Two veteran senators complained Wednesday that military officials might have been slow to react to an alleged prostitution scandal in Colombia and have not been forthcoming with Congress in reporting what happened.
House and Senate negotiators Monday announced an agreement on a giant $662 billion defense authorization bill, including modifications to its detainee language they hope will address White House concerns about that section and avoid a possible veto by President Barack Obama.
Lisa Sylvester looks at reports that most fake military components are traced to China.
A bipartisan congressional report has found a widespread problem with counterfeit electronic parts installed or purchased for use in American military systems around the world. Two U.S. senators said most of the bogus parts originate in China, according to an investigation by their staff.
In a time of high unemployment, slow growth and record debt, there's been a renewed push by many on Capitol Hill to give companies a tax break if they bring their foreign profits home.
Reactions ranged from gloom-and-doom predictions to celebrations to ho-hum business-as-usual as the U.S. military changed its rules Tuesday to allow gay men and lesbians to serve openly.
When a protester planted a plate of cream in the face of Rupert Murdoch, sustaining a ferocious slap from Murdoch's wife Wendi Deng in the process, he joined a long tradition of activists who have made their mark with pie.
Rupert Murdoch's wife tries to save him from a pie in the face. CNN's Jeanne Moos reports.
Senators have found $6 billion in potential cuts to bring next year's proposed defense budget to $682 billion, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee said Friday.
For months, the U.S. has said it's aware that counterfeit electronic parts, usually from China, posed a serious and growing problem for the U.S. military. Now the Senate Armed Services Committee is investigating the counterfeit parts problem and wants China's help, two leading senators said Tuesday.
A Senate panel issued a scathing report Wednesday that describes Goldman Sachs as a "case study" of the recklessness and greed on Wall Street that set off the 2008 financial crisis.
Presidential leadership or kowtowing to allies? Abuse of power or decisive action in the face of imminent catastrophe?
The risk of counterfeit electronics being used in military equipment has prompted a congressional investigation, the top senators on the Senate Armed Services Committee announced Wednesday.
A new report questions whether the centerpiece of the Obama administration's exit strategy for Afghanistan -- a training program for Afghan security forces -- can deliver as promised.
The president is considering a proposal to further boost the size of Afghanistan security forces as a way to speed up the withdrawal of U.S. troops, a senior Democratic lawmaker said Tuesday.
Leaders of the different branches of the U.S. armed forces gave sharply divergent answers to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Friday when asked whether the military's controversial "don't ask, don't tell" policy should be repealed, and what the consequences of a repeal might be.
The heads of the military services are preparing their final advice to Defense Secretary Robert Gates about how a repeal of don't ask, don't tell will impact their troops and officers.
The senator at the center of the legislative tug of war over a vote on the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell" said Tuesday the strategy on how it could be considered is "up in the air," according to a spokeswoman.
A Senate report released Thursday rips into the Pentagon for failing to keep track of tens of thousands of private security contractors in Afghanistan, a failure that places both the mission and U.S. troops at grave risk.
CNN's Candy Crowley asks Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) about the falling public's falling support for the war in Afghanistan.
Less than a year from the scheduled start of withdrawing some troops from Afghanistan, opinions remain varied about exactly what will happen when the transition begins at the end of June 2011.
The Goldman Sachs hearings on Capitol Hill were painful to watch for many reasons. Lloyd Blankfein, Goldman's CEO, was questioned closely by Senator Carl Levin concerning Goldman's duties to clients. Senator Levin's frustration grew as Mr. Blankfein concentrated his answers on the firm's responsibilities related to trading and market-making, rather than exhibiting a firm grasp on the distinctions in roles the firm plays with its clients in other areas, such as underwriting and asset management.
At Tuesday's epic Goldman Sachs hearing, Senator Carl Levin of Michigan led a public grilling of Wall Street not seen by a government panel since the Depression-investigating Pecora Commission. Fortune wanted to know what Levin thought of the answers he got from executives, including CEO Lloyd Blankfein, whether Goldman can save its reputation, and what his committee has learned from its hearings on the financial crisis.
A slew of internal e-mails from the leading credit rating agencies show employees at those firms knew of the dangers in subprime mortgages, but gave them the seal of approval anyway.
Kerry Killinger, the forgotten villain of the financial crisis, finally has his appointment to get fitted for goat's horns.
Senate Republicans on Wednesday launched an attempt to amend or kill legislation expanding the recently enacted health care reform law -- part of a GOP pledge to use every parliamentary tool available to undermine the measure.
Congress questions the practices of the military contractor formerly known as Blackwater. CNN's Chris Lawrence reports.
