ELKINS, W.Va. (AP) — A Marshall County man has been indicted on charges he threatened to kill President Barack Obama and the first family in a letter filled with profanity and racial slurs.

Ryan Kirker, 20, of McMechen, could face as many as five years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted.

His arraignment is set for Tuesday before U.S. Magistrate James Seibert in Wheeling.

U.S. Attorney William Ihlenfeld said Kirker threatened the president in an April letter that was sent to the White House and that closed with the phrase, “KKK forever.” The case was investigated by the U.S. Secret Service.

An affidavit from a U.S. Secret Service agent says forensic experts also determined that Kirker had written about plans to kill Obama in a March 28 letter to someone named John. Special Agent Ken Skaggs said indentations in the paper linked the two letters.

In the March letter, the affidavit says, Kirker tells John to meet him so the two can travel to Washington D.C. That letter mentioned a specific weapon and Kirker’s ability to obtain armor-piercing ammunition, as well as the fact that “the feds” had previously visited Kirker’s home to investigate a third letter.

Skaggs confirmed that he and other Secret Service agents visited the family’s home in June 2012 to investigate an anonymous threat sent to the White House in April 2012.

Kirker remained at the Northern Regional Jail on Wednesday. His attorney didn’t immediately comment on the indictment.

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Jayson Werth’s RBI single with two outs in the ninth tied it off Jonathan Papelbon, who blew a save for the second time in three nights after starting the season 13 for 13.

Starters Kyle Kendrick and Gio Gonzalez both were outstanding, but wound up with no-decisions.

Kendrick allowed one run and two hits, striking out six in 7 2-3 innings. Gonzalez gave up two runs and two hits, tying a career-high with 11 strikeouts in seven innings. He didn’t allow a hit after the second batter.

Ryan Zimmerman hit a one-out double off Mike Stutes (2-1) in the 11th. After Adam LaRoche was intentionally walked, Werth walked to load the bases. Desmond took a close 1-2 pitch that had manager Charlie Manuel screaming at plate umpire Alfonso Marquez from the dugout.

Desmond drove the next pitch out to left-center.

Drew Storen (2-1) tossed a scoreless 10th to earn the win.

Papelbon was a strike away from securing a save Monday night before allowing a tying homer to Chad Tracy. The Phillies won it in the bottom half on Domonic Brown’s RBI single with two outs.

Denard Span reached on an infield to start the Washington ninth. He went to second when LaRoche walked with two outs. Werth followed with a single to left to score Span.

Michael Young hit a two-run homer to give the Phillies a 2-0 lead in the first. He surpassed 1,000 career RBIs on the homer, becoming the 242nd player in major league history to reach that total. RBIs became an official stat in 1920.

The Phillies didn’t get another hit until Carlos Ruiz singled with two outs in the 10th.

Kendrick retired 16 straight before walking Zimmerman with one out in the seventh. Zimmerman went to second on a groundout and scored on Werth’s line-drive single.

Ben Revere hit a single to lead off Philadelphia’s first, extending his hitting streak to 10. Young then connected for just the third time this season.

Gonzalez got six of his strikeouts on Ryan Howard and Brown, who is second in the NL with 19 homers.

Coming off his worst outing of the season — seven runs and 10 hits in 4 1-3 innings at Colorado — Kendrick controlled the Nationals with a sharp sinker. He got 13 outs on grounders.

Kendrick has been Philadelphia’s second-best starter behind Cliff Lee and has allowed two runs or less in 10 of his 15 starts.

NOTES: Chase Utley began a rehab assignment going 0 for 4 at Double-A Reading. The Phillies’ five-time All-Star 2B has been sidelined by an oblique injury. … Phillies first-round pick J.P. Crawford met players and spent an hour chatting with Manuel behind the batting cage. Crawford, a shortstop chosen with the 16th overall pick, is signed and heading to Clearwater, Fla. to begin his career with Philadelphia’s Gulf Coast League team. … The Nationals reinstated 2B Danny Espinosa from the disabled list and optioned him to Triple-A Syracuse. … The Phillies are off Thursday before starting a three-game series against the New York Mets. … Jordan Zimmermann (9-4, 2.44) faces Colorado’s Roy Oswalt on Thursday night.

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An additional $6.2 billion in the master plan for state roads, bridges and rails represents more than $1 billion a year from the new transportation funding reform law the General Assembly adopted in February.

The Six-Year Improvement Plan devotes $15.7 billion to a crash course for reviving the state’s 58,000-mile web of roads with $11.5 billion for highways and bridges alone, $2.9 billion for rail and public transit and $1.3 from a new Hampton Roads tax levy.

Independent from the six-year plan, a separate regional fund from northern Virginia adds $1.9 billion to total spending.

Of the 2,787 individual items contained in the six-year plan, about one-fourth direct work on primary highways and one-fourth direct work on urban road systems. One-fifth of the line items are for secondary highways and about 8 percent of the projects are on interstate highways. Five percent goes to enhancement projects 9 percent to miscellaneous highway work.

Rail projects account for 7 percent of the items in the six-year plan, and 7 percent goes for public transit.

