Follow the Leader

The New York Times and USA Today lead with new national polls that show voters think Sen. Barack Obama has a better shot at beating Sen. John McCain. In both polls Obama beat out Sen. Hillary Clinton by a significant margin for the first time (extra credit goes to the NYT for mentioning USAT's survey). In the NYT/CBS poll, 54 percent of Democratic voters said they would want to see Obama nominated compared to 38 percent who preferred Clinton, while the USAT/Gallup poll shows a 51-39 percent lead for Obama. USAT's poll shows Republicans agree with Democrats that McCain would have an easier time if he were to face off against Clinton.

The Los Angeles Times leads with a plan by Senate Democrats to change the bankruptcy law in order to give judges the authority to change the terms of a mortgage. Under the terms being discussed, a judge would be able to reduce a mortgage or its related interest rates, during bankruptcy proceedings. The country's lenders, largely backed by Republicans, are deeply against this proposal and contend that it would force them to increase mortgage rates in order to cover the added risk. "If this proposal becomes law, it will amount to a new tax on homeowners," the chairman of the Mortgage Bankers Association said. The Wall Street Journal leads its world-wide newsbox with the suicide bomber that assassinated a top Pakistani Army general in a day that saw the first major outburst of violence since the elections. He was the most senior military officer to be assassinated in recent times. The Washington Post leads locally but off-leads a look at how Obama's rise is due in large part to his speeches and general oratory skills, which is opening up a new line of attack from his opponents. Not since Franklin D. Roosevelt "has a presidential candidate been propelled so much by the force of words," says the Post.

Ahead of debate, Clinton sharpens her attacks

Republican John McCain also campaigned in Ohio on Monday, and told reporters he must convince a war-weary country that U.S. policy in Iraq is succeeding to win the White House, or else "then I lose. I lose."

He then backed off that remark, saying merely that Iraq would be a part of voters' judgment of his ability to handle national security.

The five-year-old Iraq conflict is emerging as a fault line in the general election, with the Arizona senator calling for the U.S. military continuing its mission while his Democratic opponents urge quick withdrawal.

A coalition of anti-war groups that was influential in last year's political debate on Iraq says it plans to spend more than $20 million this year to convince voters that McCain and the Republican Party's support for the war is bad for the economy.

In a conference call with reporters Monday, activist leaders said they believe voters will blame Republicans this fall for supporting the war at a time of rising health care and college costs and a mortgage foreclosure crisis.

"Leaders who do not recognize this connection will be at a disadvantage come Election Day," said Jeff Blum, director of USAction, which plans to spend $10 million organizing a grass-roots effort against Republican candidates. Blum said the group intends to dispatch hundreds of thousands of volunteers to go door to door to convince voters that the Republicans' war effort is hurting the economy.

WASHINGTON - Hillary Rodham Clinton suggested Barack Obama was not prepared to handle a global crisis as she looked ahead to an MSNBC debate that offered one of her last chances to blunt her rival's momentum before next week's must-win primaries.

The two Democratic presidential contenders face off in a debate at Cleveland State University just a week before the March 4 primaries in Ohio and Texas that Clinton must win to keep alive her faltering bid to become the first U.S. female president.

MSNBC will telecast the debate from 9-10:30 p.m. ET.  NBC’s Brian Williams will moderate and be joined by "Meet the Press" moderator and NBC News Washington Bureau Chief Tim Russert. It will be streamed live on msnbc.com.

AUSTIN: Barack Obama escaped unscathed from a key debate which Democratic foe Hillary Clinton hoped to use to slow his surging White House quest, 12 days before their next electoral showdown. On another day of high drama in the relentless 2008 election, presumptive Republican nominee John McCain meanwhile was forced to deny he had an extra-marital affair after a report linked him to a female lobbyist.

Senator Clinton needed a game-changing moment at Thursday night’s debate at the University of Texas, as new polls showed her rival slashing her leads in her must-win fortress states of Texas and Ohio, which vote on March 4.

Obama meanwhile avoided serious gaffes, fought back against her claims that some of his soaring oratory was plagiarised, and suggested her vote to authorise war in Iraq sparked questions about her leadership skills. “If your candidacy is going to be about words, then they should be your own words. That’s, I think, a very simple proposition,” Clinton said, drawing cheers and some jeers from the audience at the University of Texas.