Several key U.S. senators on Wednesday tore into private contractors working in Afghanistan for the company formerly known as Blackwater, accusing them of flouting regulations and endangering the U.S. mission.
The chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee plans to unleash a withering attack Wednesday on private contractors working for the company formerly known as Blackwater in Afghanistan, accusing them of flouting regulations and endangering the U.S. mission.
CNN's Brian Todd reports on the resignation of a respected diplomat in protest over the Afghan war.
There is a well-known saying in Afghanistan: "You can rent an Afghan, but you can't buy him."
As thousands gathered Sunday in Washington for a march and rally focused on gay rights issues, lawmakers showed that some of the demonstrators' key goals face major obstacles ahead.
Watch as Sen. Carl Levin, chair of the Senate Armed Forces Committee, weighs in on the Afghanistan war.
America's top commander in Afghanistan warns that more troops are needed there within the next year or the nearly 8-year-old war "will likely result in failure," according to a copy of a 66-page document obtained by The Washington Post.
Biden in Iraq
updated: Mon Sep 21 2009 18:13:00
CNN's Chris Lawrence talks with Vice President Biden during his trip to Iraq.
President Barack Obama signed a bill Friday morning that breathes new life into the popular Cash for Clunkers program.
The Senate voted 60-37 passing a $2 billion extension of the popular Cash for Clunkers program Thursday evening, as lawmakers rushed to finish business before their August recess.
Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, says former Vice President Dick Cheney's claims -- that classified CIA memos show enhanced interrogation techniques like waterboarding worked -- are wrong.
C-SPAN's Steve Scully interviews Pres. Obama about former Pres. Bush and former V.P. Cheney's recent speech.
The Senate unanimously approved a bill Thursday to change the costly process of procuring weapons and equipment for the military, a budget reform pushed by President Obama.
Our executive producer said it all, "All those people who told me that news never happens on Sunday mornings are out of their minds." Yes, there was plenty of criticism and controversy on the Sunday talk shows -- and a fair amount of news was made -- but the most important story broke after the usual pundits and politicians had had their say.
Senior Bush administration officials authorized aggressive interrogation techniques -- including forced nudity and waterboarding -- on suspected terrorists, despite concerns from military psychologists and attorneys, according to a Senate report released Tuesday.
Finding a tax haven is easy. Just flip to the back of the Economist. "New Accounts in 8 Minutes" brags one ad. Another promises that no one is "better positioned to deliver solutions that work" on offshore companies. And yet another offers more than 20 years of experience and the "best prices guaranteed."
Cost overruns on big-ticket Pentagon projects have left the U.S. military facing a budgetary "train wreck" at a time of growing budget deficits, Sen. John McCain said Tuesday.
With the prospects of an auto bailout this week all but dead, Democratic leaders said Thursday that Congress would return in December to consider extending a $25 billion lifeline for troubled U.S. automakers if the companies devise a "viable" recovery plan.
CNN's Brooke Baldwin reports on the cost of letting the Big Three automakers fail versus bailing them out.
Congress kicked off a special lame-duck session Monday -- and a partisan battle over the fate of the nation's Big Three automakers.
Iraq's government is pulling its weight to reconstruct its war-torn country, Shiite lawmaker Haider al-Abadi said Wednesday, a day after U.S. auditors announced that Iraq has amassed projected surpluses of up to $80 billion from rising oil prices while Washington pays for reconstruction projects.
Iraq is raking in more money from oil exports than it is spending, amassing a projected four-year budget surplus of up to $80 billion, U.S. auditors reported Tuesday.
Sen. Carl Levin says a Defense Department justification for aggressive interrogation techniques twisted the law.
A top legal adviser to the Pentagon squelched objections from legal experts when the military was writing rules that cleared the way for harsh interrogation of prisoners, a former lawyer for the senior U.S. military commander testified Tuesday.
The Senate Armed Services Committee moved Wednesday to ban U.S. military funding of Iraqi reconstruction projects costing more than $2 million.
The Pentagon has agreed to cut from its budget $171 million to build police stations in Iraq after demands from Congress that the Iraqi government spend its recent oil windfall on reconstruction projects.
Even if government-enforced fuel efficiency standards don't prompt Americans to buy smaller cars, the rising gas price probably will
Consumers, public interest groups and some federal regulators pushed lawmakers to enact sweeping changes to the credit card industry, aimed at remedying what they view as questionable practices of the credit card industry that keep consumers mired in debt.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Sunday he appreciates "what the United States is contributing to help Iraq" but said his country is "shouldering the main burden" of its reconstruction projects.