The greatest number of items in the plan are for the northern Virginia district. Excluding rail and public transportation projects, 522 line items — one fifth of the total in the six-year plan — are for the state’s Washington, D.C., suburbs, Virginia’s most populous and traffic-choked. And that doesn’t account for work to be done using the $1.9 billion in new regional revenue raised in the Northern Virginia Planning District.

The Richmond and Hampton Roads districts each get about 16 percent of the highway line items in the six-year blueprint.

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Obama’s senior energy and climate adviser, Heather Zichal, said the plan would boost energy efficiency of appliances and buildings, plus expand renewable energy. She also said the Environmental Protection Agency was preparing to use its authority under the Clean Air Act to regulate heat-trapping pollution from coal-fired power plants.

“The EPA has been working very hard on rules that focus specifically on greenhouse gases from the coal sector,” Zichal said.

Zichal, speaking at a forum hosted by The New Republic in Washington, said that none of the proposals would require new funding or action from Congress. It has shown no appetite for legislation that would put a price on carbon dioxide after a White House-backed bill to set up a market-based system died in Obama’s first term with Democrats in charge.

The plan, with details expected to be revealed in coming weeks, comes as Obama has been under increasing pressure from environmental groups and lawmakers from states harmed by Superstorm Sandy to cut pollution from existing power plants, the largest source of climate-altering gases. Several major environmental groups and states have threatened to sue the administration to force cuts to power plant emissions. And just last week, former Vice President Al Gore, a prominent climate activist and fellow Democrat, pointedly called on Obama to go beyond “great words” to “great actions.”

It was unclear whether the White House’s plans would include controls on existing power plants. An administration official, who wasn’t authorized to comment on the plan by name, said the White House was still weighing it. But since the administration has already proposed action on future power plants, the law would likely compel it to eventually tackle the remaining plants, or it would be forced to through litigation.

Obama’s remarks in Berlin echoed comments he made in his State of the Union and inaugural speeches this year.

“This is the global threat of our time,” Obama said Wednesday. “And for the sake of future generations, our generation must move toward a global compact to confront a changing climate before it is too late. That is our job. That is our task. We have to get to work.”

Some environmentalists who cheered those remarks when they were made months ago, criticized them Wednesday.

“President Obama deserves praise for including climate change among the long-term threats facing us all,” said Ned Helme, president of the Center for Clear Air Policy, an environmentally friendly think tank. “But he should do more than talk about the problem. The president needs to put the full force of his office behind new regulations that will truly curb greenhouse gas emissions. For too long now, he has produced little action. I’m encouraged that he will finally act and not just ask.”

Meanwhile, the environmental community is growing impatient.

“I really can’t understand why they haven’t moved forward on this more quickly, and we hope that turns around,” said Nathan Wilcox of Environment America.

An orchestrated and well-publicized campaign to persuade Obama to reject the Keystone XL oil pipeline, which would carry oil extracted from tar sands in western Canada to refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast, appears to be an uphill battle.

Opponents call the $7 billion project a “carbon bomb” that would carry “dirty oil” and exacerbate global warming. But the State Department in an environmental evaluation concluded that other means of transporting the oil would be worse from a climate perspective.

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Gandolfini died while on holiday in Rome, the cable channel and Gandolfini’s managers Mark Armstrong and Nancy Sanders said in a joint statement. No cause of death was given.

“He was a genius,” said “Sopranos” creator David Chase. “Anyone who saw him even in the smallest of his performances knows that. He is one of the greatest actors of this or any time. A great deal of that genius resided in those sad eyes.”

Photos: James Gandolfini Stars in ‘The Sopranos’

Gandolfini, who won three Emmy Awards for his role as Tony Soprano, worked steadily in film and on stage after the series ended. He earned a 2009 Tony Award nomination for his role in the celebrated production of “God of Carnage.”

“Our hearts are shattered and we will miss him deeply. He and his family were part of our family for many years and we are all grieving,” said managers Armstrong and Sanders.

HBO called the actor a “special man, a great talent, but more importantly a gentle and loving person who treated everyone, no matter their title or position, with equal respect.” The channel expressed sympathy for his wife and children.

Joe Gannascoli, who played Vito Spatafore on the HBO drama, said he was shocked and heartbroken.

“Fifty-one and leaves a kid — he was newly married. His son is fatherless now … It’s way too young,” Gannascoli said.

Gandolfini’s performance in “The Sopranos” was indelible and career-making, but he refused to be stereotyped as the bulky mobster who was a therapy patient, family man and apparently effortless killer.

In a December 2012 interview with The Associated Press, a rare sit-down for the star who avoided the spotlight, he was upbeat about a slew of smaller roles following the breathtaking blackout ending in 2007 of “The Sopranos.”

“I’m much more comfortable doing smaller things,” Gandolfini said in the interview. “I like them. I like the way they’re shot; they’re shot quickly. It’s all about the scripts — that’s what it is — and I’m getting some interesting little scripts.”

He played Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta in Kathryn Bigelow’s Osama bin Laden hunt docudrama “Zero Dark Thirty.” He worked with Chase for the ’60s period drama “Not Fade Away,” in which he played the old-school father of a wannabe rocker. And in Andrew Dominick’s crime flick “Killing Them Softly,” he played an aged, washed-up hit man.