“Lifting whole passages from someone else’s speeches is not change you can believe in, it’s change you can Xerox,” the New York senator said, ripping off her rival’s campaign slogan.

But Obama rejected accusations that he had stolen language from Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick as “silly season” politics and in a cheeky quip defended his speeches: “I’ve got to admit, some of them are pretty good.” In her strongest moments, Clinton scored points on her signature issue of healthcare, and at the end of the encounter gave an emotion-tinged answer on her greatest personal challenges.

US charges six suspects over 9/11

He said there would be "no secret trials" and that they would be "as completely open as possible".

"Relatively little amounts of evidence will be classified," Gen Hartmann said.

The other five defendants are Ramzi Binalshibh, a Yemeni, Walid bin Attash, also from Yemen, Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, who was born in Balochistan, Pakistan, and raised in Kuwait, Mustafa Ahmad al-Hawsawi, a Saudi, and Mohammed al-Qahtani.

Gen Hartmann said the charges included conspiracy, murder in violation of the laws of war, attacking civilians, destruction of property and terrorism.

All but Mr Qahtani and Mr Hawsawi are also charged with hijacking or hazarding an aircraft.

The charges listed "169 overt acts allegedly committed by the defendants in furtherance of the September 11 events".

Gen Thomas Hartmann said: "The accused will have his opportunity to have his day in court.

The US has about 275 prisoners left in the detention centre

"It's our obligation to move the process forward, to give these people their rights."

In listing more details of the charges against the defendants, Gen Hartmann alleged that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had proposed the attacks to al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden in 1996, had obtained funding and overseen the operation and the training of hijackers in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a Kuwaiti of Pakistani extraction, was said to have been al-Qaeda's third in command when he was captured in Pakistan in March 2003.

He has reportedly admitted to decapitating kidnapped US journalist Daniel Pearl in 2002 but these charges do not relate to that.

The BBC's Vincent Dowd in Washington says Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has said he planned every part of the 9/11 attacks but that his confession may prove problematic as the CIA admitted using controversial "waterboarding" techniques.

Human rights groups regard the procedure as torture.

Legal challenge

The charges will now be sent to Susan Crawford, the convening authority for the military commissions, to determine whether they will be referred to trial.

Any trials would be held by military tribunal under the terms of the Military Commissions Act, passed by the US Congress in 2006.

The Act set up tribunals to try terror suspects who were not US citizens.

The law is being challenged by two prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, who say they are being deprived of their rights to have their cases heard by a US civilian court.

Nineteen men hijacked four planes in the 9/11 attacks. Two planes hit the World Trade Center in New York, another the Pentagon in Washington and the fourth crashed in Pennsylvania.

The Pentagon has announced charges against six Guantanamo Bay prisoners over their alleged involvement in the 11 September 2001 attacks in the US.

Prosecutors will seek the death penalty for the six, who include alleged plot mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

The charges, the first for Guantanamo inmates directly related to 9/11, are expected to be heard by a controversial military tribunal system.

About 3,000 people died in the hijacked plane attacks.

The Guantanamo Bay detention centre, in south-east Cuba, began to receive US military prisoners in January 2002. Hundreds have been released without charge but about 275 remain and the US hopes to try about 80.

Tribunal process

Brig Gen Thomas Hartmann, a legal adviser to the head of the Pentagon's Office of Military Commissions, said the charges alleged a "long-term, highly sophisticated plan by al-Qaeda to attack the US".

Clinton tries to stop Obama momentum

Clinton lost in Maine on Sunday, a day after the New York senator and former first lady was stung by defeats in Nebraska, Washington state, Louisiana and the U.S. Virgin Islands. She is struggling to overcome Obama's financial and political rally that came on the back of his impressive showing in last week's "Super Tuesday" series of Democratic contests in 22 states.

The Democratic nomination is far from decided, with weeks or months of campaigning still ahead. Clinton is an experienced, well-financed campaigner certainly capable of pulling off more surprise wins, as she did Jan. 8 in New Hampshire.