Senior Democratic senators challenged a new intelligence report's assessment of President Bush's "surge" strategy Friday, saying the troop increase in Iraq has failed to achieve its strategic goals.
A Senate panel grilled a key government energy expert Tuesday over why the Bush administration plans to continue adding to the nation's oil reserve as the price of crude spikes near $100 a barrel.
A congressional panel turned the spotlight on what has been called "unfair" practices of credit card issuers yesterday. This is part of a broader regulatory effort to crack down on credit card practices that are deemed unfair to customers. Here's how you can fight back against rising interest rate fees.
For the second time this year, irate lawmakers on Tuesday took credit card industry executives to task over what they claim are "unfair" practices, such as increasing interest rates on debt even when customers make payments on time or when their credit scores fluctuate.
Too many of them -- in Congress and the presidential campaign -- still don't get national security
Warner proposal draws support
Faced with walkouts by members of his government and increasing criticism from U.S. officials, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told U.S. senators Sunday to butt out of his country's domestic politics.
President Bush acknowledged a mood of "frustration" hanging over Iraq's fractious, paralyzed government Tuesday.
The party is digging in for an all-night session on the war. But passing a withdrawal timetable would bring its own problems
U.S. regulators were powerless to stop "excessive speculation" by Amaranth Advisors LLC because the giant hedge fund exploited an unregulated electronic exchange to "dominate" and "distort" natural gas markets in 2006, a U.S. Senate panel said in a report issued Sunday.
Environmental groups say the vote on three key amendments will determine their support of the Democrat-backed measure
The White House said it does not want Congress to micromanage U.S. commanders in Iraq by limiting the 2002 resolution that authorized President Bush to invade that country, as Democratic senators have proposed.
Senate Democrats will pursue a resolution aimed at limiting the role of U.S. forces in Iraq and removing combat troops there by March 2008, a senior Democratic aide familiar with the proposal said Friday.
Senate Democrats failed to garner the 60 votes they needed to consider a nonbinding resolution opposing President Bush's plan to send more troops to Iraq.
A bipartisan trio of senators on Wednesday unveiled a resolution opposing what Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton -- in proposing a separate bill -- called a "losing strategy" in Iraq.
The nonpartisan Iraq Study Group will recommend a "gradual but meaningful" reduction of U.S. troops begin "relatively early in the new year," a source familiar with the group's deliberations said Thursday.
With a top Democrat calling for a "phased redeployment" of U.S. troops in Iraq, President Bush met Monday with a commission studying the war and said conditions in Iraq, not politics, would dictate troop levels there.
House and Senate Democratic leaders have joined together to urge President Bush to start bringing U.S. troops home from Iraq this year.
Democrats who have called for U.S. troops to start coming home from Iraq said a proposed withdrawal plan reportedly put forward by the top American general there shows their criticism has been on the mark.
U.S. senators on Sunday called Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's national reconciliation plan a positive step but expressed concerns about its "amnesty" provision.
Senate Democrats offered an amendment Monday that would demand that a pullout of U.S. troops from Iraq begin this year.
The senior Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee said Tuesday he favors a phased redeployment of U.S. troops from Iraq beginning by the end of 2006 and finishing by the end of 2007.
Three U.S. senators plan legislation that will send a stark message to Iraqi politicians: Form a government quickly or risk losing U.S. military support.
Amid rising gas and oil prices, a leading Republican said on Sunday that the U.S. government should consider imposing a windfall tax on oil company profits.
A delegation of U.S. senators visiting Iraq said Tuesday they told transitional Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari to stop "dawdling" and reach a prompt political settlement.
Six senators are meeting Tuesday to set out a new schedule for investigating prewar intelligence on Iraq.
Senate Democrats stepped up their attacks on the Bush administration's handling of the war on terrorism and the war in Iraq with calls Monday for an independent probe into the treatment of prisoners in U.S. custody.
A Democratic senator on Sunday said newly declassified information shows that Bush administration officials repeatedly accused Iraq of training al Qaeda terrorists long after interrogators concluded the source of the report was "intentionally misleading" captors.
Democrats forced the Senate into a closed session Tuesday to pressure the Republican majority into completing an investigation of the intelligence underpinning the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
The following is a letter spearheaded by California Senator Dianne Feinstein and signed by 20 democratic senators.
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Top lawmakers from both parties predicted Sunday that President Bush's nominee for CIA director, Rep. Porter Goss, would win confirmation despite misgivings among some Democrats that a politician should not fill the post.
In his weekly radio address, the president said that coalition forces were conducting actions in several cities to stamp down the wildfire insurgency that has flared intensely this week.
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