There were comedies such as the political satire “In the Loop,” and the heartwarming drama “Welcome to the Rileys,” which co-starred Kristen Stewart. He voiced the Wild Thing Carol in “Where the Wild Things Are.”

Gandolfini grew up in Park Ridge, N.J., the son of a building maintenance chief at a Catholic school and a high school lunch lady.

While Tony Soprano was a larger-than-life figure, Gandolfini was exceptionally modest and obsessive — he described himself as “a 260-pound Woody Allen.”

In past interviews, his cast mates had far more glowing descriptions to offer.

“I had the greatest sparring partner in the world, I had Muhammad Ali,” said Lorraine Bracco, who, as Tony’s psychiatrist Dr. Melfi, went one-on-one with Gandolfini in their penetrating therapy scenes. “He cares what he does, and does it extremely well.”

After earning a degree in communications from Rutgers University, Gandolfini moved to New York, where he worked as a bartender, bouncer and nightclub manager. When he was 25, he joined a friend of a friend in an acting class, which he continued for several years.

Gandolfini’s first big break was a Broadway production of “A Streetcar Named Desire” where he played Steve, one of Stanley Kowalski’s poker buddies. His film debut was in Sidney Lumet’s “A Stranger Among Us” (1992).

Director Tony Scott, who killed himself in August 2012, had praised Gandolfini’s talent for fusing violence with charisma — which he would perfect in Tony Soprano.

Gandolfini played a tough guy in Tony Scott’s 1993 film, “True Romance,” who beat Patricia Arquette’s character to a pulp while offering such jarring, flirtatious banter as, “You gotta lot of heart kid.”

Scott called Gandolfini “a unique combination of charming and dangerous.”

Gandolfini continued with supporting roles in “Crimson Tide” (1995), “Get Shorty” (1995), “The Juror” (1996), Lumet’s “Night Falls on Manhattan” (1997), “She’s So Lovely” (1997), “Fallen” (1998) and “A Civil Action” (1998). But it was “True Romance” that piqued the interest of Chase.

He shared a Broadway stage with Jeff Daniels, Hope Davis and Marcia Gay Harden in “God of Carnage” when he received the best-actor Tony nod. He was in “On the Waterfront” with David Morse and was an understudy in a revival of “A Streetcar Named Desire” in 1992 starring Alec Baldwin and Jessica Lange.

In his 2012 AP interview, Gandolfini said he gravitated to acting as a release, a way to get rid of anger. “I don’t know what exactly I was angry about,” he said.

“I try to avoid certain things and certain kinds of violence at this point,” he said last year. “I’m getting older, too. I don’t want to be beating people up as much. I don’t want to be beating women up and those kinds of things that much anymore.”

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Gehry, whose Los Angeles-based firm was selected for the project in 2009, presented some changes to the Eisenhower Memorial Commission before the vote. He plans to add stone or bronze carvings in bas reliefs depicting Eisenhower’s accomplishments as Army general and president. The carvings will accompany 9-foot-tall bronze statues of Eisenhower that Gehry added to the design last year.

The famous architect said the design evolved over time as he listened to ideas from Eisenhower’s family. He added imagery of the D-Day landing at Normandy in World War II as a backdrop for a statue depicting Eisenhower addressing his troops. To show Eisenhower as president, Gehry plans to add an image of Eisenhower signing the Civil Rights Act of 1957 to advance equal rights for African Americans.

“There are some significant changes,” he said. “We did listen. We did listen.”

A sculpture of a young Eisenhower sits on a wall near the other statues, looking out at his future accomplishments. Gehry said he was “more humbled than ever” by Eisenhower’s legacy.

“He was born in a modest frame house, yet he became one of the most revered occupants of the White House,” Gehry said.

The Associated Press got an early look at the design changes ahead of the commission’s formal review and vote.

Gehry’s design calls for the memorial park to be framed with large metal tapestries showing Eisenhower’s boyhood home on the Kansas plains. But Eisenhower’s family objects to the tapestry concept, saying last year that the metal material won’t last forever and is “impractical and unnecessary.”

Adding more images of D-Day and from a key moment of Eisenhower’s presidency make the president’s story more complete, said Daniel Feil, the project’s executive architect.

“There’s more of a dynamic going on because you have two different points in time depicted within one sculptural composition,” Feil said of Gehry’s revisions. “He’s making it stronger. It’s more powerful.”

Idaho Rep. Mike Simpson, a member of the memorial commission, read a letter from Eisenhower’s granddaughters Susan and Anne Eisenhower voicing continued objections. They wrote the family will not support Gehry’s current design. They have supported legislation in the House to scrap the design and start the process over.

Simpson said the family’s objections should be considered, but he ultimately voted to approve the design.

Kansas Sen. Pat Roberts said he and his staff had worked hard to be “honest brokers” to resolve differences with the family. Roberts said he had supported Gehry’s design from the beginning with modifications “because it brings Kansas to the National Mall” and reflects Eisenhower’s roots and values for all Americans.

