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Obama campaign courting college students as they return to campus
• WASHINGTON (AP) -- As college students return to campus, President Barack Obama's campaign will be there waiting for them.
• Obama aides sees college campuses as fertile ground for registering and recruiting some of the more than 15 million young people who have become eligible to vote since the 2008 election. As Republicans hold their party convention in Florida this week, the president will make a personal appeal to college voters in three university towns: Ames, Iowa; Fort Collins, Colo.; and Charlottesville, Va.
• Obama's victory four years ago was propelled in part by his overwhelming support among college-aged voters, and polls show him leading Republican rival Mitt Romney with that group in this year's race.
• But the president faces an undeniable challenge as he seeks to convince young people that he is the right steward for the economy as they eye a shaky postgraduation job market.
• Seeking to overcome that economic uncertainty, Obama's campus staffers and volunteers are touting the president's positions on social issues, like gay rights, that garner significant support among young people. Obama has stressed his effort to freeze the interest rates on new federal student loans, a pitch he personalizes by reminding voters that he and the first lady were once buried under a "mountain" of student loan debt after law school.
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Israeli court rejects civil lawsuit brought against military by parents of killed US activist
• HAIFA, Israel (AP) -- An Israeli court on Monday rejected a lawsuit brought against the military by the parents of a U.S. activist crushed to death by an army bulldozer during a 2003 demonstration, ruling the army was not at fault for her death.
• The bulldozer driver has said he didn't see 23-year-old Rachel Corrie, a pro-Palestinian activist, who was trying to block the vehicle's path during a demonstration in the Gaza Strip against the military's demolition of Palestinian homes. The military deemed her March 2003 death to be accidental, but Corrie's parents were not satisfied by the army investigation and filed a civil lawsuit two years later.
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