In the latest overall totals in The Associated Press count, Clinton had 1,136 delegates to 1,108 for Obama. The totals include so-called superdelegates, which are party leaders not chosen at primaries or caucuses, free to change their minds. A total of 2,025 delegates is required to win the nomination.

In Maine, with 99 percent of the participating precincts reporting, Obama led with 59 percent of the vote, to 40 percent for Clinton. Obama won 15 of Maine's delegates to the national convention and Clinton won nine.

Obama, who seeks to be the U.S.'s first black president, was buoyant after his weekend winning sweep. He even won a Grammy on Sunday for his audio version of his book "The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts On Reclaiming The American Dream," beating former Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter in the best spoken word album category.

"I have the ability to bring people together," he said. Because of that, he said, "I think I can beat John McCain more effectively," he said, challenging the presumptive Republican nominee for November general elections.

WASHINGTON - Barack Obama scored a clean sweep of five weekend contests, eroding rival Hillary Rodham Clinton's narrow lead in the Democratic presidential race and prompting the former first lady to reshuffle her campaign staff in a bid to stop his momentum.

For now, at least, the wind is at Obama's back. Clinton replaced campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle with longtime aide Maggie Williams ahead of nomination races Tuesday in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C., where polls published Sunday showed Obama leading.

The two states and the U.S. capital all have a sizable number of black Democratic voters, a constituency that has aided Obama in earlier contests.

McCain, too, was nursing Saturday and Sunday losses. He took the weekend off from campaigning despite embarrassing, but not pivotal, losses against preacher-turned-politician Mike Huckabee in two Republican races on Saturday. Huckabee, a favorite of evangelical Christians, beat McCain in Kansas and Louisiana, highlighting the difficulty the veteran Arizona senator faces in convincing the party's core right-wing blocs that he is one of them.

McCain, however, remained far ahead of Huckabee in the delegate count, and retained his virtually assured nomination that came on the back of rival Mitt Romney's decision to suspend his campaign. McCain has 719 delegates out of a total 1,191 needed to secure the Republican nomination. Huckabee had 234 delegates.

Since his string of Super Tuesday wins, McCain has concentrated on wooing conservatives who view him as a political maverick on key issues like immigration and tax cuts. The former Vietnam prisoner-of-war and decorated Navy pilot secured a boost Sunday when Bush referred to him in a taped interview as a "true conservative." But the president also stressed that McCain must do more to win over conservatives.

Obama has advantage in head-to-head with McCain

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Sen. John McCain became the likely Republican nominee after Mitt Romney decided to suspend his campaign Thursday. Now, the Democrats are debating who would do better against the Arizona Republican.

Democrats are debating who would do better against Sen. John McCain, the GOP front-runner.

Two polls this month have asked registered voters nationwide how they would vote if the choice were between McCain and Democratic Sen. Hillary Clinton.

A CNN poll, conducted by the Opinion Research Corporation February 1-3, shows Clinton three points ahead of McCain, 50 percent to 47 percent. That's within the poll's margin of error of 3 percentage points, meaning that the race is statistically tied..

A Time magazine poll, conducted February 1-4, also shows a dead heat between Clinton and McCain. Each was backed by 46 percent of those polled.

Sen. Barack Obama believes he can do better, arguing "I've got appeal that goes beyond our party."

In the CNN poll, Obama leads McCain by 8 points, 52 percent to 44 percent. That's outside the margin of error, meaning that Obama has the lead.

And in the Time poll, Obama leads McCain by 7 points, 48 percent to 41 percent -- a lead also outside of the poll's margin of error of 3 percentage points.