“At the end of the day, there was just an impasse,” he said. “I’m sorry we have not been able to work things out … but I also know that we have to move forward.”

There is increased urgency to complete the memorial, Roberts said, because the World War II generation that Eisenhower led will soon be gone.

Commission Chairman Rocco Siciliano, who served in Eisenhower’s White House, said Eisenhower’s family has been involved in the project for more than a decade. The president’s grandson, David Eisenhower, was a member of the commission until he resigned in late 2011. Around the same time, Susan Eisenhower began voicing public objections to the scope and scale of the project on behalf of the family.

“The family deserves to be heard, but they do not deserve to be obeyed,” Siciliano said.

Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran called on the commission to vote to endorse Gehry’s design and allow him to move forward to seek further approvals from two federal panels that oversee public art and architecture in the nation’s capital.

Gehry has selected two sculptors to work with his design team. They are Russian sculptor Sergey Eylanbekov, who moved to the United States in 1989, and Penelope Jencks, who created a sculpture of Eleanor Roosevelt for New York City, among other figures, and has spent much time living and working in Italy.

During his presidency, Eisenhower took a lead in desegregating public schools in Little Rock, Ark., and in Washington, D.C. So the new imagery of him signing the Civil Rights Act, in particular, adds a new element of history to the memorial.

Above the presidential imagery, historians have proposed a quotation to be carved in stone to capture some of Eisenhower’s values.

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed,” Eisenhower said in a 1953 speech to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, speaking about the rising cost of Cold War-level military spending and the nation’s priorities.

For the imagery of Eisenhower as World War II hero, historians proposed an inscription with this quotation from D-Day: “The tide has turned,” Eisenhower said in an address to his troops. “The free men of the world are marching together to victory!”

The 12-member memorial commission kept Gehry’s metal tapestries concept as part of the design, despite objections from some critics who called it an “avant-garde approach” to memorial architecture. Others have praised Gehry’s concept for its innovation.

Retired Air Force Gen. Carl Reddel, the executive director of the memorial commission, said the combination of imagery from Eisenhower’s Kansas roots, his achievements as supreme Allied commander in Europe and his two-term presidency capture Ike’s unique role in history.

“What you have here is the Eisenhower story as the American story. It’s a great way to provide a narrative,” Reddel said. “Eisenhower was the last president born in the 19th century and the first one to look at reconnaissance photographs taken from satellites in space.”

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The academy said in a news release that the male midshipmen are being charged with two violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. One charge involves rape, sexual assault or other sexual misconduct. The other is for making a false official statement.

The academy did not identify the three male students, and it was not immediately clear if they have an attorney.

Two of the students were football players this past season, but they are not on the team anymore. Another is still on the team, but he has been suspended pending the outcome of the case.

“The case is still in the pre-trial phase, so any further comment on this ongoing investigation would be inappropriate,” Cmdr. John Schofield, an academy spokesman, said in a statement.

The case has brought renewed focus to how the nation’s military academies handle reports of sexual assaults. The service academies have struggled for years with sexual assault and harassment allegations, and a string of sexual assault cases has recently drawn attention in Congress and at the Pentagon and The White House. Many of the assault cases involve alcohol.

President Barack Obama addressed the sexual assault problem when he spoke at the academy’s commissioning ceremony last month. The president said those who commit sexual assault threaten the trust and discipline that make the military strong.

The alleged assault occurred in April 2012. The woman’s attorney, Susan Burke, has said the woman woke up with bruises after a night of heavy drinking and later learned from friends and social media that three football players she considered friends were claiming to have had sex with her while she was intoxicated and blacked out.

“My client and I are cautiously optimistic that justice will finally prevail in this case,” Burke said in a statement Wednesday. “Even if this case is successfully prosecuted, the larger problem remains: rape cases in the military are controlled by untrained and biased commanders whose career interests may be served by covering up incidents like this one. The Naval Academy’s handling of this case raises troubling questions about how the victim and the football players were treated. This case reflects why rape victims are fearful and skeptical of the military justice system.”

Burke has noted that the academy closed an investigation into the same allegations last year without charges.

The woman reported the allegations to Navy criminal investigators and was disciplined for drinking while the athletes, one of whom discouraged her from cooperating, were permitted to continue playing, Burke has said. The female midshipman remains a student in good standing.

The Navy agreed to reopen the investigation this year after the woman sought legal help, Burke said. The new investigation involved wiretapped conversations that Burke said further substantiated her client’s account.

Burke said the scheduled graduation of one of the three students was put on hold because of the allegations, while the other two were not scheduled to graduate this year.

The academy announced on Monday that Vice Adm. Michael Miller, the academy’s superintendent, had decided to forward the case to Article 32 proceedings, which are held to determine if there is enough evidence for a court-marital.

Schofield said earlier this week that the initial Naval Criminal Investigative Service investigation into the case had been completed and reviewed.

U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski recently wrote to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel that she is “deeply troubled by the lackluster response from the superintendents to increasing rates of sexual assault within their academies.”

Mikulski, D-Md., is a member of the U.S. Naval Academy’s Board of Visitors, which acts as a board of trustees for the Annapolis military college.

