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gunfight with police, and Dzhokhar, who was wounded and captured.
• ___

• WASHINGTON (AP) -- Presidents like to take credit for economic recoveries, just as President Barack Obama is angling to do now.
• He and his allies in Congress have "walked the economy back from the brink," his new 2014 federal budget blueprint asserts. And Democrats hope these improvements, while still slow and uneven, will give them at least a small boost in 2014's midterm races.
• That's a big order, considering:
• --Presidential claims of responsibility for economic gains rarely win plaudits from voters, yet presidents nearly always get blamed when things get worse.
• --The historical odds for midterm gains in Congress by the in-power party are slim at best. Since World War II, the president's party has lost an average of 26 seats in midterm elections and gained seats only twice -- Democrats in 1998 under

President Bill Clinton and Republicans in 2002 with George W. Bush in the Oval Office.
• ___

• DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) -- Syria's prime minister escaped an assassination attempt Monday when a bomb went off near his convoy in Damascus, state media reported, the latest attack targeting a top official in President Bashar Assad's regime.
• Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi was unhurt in the bombing in the capital's western neighborhood of Mazzeh, state TV said. The TV showed footage of heavily damaged cars and debris in the area of the blast as firefighters fought to extinguish a large blaze caused by the explosion.
• The daring attack in the upscale neighborhood, which is home to many embassies and officials, was another blow to the government, exposing its vulnerability in the very seat of Assad's powerbase.
• A Syrian government official told The Associated Press that an improvised explosive device was placed under a car that was parked in the area and was detonated

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