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Don't blame us for prices - oil execsA Senate Judiciary Committee seeks answers from Big Oil execs for rising oil prices on day that crude crossed $130 a barrel. By Steve Hargreaves, CNNMoney.com staff writer Last Updated: May 21, 2008: 3:47 PM EDT NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Amid increasing public outcry over record-shattering oil and gas prices, senators on Wednesday hauled industry executives in to testify about the recent runup. **SNIP** The executives said it did, and that they are doing all they can to bring new oil supplies to market, but that the fundamental reasons for the surge in...

The U.S. Senate on Tuesday endorsed a March 31, 2008, target date for withdrawing American combat troops from Iraq, moving Congress a step closer to a showdown with President George W. Bush over the war. By a vote of 50-48, the Senate defeated an amendment that would have stricken the withdrawal language from a $121.6 billion bill that mostly would fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. A final vote on the bill is expected later this week. ~ snip ~

According to a report released September 8 by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, Saddam Hussein "was resistant to cooperating with al Qaeda or any other Islamist groups." It's an odd claim. Saddam Hussein's regime has a long and well-documented history of cooperating with Islamists, including al Qaeda and its affiliates. As early as 1982, the Iraqi regime was openly supporting, training, and funding the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist organization opposed to the secular regime of Hafez Assad. For years, Saddam Hussein cultivated warm relations with Hassan al-Turabi, the Islamist who was the de facto leader of the Sudanese...

WASHINGTON - In what has become almost an annual ritual, the House approved legislation Thursday that would allow energy firms to search for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. But as with 11 previous attempts since 1995 to allow drilling in the refuge, it is unlikely that the politically charged legislation will reach the president's desk. The measure would end a 26-year moratorium on drilling in the Alaska refuge, thought to be the largest untapped oil deposit left onshore in the United States. House Republican leaders brought the issue to the floor in response to rising gas prices that...