Hollywood Writers Consider Studio Offer

Technorati Tags: Hollywood,america,film,movies

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Hollywood writers got their first look Saturday at details of a tentative agreement with studios that could put the strike-crippled entertainment industry back to work, an offer the union's East Coast president said he was endorsing.
A summary of the proposed deal crafted this week was posted on the Writers Guild of America's Web site hours before members attended meetings in New York and Los Angeles.
Compensation for projects delivered via digital media was the central issue in the 3-month-old walkout, which idled thousands of workers, disrupted the TV season and moviemaking and took the shine off Hollywood's awards season.
"I believe it is a good deal. I am going to be recommending this deal to our membership," Michael Winship, president of the Writers Guild of America, East, told reporters before the New York meeting at a Times Square hotel.
Winship said afterward that he was encouraged by the membership's response.
"We had a very lively discussion. I'm happy with what happened. ... At the moment, I feel strongly it (the proposed deal) has a strong chance of going through," he said.
Writers leaving the two-hour-plus New York meeting characterized the reaction as generally positive and said there was cautious optimism that the end of the strike - the guild's first in 20 years - could be near.
"There's a general feeling of tremendous success. I was delighted," said TV writer John Simmons, who estimated that about 500 writers were on hand. "We agreed that this looks pretty good. ... It bodes well for the future."
He added that there are "always some people who will dissent" and that the complex deal required further scrutiny.
Carmen Culver, a film and TV writer, lauded the guild "for hanging tough."
"It's a great day for the labor movement. We have suffered a lot of privation in order to achieve what we've achieved," Culver said.
Michael Moore, the Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker ("Bowling for Columbine") and a nominee this year for his health-care film "Sicko," attended the New York meeting.
"It's an historic moment for labor in this country," Moore told The Associated Press.
Hundreds of writers filed into the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles to hear from union leaders about the proposed deal. Some were cautiously optimistic that they could begin work by next week.
"I'm hopeful. We've been jerked around so much by the studios," film writer Brian Suskind said. "I don't think we're feeling vindictive, but we're angry about how we've been treated."
If guild members on both coasts react favorably to the proposed deal, the guild's board could vote Sunday to lift the strike order and the industry could be up and running Monday. This month's Oscars ceremony, which has been under the cloud of a union and actors boycott, also would be a winner.
Sunday's Grammy Awards ceremony has a picket-free pass from the union.
Winship cautioned that it's not a "done deal" until the contract is ratified by members. He also said that several steps must be taken before the West guild's board and East guild's council decide to lift the strike order.
"It conceivably could be Monday, but there are several different alternative ways that the board and council could determine how this should be dealt with," Winship said.
An outline of the three-year deal was reached in recent talks between media executives and the guild, with lawyers then drafting the contract language that was concluded Friday.
According to the guild's summary, the deal provides union jurisdiction over projects created for the Internet based on certain guidelines, sets compensation for streamed, ad-supported programs and increases residuals for downloaded movies and TV programs.
The writers deal is similar to one reached last month by the Directors Guild of America, including a provision that compensation for ad-supported streaming doesn't kick in until after a window of between 17 to 24 days deemed "promotional" by the studios.
Writers would get a maximum $1,200 flat fee for streamed programs in the deal's first two years and then get a percentage of a distributor's gross in year three - the last point an improvement on the directors deal, which remains at the flat payment rate.
"Much has been achieved, and while this agreement is neither perfect nor perhaps all that we deserve for the countless hours of hard work and sacrifice, our strike has been a success," guild leaders Winship and Patric Verrone, head of the Writers Guild of America, West, said in an e-mailed message to members.
Together, the guilds represent 12,000 writers, with about 10,000 of those involved in the strike that began Nov. 5 and has cost the Los Angeles area economy alone an estimated $1 billion or more. Studios are represented by Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.
One observer said the guild gained ground in the deal but not as much as it wanted.
"It's a mixed deal but far better than the writers would have been able to get three months ago. The strike was a qualified success," said Jonathan Handel, an entertainment attorney with the TroyGould firm and a former associate counsel for the writers guild.
The walkout "paved the way for the directors to get a better deal than they would otherwise have gotten. That in turn became the foundation for further improvements the writers achieved," Handel said.

Obama Sweeps 3 States, Virgin Islands

WASHINGTON (AP) - Sen. Barack Obama swept the Louisiana primary and caucuses in Nebraska and Washington state Saturday night, slicing into Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's slender delegate lead in their historic race for the Democratic presidential nomination.

The Illinois senator also won caucuses in the Virgin Islands, completing his best night of the campaign.

"Today, voters from the West Coast to the Gulf Coast to the heart of America stood up to say 'yes we can"' Obama told a cheering audience of Democrats at a party dinner in Richmond, Va.

