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WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Americans who raided Osama bin Laden's lair met far less resistance than the Obama administration described in the aftermath. The commandos encountered gunshots from only one man, whom they quickly killed, before sweeping the house and shooting others, who were unarmed, a senior defense official said in the latest account. In Thursday's revised telling, the Navy SEALs mounted a precision, floor-by-floor operation to find the al-Qaida leader and his protectors - but without the prolonged and intense firefight that officials had described for several days.

Richard C. Holbrooke, 69, passed away Monday after doctors conducted the surgery to repair a tear in an artery in his heart. Most recently he served as the President’s point man in the highly volatile Afghan-Pakistani war zone. World leaders today mourn the death of a diplomat who led the end of the Bosnian war on the 15th anniversary of the peace deal he helped design. Deal Maker Of Respect In 1995 Mr Holbrooke seized the opportunity presented by the Bosnian/Croatian military prowess against the Serbs and the Nato decision after the Srebrenica massacre to finally intervene with air attacks....

Mr Bush has allegedly told friends that Mrs Palin is not qualified to be president and criticises John McCain for picking her as his Running Mate in 2008 "Naming Palin makes Bush think less of McCain as a man," a Republican official close to Mr Bush told the New York Daily News. "He thinks McCain ran a lousy campaign with an unqualified running mate and destroyed any chance of winning by picking Palin." Mr Bush has allegedly been disparaging about Mrs Palin in the past. Matt Latimer, former special assistant to Mr Bush, wrote in a book released last year:...

Ex-President George W. Bush rips wisdom of Barack Obama, Sarah Palin and John McCain to friends WASHINGTON - Two years of retirement haven't dulled George W. Bush's political zest - and President Obama and Sarah Palin are among his under-the-radar targets. The 43rd President has told friends the ex-Alaska governor isn't qualified to be President and criticizes Arizona Sen. John McCain for putting Palin on the 2008 GOP ticket and handing her a national platform. "Naming Palin makes Bush think less of McCain as a man," a Republican official familiar with Bush's thinking told the Daily News. "He thinks McCain...

LOS ANGELES, July 30 (UPI) -- Bristol Palin, the daughter of former U.S. vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, and her fiance, Levi Johnston, have split a second time, sources told E! News. The sources said the breakup followed a fight between the Alaska natives over one of Johnston's ex-girlfriends, E! News reported. The younger Palin, 19, and Johnston, 20, are the parents of a 19-month-old son named Tripp. Neither Palin nor Johnston has publicly commented on the latest split, E! News said.

Huckabee’s taken potshots at her from time to time, but between this fusillade from unnamed Mitt advisors and the furious counterattack on Romney at Conservatives 4 Palin, I’d say that the 2012 primary is now, at long last, officially on. In the immortal words of Greg Stillson, “The missiles are flying. Hallelujah.” Still, few express much regard for Palin’s ultimate chances. One adviser to Mitt Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, and, by traditional standards, the putative 2012 frontrunner, says of Palin, “She’s not a serious human being.” Another Romney intimate warns, “If she’s standing up there in a debate and...

(NewsCore) - Teen mom and abstinence advocate Bristol Palin has reunited with her Playgirl model ex-boyfriend Levi Johnston, Us Weekly reported Tuesday. The couple, who broke off their engagement in March 2009 after the birth of their son Tripp, “are still very close,” a source told the magazine. “Now that Mama Palin is out of the picture and Bristol is on her own in Anchorage, they spend more time together than most people think," Us Weekly quoted the source as saying.

Catholic nuns are urging Congress to pass President Obama's health care plan, in an unusual public break with bishops who say it would subsidize abortion. Some 60 leaders of religious orders representing 59,000 Catholic nuns Wednesday sent lawmakers a letter urging them to pass the Senate health care bill. It contains restrictions on abortion funding that the bishops say don't go far enough. The letter says that "despite false claims to the contrary, the Senate bill will not provide taxpayer funding for elective abortions." The letter says the legislation also will help support pregnant women and "this is the real...

Alaska's lipstick-wearing pit-bull is a "Little Shop of Horrors." That's how one longtime friend and campaign trail companion of John McCain, the vanquished 2008 GOP presidential nominee, described veep nominee Sarah Palin. In an expansive story in the August edition of Vanity Fair, a slew of senior members of McCain's campaign team told reporter Todd S. Purdum that they suffer a kind of survivor's guilt following the 2008 presidential election.

Sarah Palin has begun to get on the nerves of Republican senators who say the former GOP vice presidential nominee is taking her own White House aspirations entirely too seriously. But those same senators may have their eye on a 2012 White House run or be friends with senators with presidential ambitions. And Palin, who does not have a lot of Washington connections, energized the party’s grass roots in 2008 while bucking the D.C. establishment, leaving much of the party’s elite grumbling about her appeal to the conservative base. Several GOP senators offered searing criticism of the Alaska governor when...