“If we are going to end sexual assault in the military, we must start by changing the culture in the service academies where future leaders are created,” Mikulski wrote.

Other Navy football players have faced assault allegations in the past.

In 2006, Lamar Owens Jr., the team’s starting quarterback, was acquitted of rape but found guilty of lesser charges in a military court. He was expelled from the school. Another one-time member of the team, Kenny Ray Morrison, was convicted in 2007 of sexually assaulting a female classmate at a Washington hotel. He was sentenced to two years in the Navy brig.

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Mikulski wrote to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel in a letter made public Wednesday that she is “deeply troubled by the lackluster response from the superintendents to increasing rates of sexual assault within their academies.”

Mikulski, D-Md., is a member of the U.S. Naval Academy’s Board of Visitors, which acts as a board of trustees does at a civilian college.

Vice Adm. Michael Miller, the Naval Academy’s superintendent, announced this week he has decided to send the cases of Navy football players accused of sexual assault to Article 32 proceedings, which are held to determine if there is evidence to hold a court-martial.

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D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier (center) speaks about a string of stabbings during a news conference Wednesday, June 19. (Credit: Cameron Thompson/All-News 99.1 WNEW)

WASHINGTON (CBSDC/AP) — D.C. police are investigating whether the same man is responsible for four late-night stabbing attacks on women.

Three of the attacks in the Petworth area of the city are believed to be connected based on the time of day they occurred and their proximity to each other, D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier said Wednesday at a news conference briefing the media and public on the string of attacks.

The first attack occurred May 5 in the 400 block of Emerson Street NW, and the other three occurred this month.

The most recent one took place just after midnight Wednesday, when a woman walking in the 1100 block of Allison Street NW was approached from behind and tackled to the ground. Police say the man took out a sharp object, cut her and then ran off.

Lanier said all four of the female victims were attacked from behind as they walked alone after 10 p.m. They were each cut with a sharp object, but their injuries aren’t life-threatening. The man fled as soon as the women screamed.

The suspect is described as a black or Hispanic male with a light to medium complexion, short brown hair, and is 5-feet-8-inches to 6-feet-1-inches tall, with a slim athletic build.

Three of the attacks occurred near Sherman Circle in the Petworth neighborhood and the other was on Adams Street near Bloomingdale and LeDroit Park.

The map below marks the locations of the four attacks:

Anyone with information about these cases is asked to call police at 202-727-9099.

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In an editorial published Wednesday, the newspaper said it would become known as the Fauquier Times. The editorial said having the word “Democrat” in its name in such partisan political times “is no longer a very astute business decision.”

Executive Editor Bill Walsh, who writes the editorials at the 14,000-circulation paper, told The Associated Press the decision was made to reach new people moving into the community who associated the newspaper with the political party. It has no such political alignment, he said, pointing to the paper’s endorsement of Republican John McCain for president in 2008 — the last presidential endorsement it made.

Walsh said the idea came from the paper’s circulation department, which was increasingly rebuffed because of the political assumption.

“Perceptions are hard to fight sometimes,” he said. “Looking at trying to make a living doing this, you don’t want to chase people away from reading your product when the reason they’re not reading the product is not really a reason at all.”

Fauquier County in Virginia’s horse country — about 45 minutes from the nation’s capital — is far from Democratic.

While some neighboring exurban communities such as Prince William and Loudoun have swung Democratic in recent elections, Fauquier stayed steadfastly Republican. The GOP has easily carried Fauquier in each of the past four gubernatorial and presidential elections, averaging at least 60 percent of the vote. The high water mark for Democrats during that span was 43 percent shared by Tim Kaine in winning the 2005 governor’s race and President Barack Obama in winning his first term in 2008.

A growing tea party in the county and the creation of competing online news outlet FauquierNow.com in 2011 also likely played a role, said Jeff South, an associate professor and director of undergraduate studies for Virginia Commonwealth University’s School of Mass Communications.

While many newspapers in the U.S. have the word “Democrat” or “Republican” in the title, South said he hasn’t seen similar moves to drop the potentially offensive names.

The change reflects not only the political climate, but also the suspicion many have of mainstream media, South said. That has developed since he worked in newspapers 10 to 20 years ago, he said, “when most readers gave newspapers the benefit of the doubt.”

“It’s just emblematic of how polarized we’ve become as a society,” South said. “So many people seem to jump to the conclusion that news organizations have a hidden agenda, that they are biased from the get-go.”

Walsh said the paper has been tossing around the idea of a name change for a couple years, and that it aired the suggestion with two focus groups about two weeks ago. The overall feeling was that the effect would be modest.

“I would say the majority of the people here, when they talk about the paper, they talk about ‘the Democrat,’ they don’t talk about ‘the Times-Democrat.’ We’re still going to hear that for years to come,” he said.

As of midmorning Wednesday, he said the paper hadn’t received any calls about the name change.

The Fauquier newspaper traces its roots back nearly 200 years to the Palladium of Liberty, which began publishing in 1817. In 1905, the newspaper became the Fauquier Democrat. In 1989, it changed its name to the Fauquier Times-Democrat to more closely identify with owner Times Community News.

