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mind voters of who's in charge -- and who can pull the purse-strings.
• Navalny is the one who has been soaking up attention, and generating buzz. On a recent August day, the opposition leader stood on stage in a sprawling Moscow park dotted with enormous space shuttles and other scraps of Soviet-era glory, and attempted to connect with an audience he rarely reaches through Twitter: the feared and revered babushka contingency.
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• DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) -- A U.N. team that is supposed to investigate an alleged deadly chemical attack near the Syrian capital Damascus last week left their hotel Monday, as President Bashar Assad denied his troops used chemical weapons during the fighting in the rebel-held suburb.
• An Associated Press photographer saw the members wearing body armor leaving in seven SUVs. It was not clear if the team was headed to the suburb where the alleged attack occurred.

• The United States has said that there is little doubt that Assad's regime was responsible for the attack on Aug. 21 in the capital's eastern suburbs. The group Doctors Without Borders said 355 people were killed in an artillery barrage by regime forces Wednesday that included the use of toxic gas.
• The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says the eastern suburbs have witnessed a wide army offensive over the last week, but have been relatively quiet since Sunday night.
• Mohammed Abdullah, an activist in the eastern suburb of Saqba, said the U.N. is expected to visit the rebel-held area on Monday and they will be under the protection of the Islam Brigade, which has thousands of fighters in the area.
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• FORT HOOD, Texas (AP) -- The Army psychiatrist convicted of the Fort Hood rampage that killed 13 people begins the sentencing phase of his trial Monday facing a possible death sentence for the deadliest mass shooting ever on a U.S. military installation.

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