HYANNIS, Mass. — Eunice Kennedy Shriver, the presidential sister who founded the Special Olympics, was celebrated Friday at a funeral Mass as a fearless warrior for the voiceless who changed the world for millions and an unconventional woman who smoked Cuban cigars and played tackle football. “She was scary smart and not afraid to show it,” Maria Shriver said of her mother, who died Tuesday at age 88. “If she were here today … she would pound this podium … and ask each of you what you have done today to better the world.” The Special Olympics torch led a …

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FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — The Charles Manson follower convicted of trying to assassinate President Gerald Ford has been released after more than three decades behind bars. Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme was just 26 years old hen she pointed a semiautomatic .45- caliber pistol at Ford in September 1975 in Sacramento, Calif. Secret Service agents grabbed her and Ford was unhurt. Fromme, now 60, left the Federal Medical Center Carswell in Fort Worth at about 8 a.m. Friday, spokeswoman Dr. Maria Douglas said in a statement.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — A personal phone call during last week’s collision over New York’s Hudson River has led to two air traffic controllers being removed from duty, although officials said the conversation probably had no impact on the tragedy. The Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement Thursday that a controller at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey and his supervisor have been placed on administrative leave because the controller was involved in “apparently inappropriate conversations” at the time of the crash between a small plane and a tour helicopter that killed nine people. The agency said while there was no …

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Students, teachers and local pastors are protesting over a court case involving a northern Florida school principal and an athletic director who are facing criminal charges and up to six months in jail over their offer of a mealtime prayer. There have been yard signs, T-shirts and a mass student protest during graduation ceremonies this spring on behalf of Pace High School Principal Frank Lay and school athletic director Robert Freeman, who will go on trial Sept. 17 at a federal district court in Pensacola for breaching the conditions of a lawsuit settlement reached last year with the American Civil …

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OPINION/ANALYSIS: I suspect many would agree that one of the larger issues of the last economic boom was overconsumption by consumers. Now we can argue over responsibility - whether companies should have extended such easy credit or whether consumers should have taken it. But no matter how you slice it, consumers lived above their means and this fueled not only economic expansion, but also bubble expansion. As I touched on last week, the combination of the current economic environment, credit crunch, consumer concern over jobs and shrinking personal income means consumers now are saving. Another factor for greater consumer savings …

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OPINION/ANALYSIS: Congressmen (and women), with due apologies to F. Scott Fitzgerald, are different from you and me. Privilege makes them soft where life teaches the prudent to be hard, cynical where their constituents must be trustful. The congressional entitlement to privilege, wrought not by talent or inheritance but by legislation, explains the typical congressman’s blindness to tint and deafness to tone, revealed in the angry “town hall” confrontations over health care legislation. Instead of reassuring frightened constituents, Democratic congressmen (and women) denounce the voters who sent them to Washington as Nazis, Brown Shirts and the “un-American.” Harry Reid, the leader …

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WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. Les Paul, who invented the solid-body electric guitar that was later wielded by a legion of rock ‘n’ roll greats, died Thursday of complications from pneumonia. He was 94. According to Gibson Guitar, Mr. Paul died at White Plains Hospital. His family and friends were by his side. As an inventor, Mr. Paul also helped bring about the rise of rock ‘n’ roll with multitrack recording, which enables artists to record different instruments at different times, sing harmony with themselves, and then carefully balance the tracks in the finished recording. The use of electric guitars gained popularity …

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Did she say that? “What’s wrong with Hillary is one week too long on this African hellish tour that she’s on. Think of it from the human point of view: She is in her second week. She’s hot. She is feeling fat. She had this horrible business where she suddenly lost it a bit over the whole Bill thing.” - Daily Beast Editor Tina Brown, remarking on why she thinks Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton blew up at a meeting in Africa during which she was asked about her husband’s thoughts on foreign policy. It later came out the …

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NEW YORK (AP) | A New York City policeman who fatally shot another officer on a dark street in Harlem will not face criminal charges, the Manhattan district attorney announced Thursday. After hearing from 20 witnesses and examining 68 documents, a grand jury voted not to indict Officer Andrew Dunton in the May 28 shooting of Officer Omar Edwards, District Attorney Robert Morgenthau said. Officer Edwards, 25, was off duty and in street clothes when he chased a man who had broken into his car. Officer Dunton and other plainclothes officers patrolling nearby noticed the two men and ordered them …

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CALIFORNIA Thousands evacuate mountain homes DAVENPORT | A Northern California wildfire has forced the mandatory evacuation of about 2,400 residents in the Santa Cruz Mountains. On Thursday morning, officials ordered the evacuation of about 2,000 residents of Bonny Doon, about eight miles north of Santa Cruz, and the evacuation of all 400 residents of the Swanton community. State fire officials said the blaze started about 7 p.m. Wednesday. On Thursday, it had grown to 2,300 acres, or 3.6 square miles, and was at zero containment as about 750 firefighters battled the blaze. Down the coast, officials said a 46-square-mile blaze …

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