The newspaper is published twice a week, on Wednesdays and Fridays.

“The news coverage is not changing,” Walsh said. “The editorial pages — I write editorials and I’m fairly liberal — that’s not going to change. I’m going to still have the same opinion on the issues of the day facing our readers. We hope to continue to stir a pretty lively debate.”

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The study confirms research done before the HPV vaccine came on the market in 2006. But this is the first evidence of how well it works now that it is in general use.

“These are striking results and I think they should be a wake-up call that we need to increase vaccination rates,” said Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Only about half of teen girls in the US have gotten at least one dose, and just a third of teen girls have had all three shots, according to the latest CDC figures.

HPV is the most common sexually transmitted infection. The vaccine protects against certain types of the human papillomavirus that cause most cases of cervical cancer. The shots work best if given before someone is sexually active so the emphasis has been on giving the shots to 11- and 12-year olds.

The CDC study compared infection rates in girls before and after the vaccine became available. In girls ages 14 to 19, the proportion infected with the targeted strains of HPV fell from about 12 percent to 5 percent, a reduction of 56 percent.

Among girls who had gotten the vaccine, the drop in HPV infections was higher — 88 percent.

There are two vaccines against HPV, but the study mainly reflects the impact of Gardasil, the Merck & Co. vaccine that came on the market in 2006. A second vaccine approved in 2009 — GlaxoSmithKline’s Cervarix — probably had relatively little bearing on the results, said the CDC’s Dr. Lauri Markowitz, the study’s lead author.

Both vaccines are approved for use in males and females — in ages 9 to 26 for females, and 9 to 21 in males. The vaccine was only recommended for boys in late 2011, and the CDC has not yet reported data on how many boys have gotten the shot since then. HPV vaccination requires three shots over 6 months.

An estimated 75 to 80 percent of men and women are infected with HPV during their lifetime. Most don’t develop symptoms and clear it on their own. But some infections lead to genital warts, cervical cancer and other cancers. The study didn’t look at cervical cancer rates. It can take many years for such cancers to develop, and not enough time has passed to know the vaccine’s impact on cancer rates, CDC officials said.

The study involved interviews and physical examinations of nearly 1,400 teen girls in 2003 through 2006 and of 740 girls in 2007 through 2010.

The vaccine’s impact was seen even though only 34 percent of the teens in the second group had received any vaccine, and only about 20 percent got all three doses. That result will likely feed an ongoing discussion about whether all three doses are necessary, Markowitz said.

Overall, the study found no significant change over time in the proportion of teens who’d ever had sex and in those who had multiple sex partners. However, it did find that a higher percentage of vaccinated teens said they’d had three or more sex partners.

That could have driven down infection rates, Markowitz noted, if the teens who got vaccinated were the ones at highest risk of getting an infection and spreading it.

The research was released online by the Journal of Infectious Diseases.

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This just in: Winning a Stanley Cup is difficult.

Most of the current Bruins roster knows that firsthand, as two years ago they had to erase 2-0 and 3-2 deficits against Vancouver. They, of course, did that, forcing a Game 7 in Vancouver and winning 4-0 to earn that title. This year, it’s too early to say whether or not their season will have the same end result, but they’re unquestionably in a much better position to do it this time around.

But now, the real work begins. Nothing in the world was more important to the Bruins than winning Game 3 on Monday night. Now, it’s meaningless history, because anything short of a perfect effort Wednesday night in Game 4, and the balance of power in the series will shift right back to Chicago. While it may seem like the Bruins seized control of the series with Monday’s 2-0 win, the fact is that the Bruins have outscored the Blackhawks by just two goals over the course of nearly 13 full periods.

Now, nothing in the world is more important for the Bruins than winning Game 4, thereby inviting Lord Stanley’s Cup to the Windy City this weekend and putting a world of pressure on Chicago going forward. Here’s a look at how they can do it.

1. Survive Early
The greatest mystery of Game 3 was the impossible-to-explain appearance of the Blackhawks simply not giving an all-out effort. The Bruins likely deserve some credit for imposing their will and making it hard for Chicago, but overall, there was very little desperation on display by the Blackhawks. Once they fell behind by two goals, they looked like a team waiting to lose rather than one willing to fight to win — or at least try to win.

If this were an early round and if the Blackhawks were the clearly inferior team, it might be safe to assume they’d roll over and quit. But this is the Stanley Cup Final, and these Blackhawks were the best team the NHL had to offer all season long. They will not fade away quietly, and I expect them to come out guns a-blazing early on in Game 4.

For the Bruins, that might mean treating the first 10 minutes like a road game. If the Bruins can stick with their defensive game plan, limit Chicago opportunities, lay big hits whenever the opportunity presents itself, block shots and allow Tuukka Rask to see shots, keeping the Blackhawks off the board early may deflate their sails, allowing the Bruins to mount an attack of their own.

The Blackhawks are going to hit the ice looking to get an early goal and take the crowd out of the game. It’s up to the Bruins to withstand the surge.