He jabbed simultaneously at Clinton and Arizona Sen. John McCain, saying the election was a choice between debating the Republican nominee-in-waiting "about who has the most experience in Washington, or debating him about who's most likely to change Washington. Because that's a debate we can win."

Clinton preceded Obama to the podium. She did not refer to the night's voting, instead turning against McCain. "We have tried it President Bush's way," she said, "and now the Republicans have chosen more of the same."

She left quickly after her speech, departing before Obama's arrival. But his supporters made their presence known, sending up chants of "Obama" from the audience as she made her way offstage.

Obama's winning margins ranged from substantial to crushing.

He won roughly two-thirds of the vote in Washington state and Nebraska, and almost 90 percent in the Virgin Islands.

With returns counted from nearly two-thirds of the Louisiana precincts, he was gaining 53 percent of the vote, to 39 percent for the former first lady. As in his earlier Southern triumphs in Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina, Obama, a black man, rode a wave of African-American support to victory in Louisiana.

In all, the Democrats scrapped for 161 delegates in the night's contests.

In initial allocations, Obama had won 31, Clinton nine.

In overall totals in The Associated Press count, Clinton had 1,064 delegates to 1,029 for Obama. A total of 2,025 is required to win the nomination at the national convention in Denver.

The Democratic race moved into a new, post-Super Tuesday phase as McCain flunked his first ballot test since becoming the Republican nominee-in-waiting. He lost Kansas caucuses to Mike Huckabee, gaining less than 24 percent of the vote.

Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor, got nearly 60 percent of the vote a few hours after telling conservatives in Washington, "I majored in miracles, and I still believe in them." He won all 36 delegates at stake.

Huckabee also edged ahead of McCain in caucuses in Washington, and in Louisiana's primary, where he flirted with gaining 50 percent of the vote, the requirement for pocketing 20 delegates.

For all his brave talk, Huckabee was hopelessly behind in the delegate race. McCain had 719, compared with 234 for Huckabee and 14 for Texas Rep. Ron Paul. It takes 1,191 to win the nomination at the national convention.

The Democrats' race was as close as the Republicans' was not, a contest between Obama, hoping to become the first black president, and Clinton, campaigning to become the first female commander in chief.

The two rivals contest primaries on Tuesday in Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia, all states where Obama and his campaign are hopeful of winning.

Preliminary results of a survey of voters leaving their polling places in Louisiana showed that nearly half of those casting ballots were black. As a group, African-Americans have overwhelmingly favored Obama in earlier primaries, helping him to wins in several Southern states.

Obama was gaining about 80 percent of the black votes statewide, while Clinton was winning 70 percent support among whites, the exit poll showed.

One in seven Democratic voters and about one in 10 Republicans said Hurricane Katrina had caused their families severe hardship from which they have not recovered. There was another indication of the impact the storm had on the state. Early results suggested that northern Louisiana accounted for a larger share of the electorate than in the past, presumably the result of the decline in population in the hurricane-battered New Orleans area.

McCain cleared his path to the party nomination earlier in the week with a string of Super Tuesday victories that drove former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney from the race. He spent the rest of the week trying to reassure skeptical conservatives, at the same time party leaders quickly closed ranks behind him.

His Kansas defeat aside, McCain also suffered a symbolic defeat when Romney edged him out in a straw poll at the Conservative Political Action Conference meeting across town from the White House.

The day's contests opened a new phase in the Democratic race between Clinton and Obama.

The Feb. 5 Super Tuesday primaries and caucuses in 22 states, which once looked likely to effectively settle the race, instead produced a near-equal delegate split.

That left Obama and Clinton facing the likelihood of a grind-it-out competition lasting into spring - if not to the summer convention itself.

With the night's events, 29 of the 50 states have selected delegates.

Two more - Michigan and Florida - held renegade primaries and the Democratic National Committee has vowed not to seat any delegates chosen at either of them.

Maine, with 24 delegates, holds caucuses on Sunday. Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia and voting by Americans overseas are next, on Tuesday, with 175 combined.

Then follows a brief intermission, followed by a string of election nights, some crowded, some not.

