"senate"

It’s a fast start for the former Natural Resources Commissioner, who is in a three-way race for the Republican primary.

There won’t be many appropriations for Southeast Alaska projects this legislative session. That’s the word from Sitka Senator Bert Stedman, who represents most of the region.

onfirming one of the week’s less-secret secrets, the White House announced Friday morning that President Obama intends to nominate Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., to be the next ambassador to the People’s Republic of China.

The Senate voted 67 to 33 on Tuesday to move forward on the two-year, bipartisan budget plan that restores some of the automatic spending cuts of recent years, trims spending in other areas and appears to have put on hold until 2015 the bitter battles that led to this year’s partial government shutdown.

The House is expected to vote Thursday on the bipartisan deal that would set spending levels for the next two years, replace many of the indiscriminate “sequester” budget cuts and, in theory at least, take off the table one of the most partisan of the many partisan issues that have contributed to the gridlock in Washington, D.C.

Janet Yellen cleared a key hurdle Thursday, as her confirmation hearing to become the next chair of the Federal Reserve went smoothly.

Bringing to an end an episode that once again exposed Washington gridlock at its worst, the House approved a Senate deal that will end a 16-day federal government shutdown and avert the first government default in U.S. history.

The partial government shutdown begins its third week on Tuesday as the debt ceiling deadline looms just two days from now. Congressional leaders seem to be inching toward a deal that could prove acceptable to both sides and the White House. But, we’ve been here before.

This year’s Columbus Day falls on Day 14 of the federal government shutdown, which means both the House and Senate will be in session on the holiday.