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• Bryce Harper to Resume ‘Baseball Activities’ Could Be Back ‘Within a Week’
• Tiger Woods to Miss AT&T National with Elbow Strain

After missing twenty games with bursitis in his left knee, the result of running into an outfield wall, Rizzo told 106.7 The Fan’s Holden and Danny Wednesday Harper would be “doing some baseball activities in the next day or so.”

“Here’s a guy that hasn’t gotten at-bats in the last couple weeks, so he’s going to have to see some live pitching to get his stroke back, and to fully prepare himself to rejoin us,” Rizzo said.

While he wouldn’t place a timetable on Harper’s return, comments from Johnson earlier in the day gave both an idea of when fans can expect him back in the Nats’ lineup, and suggested he’s never stopped “doing baseball activities” since he last played on May 26.

Davey was initially asked if Harper will return to play before July 1^st, twelve days from now.

“I’m looking forward to seeing him,” Davey told the Junkies. “I was reading in the newspaper he’s in a wheelchair and he’s got an iron cast on his leg so I think he’s going to be fine.”

“I think our doctors are optimistic,” he continued. “I think he’s going to be doing baseball activities – if I know Bryce he’s been doing baseball activities all this time.”

“What’s he doing, hitting off a tee or something?” EB of the Junkies asked.

“Oh I’m sure he’s doing all of that. You can’t tell me he’s not,” Davey responded.

“So is that a yes or a no on July 1^st?” Jason Bishop followed up.

“Oh I think he can probably be back probably within a week,” Johnson said.

“I know he’s been hitting,” he added. “They can’t tell me he hasn’t. I mean somewhere, knowing Bryce, he’s probably been hitting every day while he’s been out.”

If you’re still skeptical, you can listen to their two responses sandwiched together below.

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AP President and CEO Gary Pruitt told a luncheon gathering of journalists and others that the seizure was not only excessively broad, but that the department failed to notify AP in advance of the subpoena, as normally required. Department rules say a delay in notification is justified only if needed to protect the integrity of its investigation. Pruitt said that justification was unfathomable in this case.

The freedom of the press, Pruitt said, is a bedrock of the U.S. Constitution and the sweeping seizure of phone records threatens the very foundation of that freedom. “The DOJ’s actions could not have been more tailor-made to comfort authoritarian regimes that want to suppress their own news media,” he said.

The records of more than 20 phone lines assigned to the AP and its reporters and editors were obtained in secret by the department in April and May 2012 as the Obama administration tried to find out who leaked information to the AP for a story about a foiled plot in Yemen to bomb a U.S.-bound airliner. The Justice Department informed the AP of the seizure last month.

Pruitt, speaking at The National Press Club, said the seizure has stifled trusted sources not just for AP reporters but for other news organizations, too. In one instance, he said, AP journalists could not get a law enforcement official to confirm a detail that had been reported elsewhere. Reporters from other news organizations, he said, have personally told him that their sources have felt intimidated by what he called DOJ’s aggressive seizure.

He said the Justice Department has assured the AP that the seized phone records have been “walled off and protected and used for no other purpose than the leak investigation.” But he said that doesn’t excuse what the department did. “We need to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” he said.

Attorney General Eric Holder last month defended the secret gathering of AP phone records, saying that a serious national security leak required it. His deputy attorney general, James Cole, has said such disclosures risk lives and cause grave harm to the security of Americans. Cole has said that the records subpoena was narrowly drawn, consistent with department policy, and that the government does not have to inform a media outlet of a subpoena if it would threaten the leak investigation.

More recently, Holder acknowledged that a better balance needs to be struck between press freedoms and keeping national secrets safe. He has been meeting with the news media as the department reviews how it treats the media when it investigates national security leaks. The discussions were ordered by President Barack Obama, who has set a July 12 deadline for Holder to recommend any changes to the department’s procedures.

Pruitt said it’s hard to imagine how notifying the AP of the subpoena in advance could have harmed the investigation. Failure to do that denied the news organization the opportunity to contest or narrow the records demand. The phone records were in the possession of the phone company and there was no way the AP could have tampered with the records, he said. The FBI already had publicly announced its leak investigation, so the leaker had already been tipped off by the government itself, he added. And if fear of a tipoff were the standard in all cases, notification would never be made, he argued. “The exception would effectively swallow the rule,” Pruitt said.

Pruitt says the Justice Department must recognize the right of the press to receive advance notice and that the courts need to be involved — the department can’t just decide on its own to seize phone records. He also backed legislative efforts for a federal shield law for journalists to protect them from having to reveal confidential sources.

(© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

The golfer announced on his website Wednesday he’ll miss his own annual event, to be held at Congressional Country Club in Bethesda from Thursday June 27 to Sunday June 30.

“I was examined after I returned home from the U.S. Open, and the doctors determined I have a left elbow strain,” Woods said.

“I have been advised to take a few weeks off, rest and undergo treatment. I’ll be ready to go for the British Open, and I’m looking forward to playing at Muirfield. I would like to extend my regrets to AT&T, our sponsors and the fans in the Washington, D.C., area,” Woods said. “The AT&T National means a lot to me and my foundation. It’s especially difficult not defending at my own tournament. It’s going to be a great event, and I look forward to being there to provide my support.”

