclear energy should be taken away from the hands of a few powers," state media reported. "The Americans open their mouth and close their eyes and say whatever they want, such as 'the world opposes enrichment,' Khamenei said, referring to Iran's enrichment of uranium, which the U.N. Security Council has called on...

BAGHDAD (AFX) - The main Sunni Arab bloc in Iraq's parliament threatened today to pull out of the unity government and take up arms if the Shiite-dominated government continued to ignore its calls for the dismantling of militias. Salim Abdallah, spokesman for the National Concord Front, a bloc of three Sunni parties holding 44 seats in parliament, told Agence France-Presse his group had delivered a message to the government two weeks ago about dissolving the militias. 'If they do not respond to this request, we may abandon the political process and have no other choice but to take up arms,'...

DAMASCUS, Syria - Hamas chief Khaled Mashaal said Wednesday that a truce with Israel is finished and his group's militants can resume fighting following an Israeli tank attack that killed 18 Palestinians. Militants will answer the deaths with "deeds, not words," Mashaal told a news conference in the Syrian capital. "The truce (with Israel) ended at the end of 2005," Mashaal said. "The armed struggle is free to resume, and the resistance is dictated by local circumstances." The truce formally ended last year but had remained in effect. Palestinian witnesses and officials said Israeli tank shells crashed into a residential...

Dick Morris has been predicting to NewsMax readers that the GOP would hold the Senate and lose the House. Based on latest results and exit polls, Morris tells NewsMax: The Republicans will lose the House with a 5 to 10 seat Democratic majority. The Republicans keep the Senate with at least 50 votes Allen wins in Virginia. Too early to tell on Missouri. Stay tuned.....

Ohio Democrats Filing Lawsuit To Keep Polls Open Late 13 Percent Voter Turnout Reported In Cuyahoga County POSTED: 11:02 am EST November 7, 2006 UPDATED: 5:51 pm EST November 7, 2006 CLEVELAND -- The Ohio Democratic party is filing a lawsuit to keep polling locations in Cuyahoga County open late, NewsChannel5 reported. Four polling locations did not open until about 7 a.m. The Democrats are not happy that they did not open on time. They are asking a federal judge to keep them open. The same thing happened in the May primary. The Democrats want to give voters extra time...

(New Jersey - WABC, November 7, 2006) - The US Attorney for New Jersey has dispatched investigators to run down complaints of voting machine problems which are preventing voters from casting ballots for GOP Senate hopeful Tom Kean, Jr. The counsel for the NJ Republican State Committee, Mark Sheridan, says he has four sworn affidavits and has received more than two dozen calls alleging that some of New Jersey's electronic voting machines were either "pre-voted" for Democratic incumbant Bob Menendez, or were otherwise inoperable when voters sought to cast votes for Kean. Sheridan says complaints had come in from five...

Political strategist Dick Morris tells NewsMax: 1. Senator Allen is showing a last minute surge in Virginia, with the latest Gallup poll showing him at 49 percent and his opponent Jim Webb at 46 percent. 2. With Allen likely victorious it becomes very difficult for the Democrats to get control of the Senate. The best they can hope for now is a 50-50 tie. "Independent” Joe Lieberman will play an influential role under such a circumstance. 3. There appears to be momentum for the GOP. "Overall it’s been a pretty good week for the Republicans,” Morris said. 4. Kerry’s gaffe...

by Robert Novak Posted Nov 06, 2006 November 6, 2006 Washington, DC Special Edition To: Our Readers Democrats are set to gain 19 House seats, two Senate seats, and five governorships in tomorrow's elections. It is a sign of Republicans' sorry state that, at this point, this is actually a very favorable outlook for them. In the last day of the midterm election campaign, we offer a final run-down of how candidates are doing in each contested district or state. We aim to give a complete forecast on tomorrow's competitive election contests in this final-hour newsletter, which will be followed...

DEMOCRATS SEND CEASE-AND-DESIST LETTER TO REPUBLICAN CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEE OVER AUTOMATED PHONE CALLS TO VOTERS

The following is a memorandum from Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman to Republican leadership and interested parties regarding momentum heading toward Election Day: New polls say our party is heading into Election Day with strong momentum. Specifically, three national polls this weekend show Republicans making major gains. The Generic Ballot is Closing - The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press (Nov. 1-4) shows Republicans cutting the Democrat lead on the generic ballot from down 11 last month (39- 50) to down just four points today (43-47). The ABC News/Washington Post poll (Nov. 1-4) shows Republicans cutting...

Democratic Senate challenger Jon Tester appears to hold a slight lead in Montana over Republican Sen. Conrad Burns according to a new poll of likely voters released Monday. The poll drew an unusually sharp reaction from the Burns campaign. A Burns spokesman dismissed the USA Today/Gallup poll as inaccurate and said the campaign was revoking one newspaper's credentials to attend Burns' election night event in Billings because it wrote about the poll. Jason Klindt said the Great Falls Tribune would not be allowed to attend. "Running a bogus poll on the day before an election to try and suppress Republican...