WASHINGTON (CNN) – Some of Sarah Palin's former campaign aides are frustrated with the Alaska governor for remarking in a lengthy, freewheeling speech that she had refused to pray with them before last October's vice presidential debate. Palin told the story in a speech to a GOP dinner in Alaska last Friday. "So I'm looking around for somebody to pray with, I just need maybe a little help, maybe a little extra," she said of the moments before the debate. "And the McCain campaign, love 'em, you know, they're a lot of people around me, but nobody I could find...

Pope Benedict's repeated gaffes and the Vatican's inability to manage his message in the internet era are threatening to undermine his papacy, Vatican insiders have said. The Holy See is struggling to contain international anger over the Pope's claim on his first official visit to Africa that Aids "cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which even aggravates the problems". The Pope's remarks about condoms, and a recent furore over his lifting of the 20-year excommunication of a British bishop who has questioned the Holocaust, has left him looking isolated and out of touch, prompting calls for a radical...

The Republican U.S. senator sits glumly across the restaurant table. "I don't think we have learned much from the election in terms of what people want to see," he says. "We have the same gridlock." By the "same gridlock," he means that party hard-liners, both Democrats and Republicans, will remain in control of the machinery of Congress. And that means more of the same. It means more politics as usual — especially in his party. "We need someone who speaks from the center," he says. "Sarah Palin is not the voice of our party." He talks a little about immigration....

To my fellow bloggers: The next time you get an e-mail from someone saying it’s time to organize a conservative netroots, bear in mind that it’s these morons, by and large, whom that person wants you to support. The same people who couldn’t muster a judgment on the bailout independent of Nancy Pelosi being a big meanie, the same people who can’t organize a press conference without having it descend into backbiting and recriminations. Some Republican governors tell CNN they were not particularly happy with the way the Republican Governors Association press conference was executed Thursday, saying that they agreed...

Some aides to Sen. John McCain say they weren't happy that running mate Sarah Palin went off script Sunday...Palin deviated from her prepared remarks to talk about her wardrobe controversy Sunday. ... A senior McCain adviser told CNN those comments "were not the remarks we sent to her plane." ...A Palin aide said that the governor clearly felt like she had to say something to defend herself, because "that's really not who she is." ... sources told CNN that long-brewing tensions between Palin and key aides to McCain were on the rise. McCain advisers suggested that they have become increasingly...

Sarah Palin is the rogue elephant in the GOP war room. The maverick mom is distancing herself from John McCain and blowing off the advice of senior Republican aides, convinced they're damaging her reputation and ruining the campaign. Things have gotten so tense between Palin and her traveling staff, an insider said, that she's overruling their advice - which was evident last week when she ignored GOP aides piling into waiting cars at a Colorado event and strolled over to the press corps for an impromptu talk. MORE: Palin Has Future Even If McCain Loses In speeches, Palin has contradicted...

WATERLOO, Iowa, (AFP) – Bitter infighting between aides to John McCain and Sarah Palin erupted into public view in a sign of tension gripping the Republican camp with the election 10 days away. A series of recent surveys have suggested Palin's presence on the ticket is hurting McCain's chances in the November 4 election, at a time when Democratic rival Barack Obama has surged clear in most key polls. The inquests into what has gone wrong with McCain's campaign appear to have already begun, according to reports, with Palin's camp blaming the Arizona senator's senior advisers for mismanaging her contribution....

ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (CNN) -- With 10 days until Election Day, long-brewing tensions between GOP vice presidential candidate Gov. Sarah Palin and key aides to Sen. John McCain have become so intense, they are spilling out in public, sources say.

CNN) -- With 10 days until Election Day, long-brewing tensions between GOP vice presidential candidate Gov. Sarah Palin and key aides to Sen. John McCain have become so intense, they are spilling out in public, sources say. Several McCain advisers have suggested to CNN that they have become increasingly frustrated with what one aide described as Palin "going rogue." A Palin associate, however, said the candidate is simply trying to "bust free" of what she believes was a damaging and mismanaged roll-out. McCain sources say Palin has gone off-message several times, and they privately wonder whether the incidents were deliberate....

Even as John McCain and Sarah Palin scramble to close the gap in the final days of the 2008 election, stirrings of a Palin insurgency are complicating the campaign's already-tense internal dynamics. Four Republicans close to Palin said she has decided increasingly to disregard the advice of the former Bush aides tasked to handle her, creating occasionally tense situations as she travels the country with them. Those Palin supporters, inside the campaign and out, said Palin blames her handlers for a botched rollout and a tarnished public image — even as others in McCain's camp blame the pick of the...