The date of March 4 looms large, 370 delegates in primaries in Ohio, Texas, Rhode Island and Vermont.

Mississippi is alone in holding a primary one week later, with a relatively small 33 delegates at stake.

Puerto Rico anchors the Democratic calendar, with 55 delegates chosen in caucuses on June 7.

If Super Tuesday failed to settle the campaign, it produced a remarkable surge in fundraising.

Obama's aides announced he had raised more than $7 million on line in the two days that followed.

Clinton disclosed she had loaned her campaign $5 million late last month in an attempt to counter her rival's Super Tuesday television advertising. She raised more than $6 million in the two days after the busiest night in primary history.

The television ad wars continued unabated.

Obama has been airing commercials for more than a week in television markets serving every state that has a contest though Feb 19.

Clinton began airing ads midweek in Washington state, Maine and Nebraska, and added Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia on Friday.

The exit poll was conducted by Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International for The Associated Press and the television networks.

Yes We Can - Barack Obama Music Video

Yes, We Can! - Si, Se Puede! Song & video, featuring a star cast, by Will.i.am of The Black Eyed Peas. Inspired by Barack Obama's 'Yes We Can' speech. ---------------------------------------- 02/05/08 Note: Please keep the comments civil and try to keep the conversation to issues. No personal attacks or pejoratives. We'd prefer to keep the comments, and dialogue, open and flowing. Most importantly, no matter who your preferred candidate is, get out and vote! 02/06/08 Note: Please see note from 02/05/08. ------------------------- http://www.yeswecansong.com http://www.barackobama.com/ http://factcheck.barackobama.com/ It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation. Yes we can. It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail toward freedom. Yes we can. It was sung by immigrants as they struck out from distant shores and pioneers who pushed westward against an unforgiving wilderness. Yes we can. It was the call of workers who organized; women who reached for the ballots; a President who chose the moon as our new frontier; and a King who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the Promised Land. Yes we can to justice and equality. Yes we can to opportunity and prosperity. Yes we can heal this nation. Yes we can repair this world. Yes we can. We know the battle ahead will be long, but always remember that no matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change. We have been told we cannot do this by a chorus of cynics...they will only grow louder and more dissonant ........... We've been asked to pause for a reality check. We've been warned against offering the people of this nation false hope. But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope. Now the hopes of the little girl who goes to a crumbling school in Dillon are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the streets of LA; we will remember that there is something happening in America; that we are not as divided as our politics suggests; that we are one people; we are one nation; and together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story with three words that will ring from coast to coast; from sea to shining sea -- Yes. We. Can. Celebrities featured include: Jesse Dylan, Will.i.am, Common, Scarlett Johansson, Tatyana Ali, John Legend, Herbie Hancock, Kate Walsh, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Adam Rodriquez, Kelly Hu, Adam Rodriquez, Amber Valetta, Eric Balfour, Aisha Tyler, Nicole Scherzinger and Nick Cannon Also check out this other great song and video inspired by Barack: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v

Baby Found Amid Tornado Devastation

 

At a makeshift shelter for storm victims at Hartsville Pike Church of Christ in nearby Gallatin, the Rev. Doyle Farris said the child was a reminder that people "should never give up, even in the midst of the worst storm."
"If you look, you can find an inspiration or a bright spot," he said. "The child will always be a reminder in this community of that message."
Kyson's story emerged as a tale of hope amid spectacular misery as residents in Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas tried to piece their lives back together after the nation's deadliest twister rampage in two decades killed 58 people.
The extent of the damage was still being tallied Thursday, two days after the storms.
Federal and state emergency teams dashed into the hardest-hit areas, along with utility workers and insurance claims representatives. President Bush, who said he called the governors of the affected states to offer support, planned to visit Tennessee on Friday.
Though homes were destroyed, communities flattened and loved ones lost, there were signs everywhere that recovery, while far away, was possible: Food and clothes began pouring in for the homeless. The morning coffee was brewing at a service station.
In Greenville, Ky., 18-year-old Samantha Oakley gave birth to a healthy 7-pound, 1-ounce son in the dark soon after the storm knocked out power at Muhlenberg Community Hospital.