Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

Mexico's oil output is falling, and the country could cease to be a major oil exporter in a few years. That's bad news for the world -- and for the U.S. in particular. Mexico is one of its top-three sources of foreign oil. If Mexico can't turn things around, U.S. dependence on Middle East oil will grow.

Invoking the two legal waivers - which Congress authorized - will cut through bureaucratic red tape and sidestep environmental laws that currently stand in the way of the Homeland Security Department building 267 miles of fencing in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, according to officials familiar with the plan. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly about it.

There was little truth to the mythology of the welfare queen, the vast majority of welfare stints were always short and were usually the result of family breakups or job loss. Furthermore, welfare never amounted to more than a trivial item in the federal budget, coming in near one percent of total spending. And, most welfare beneficiaries were white. But the welfare queen mythology proved to be an effective political tool, propelling Reagan to an election victory and boosting Republican prospects over the next two decades.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission says you can't sue a mattress maker if your mattress bursts into flame despite meeting CPSC standards. Companies making sport utility vehicles would get similar protection from suits brought by people injured or the families of those killed in rollovers under National Highway Traffic Safety Administration proposals for stronger roofs.

Federal health officials in recent years have made strides to improve transparency in health care. But measuring how well hospitals do their job can be technical. New patient satisfaction scores, which went online Friday, cover basic premises that just about every hospital patient and their family members can understand.

Life expectancy for the nation as a whole has increased, the researchers said, but affluent people have experienced greater gains, and this, in turn, has caused a widening gap.

Americans owe a staggering $1.1 trillion on home equity loans — and banks are increasingly worried they may not get some of that money back.

Our traffic congestion grows more intense and frustrating each day. Higher housing prices and the cost of public services have led to increasing tax burdens. We are still challenged to create good jobs at good wages throughout the metropolitan area. And the twin hallmarks of our famed quality of life — the region's outstanding natural beauty and cultural vitality — seem continually threatened by the pressures of growth.

Gov. Rick Perry's office confirmed Wednesday that the Denton facility is under review by the department's civil rights division, and officials at the agency that oversees the state schools said they'd cooperate fully with the investigation.

About 100,000 people poured into county and Senate district conventions last weekend in the second part of a three-step process for awarding Texas delegates to either Hillary Rodham Clinton or Barack Obama. The Illinois Democrat is poised to win a majority of caucus delegates.

In December, the University of Texas Board of Regents voted to cap tuition hikes at its nine campuses, including the University of Texas at San Antonio, at 4.95 percent or $150, whichever was higher.

Berlanga, who as a child learned English from seven older siblings, has pushed her colleagues, sometimes tearfully, to develop a new English language arts and reading curriculum that takes into consideration the growing ranks of minority children who struggle with the language barrier.

Solar energy’s long-range future shines brightly, and Texas should not miss opportunities to establish itself as a force in its development, just as it has done with wind energy.

The International Court of Justice ruled that Mr. Medellín and 50 other Mexican citizens deserved to have their cases reviewed because their rights under the treaty had been violated. To enforce the treaty, President Bush requested that the Medellín case be retried. But the Supreme Court ruled that a retrial wasn't appropriate because Congress had never passed a law requiring states to abide by the treaty.

In a case involving a Mexican national on Texas' death row, five of the court's justices joined Chief Justice John Roberts in ruling that only "self-enforcing" treaties were binding on the states. The Vienna Convention, the majority agreed, was not binding because neither it nor any accompanying U.S. legislation stated it was binding.

The board unanimously approved new rates for the next two school years. The lowest average increase next year will be at the flagship campus in Austin, where in-state undergraduates will pay an average of about $8,500 next school year, up almost 5 percent. Rates will climb at about the same pace the year after that, to nearly $9,000.
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Although Gov. Rick Perry's proposal to turn the Texas lottery over to a private contractor fizzled out last year, he still supports the idea because he thinks it could generate billions of additional dollars for health or education programs, his spokesman said Wednesday.

In recent months, 33 lenders have suspended or ended their participation in the federal student loan program and 11 more have halted their private student loan programs, said Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of financial aid site FinAid.org.

Critics said the failure to approve specific content standards for the course could lead to some teachers promoting their own religious views or cause other constitutional problems that result in lawsuits against school districts.

And while the fast-growing cities of Round Rock and Georgetown, which have relatively high tax bases, are trying to find ways to take on major road improvements once under the state's jurisdiction, with TxDOT funding expected to continue shrinking this year, local governments across the state may feel forced to take on costly projects.