Yahoo! News: Elections
AP EXCLUSIVE: Salazar tours rigs, keeps drill ban (AP)
AP - The helicopter passes over the blue waters of the Gulf of Mexico — with surprisingly little oil visible on its surface — when out of the sea rises a skyscraper-like structure nearly 350 feet above the waves. The $600 million rig, nearly 100 miles off Louisiana's coast, has a hull larger than a football field and can drill more than 5 miles beneath the ocean floor.
When Double Dippers become economic party poopers (AP)
AP - They're a minority, but a vocal one, and they're hovering like storm clouds over a brittle recovery.
GOP's Rand Paul softens rhetoric in Ky. Senate bid (AP)
AP - A tea party success story in search of a statewide triumph, Kentucky Republican senatorial candidate Rand Paul volunteers that he's spent two decades "popping off" about one issue or another. Not quite so much now, though.
Obama blames GOP on small business lending bill (AP)
AP - President Barack Obama is going after Senate Republicans who have stymied his proposal to create a $30 billion fund to help unfreeze lending for credit-starved small businesses.
Inside the FLOTUS office (Politico)
Politico - The Oval Office is nearly as familiar an image as the president himself.
California Rep. Waters may face fall ethics trial (AP)
AP - A second House Democrat, Rep. Maxine Waters of California, could face an ethics trial this fall, further complicating the election outlook for the party as it battles to retain its majority.
Paperwork nightmare: A struggle to fix new law (AP) AP - Tucked into the new health care law is a requirement that could become a paperwork nightmare for nearly 40 million businesses.
Obama: Rangel case troubling; some Dems say resign (AP)
AP - Rep. Charlie Rangel is getting sympathy from some fellow Democrats but scant support from others as he faces trial on several ethics charges.
House approves oil spill bill; stalled in Senate (AP)
AP - The House has approved a bill to boost safety standards for offshore drilling and remove a liability cap for oil spills, but a partisan fight in the Senate will likely delay action on a response to the Gulf oil spill until Congress returns from its summer recess.
AP - It's hard to travel incognito when you're the president — even on a mission to a spy museum.