New York City
New York Times' William Safire to retire
William Safire, whose op-ed columns in The New York Times have provided provocative and insightful discourse for 31 years, said Monday he had decided to "hang up his hatchet."
The 74-year-old Pulitzer Prize-winning writer's last op-ed column will be published Jan. 24.
"After more than three decades of opinionated reporting on the world's first and foremost political battle page, it's time to hang up my hatchet," Safire said in a statement. "The Times said at the start of this run that it wanted 'another point of view,' which was what it surely got."
The paper said Safire would continue to write his "On Language" column, which appears in its Sunday magazine.
Atlanta
Number of adolescents giving birth decreases
The birth rate among American girls ages 10-14 has fallen to its lowest level since 1946, the government reported Monday.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the number of births among girls in this age group dropped 38 percent from 1994 to 2002 alone, even though the number of girls 10 to 14 climbed 16 percent during the same period.
CDC researchers attributed the decline to sex education.
"The message is getting across to them. Teens are behaving more responsibly when it comes to sex," said Fay Menacker, at the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics.
The birth rate among girls this young has been declining since 1994, when 12,901 babies were born to mothers ages 10-14.
Washington, D.C.
U.S. bishops elect new president
America's Roman Catholic bishops chose a new president Monday who has released the names of priests accused of molesting children and reached out to victims but who also plans to seek bankruptcy protection for his diocese because of abuse claims.
Bishop William Skylstad of Spokane, Wash., was elected conference president by his fellow bishops on the first ballot, just days after announcing his diocese would go into Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Skylstad, who has served as conference vice president for the past three years, received 120 votes, or 52 percent of the total.
Advocates for victims have accused Skylstad of using bankruptcy to help his diocese avoid responsibility for mishandling abuse claims against priests.
Los Angeles
NASA delays flight of hypersonic jet
NASA on Monday delayed a planned flight of an unmanned hypersonic jet designed to reach a record speed of Mach 10, or 7,000 mph.
A problem developed with the plane's avionics shortly before the flight, leaving too little time to reach the launch area as scheduled, NASA officials said.
Engineers planned to try again today to launch the plane off the California coast.
Just 12 feet long and 5 feet wide, the X-43A jet is mounted on a modified Pegasus rocket designed to be carried aloft by a B-52 aircraft and released at 40,000 feet. The rocket will carry the X-43A to 110,000 feet and separate, allowing the craft to fly for about 10 seconds
Chicago
Pentagon to stop sponsoring Boy Scouts
To settle part of a federal lawsuit in Chicago, the Pentagon has agreed to stop sponsoring hundreds of Boy Scout troops at military facilities across the United States and overseas, the American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois said Monday.
The agreement won't drive the Boy Scouts out of military bases and other facilities, but it means veterans and other community groups will have to sponsor the Scout troops.
The Boy Scouts of America has been a lightning rod for criticism from some quarters in recent years because of its requirement that Scouts swear an oath of duty to God.
The ACLU suit, filed in 1999 on behalf of an Eagle Scout and four others, alleges that governmental involvement in a group that excludes those who do not believe in God violates the constitutional requirement of separation of church and state.
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