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• Following Friday's strong jobs report -- 236,000 new jobs and unemployment dropping to a four-year low of 7.7 percent -- partisans hurriedly staked out turf.
• "Woot woot!" tweeted former White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee. "With 12 million still unemployed?" countered Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell's spokesman, Don Stewart.
• When it comes to the economy, presidents usually get the rap for downturns and reap benefits from upturns. But the main factors affecting the current recovery and the record activity in the stock market may have less to do with high-profile fiscal policy fights in Washington than they do in the decisions of the Federal Reserve Bank, which has pumped trillions of dollars into the economy, kept interests rates at near zero and pushed investors away from low-yield bonds to stocks.
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Venezuela's acting president Maduro imitating Chavez as he tries to build own popularity
• CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) -- Nicolas Maduro so far has led by imitation, seeking to fill the shoes of a president whose uncanny vigor, mischievous humor and political wiles sowed a revolution and transformed a nation.
• As Hugo Chavez did during his 14-year presidency, Maduro has stoked confrontation, and shed tears.
• While steering Venezuela through the trauma of Chavez's death, Maduro has pinned his move to the top on his beloved predecessor.
• Yet there are serious doubts, even among die-hard Chavistas, about his ability to lead the nation.
• At his swearing-in Friday evening as acting president in the National Assembly chamber where less than a decade ago he was just another lawmaker, Maduro pledged his "most absolute loyalty" to Chavez.
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Family: 24-year-old intern's death in lion attack in Calif. was a tragic accident
• FRESNO, Calif. (AP) -- Family members of the young woman killed in a lion attack at a Central California animal park say they believe no rules were broken and the volunteer worker's death was a tragic accident.
• Investigators think the 550-pound male African lion lifted the door of a partially closed feeding cage with its paw and killed 24-year-old Dianna Hanson as she cleaned a bigger enclosure area Wednesday, Fresno County Coroner David Had (Continued on page 48)
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