This likely won’t go over well with ticket holders.

sigh....yep RT @jabbyburns: @EBJunkies: Is Tiger really out of the AT&T National? #Elbowstrain

—
Eric Bickel (@EBJunkies) June 19, 2013

Woods edged out Bo Van Pelt on the final day to win the tournament in 2012. Fans were barred from attending the third day of the event last year, after strong winds from the Derecho storm downed trees throughout the course, making the extra foot traffic a hazard to everyone involved.

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The complaint filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Baltimore alleges negligence by John J. Alban Jr. and his company, Alban Waste LLC. The Associated Press was unable to reach either of them by telephone Thursday.

Suitland lawyer John F.X. Costello, named in a court document as the defense attorney, said he hasn’t been hired to represent either defendant. He declined to comment on the case.

CSX Transportation Inc. of Jacksonville, Fla., filed the complaint Tuesday. It seeks at least $225,000 in damages. The National Transportation Safety Board has said the May 28 derailment caused an estimated $625,000 worth of damage to the train and tracks.

The train derailed after striking the truck driven by Alban, leading to an explosion and fire that a preliminary investigative report from the NTSB last week said damaged buildings as far as a mile away.

The NTSB said in its report last week that Alban did not stop before crossing the tracks. The agency said the crossing was marked with X-shaped crossbucks and yellow stop signs that were faded and displaced. One of the stop signs was hanging upside down and facing away from the road, the NTSB said.

CSX contends that Alban and his company were familiar with the crossing because the business is located near the tracks.

“Alban was under a statutory and common law duty to slow and stop the truck and exercise due care, including by looking and listening, to ensure the tracks were clear of approaching trains and that the crossing could be traversed safely,” the lawsuit says.

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Benjamin Nuzzi is a family man and former active duty United States Marine Corp. Sergeant marksmanship instructor. Nuzzi is no stranger to either weaponry or to having small children under foot. “Many individuals would argue that gun-safety precautions defeat the purpose of having a gun in the first place. Having to first remove, unlock, chamber and fire would take too long, costing precious seconds in a life-threatening situation. And to an extent, that is true. However, you must ask yourself, what is the greater threat to my children’s lives: a weapon present 100 percent of the time or a potential home invasion?”

Here are some of Nuzzi’s tips for gun safety:

• Any weapon not used for a potential home-defense situation should be locked away with ammunition locked away in a separate location. There is no excuse for someone being harmed with a range/sporting weapon.
• Weapons used for home defense, such as pistols, should always be kept out of sight of little eyes. Nuzzi keeps a “false book” hidden under non-descript papers.
• Always use trigger locks. Keep the key where you need it, i.e., in reach of your bed, but never next to the lock.
• Never keep the weapon with a round in the chamber. Pulling the slide on most pistols, thus chambering a round, is too difficult for most children to do. And always keep the weapon on safe.
• Take time to know your weapon. Practice with it and make time for the shooting range. This will reduce the time it takes to engage in a dangerous situation.

Talking to children and teaching them about gun safety is of paramount importance, says Stephanie Himel-Nelson, a navy spouse and the director of communications at Blue Star Families. “We’ve taught our children a bit about guns. If they ever see one, they know they shouldn’t touch it and must immediately find a parent or other adult,” she says. “In addition, we don’t allow toy guns in our home because we want our children to understand that weapons are not toys.”

Nuzzi agrees. “Don’t make gun use taboo,” he says. “Teach your family about firearms and firearm safety. Want to dissuade children from playing with guns? Take them to the range and let them hear one fire. They are loud! Once a child learns that guns are not fun toys, much temptation will be removed.” And so, hopefully, will many gun-related accidents.

Corey Whelan is a freelance writer in New York. Her work can be found at Examiner.com.

Police tell media outlets that the officers forced their way into the camper after they heard crying. They found a 2-year-old girl and a 6-month-old boy inside.

The officers also found soiled diapers, feces and urine-covered bedding.

The camper was in the backyard of a residence where the officers went Tuesday morning to serve a warrant in a different case.

The children were taken to a local hospital and later released to their grandfather.

Police charged 23-year-old Jaronda Rena Wilson of Newport News and 22-year-old Laron Huston Neal of Suffolk with abuse and neglect, reckless disregard and cruelty and injuries to children.

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(© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

They’re searching for answers and coming up empty on a nightly basis. Whether it’s a solution to their miserable team on-base percentage, or just that breakthrough game for a player who’s struggled to find his identity this season, like Ryan Zimmerman.

“Players are grinding away and trying to do too much at times, but there’s also over-thinking it,” Mike Rizzo told 106.7 The Fan’s Holden and Danny on Wednesday, tracking with comments Davey Johnson made earlier in the day.

“This is a ballclub that has great talent, great ability – I think it’s the second youngest team in the Major Leagues,” he continued. “They achieved a lot last year, and they’re so athletic and so talented that over-thinking it sometimes isn’t the way to go. It’s kind of see ball, hit ball and catch ball, and running the bases and play the game like you’ve played it your whole life and I think good things will happen from there.”

One spark that’s been missing from the Nationals’ firepower is Bryce Harper, who’s now missed 20 games with bursitis in his left knee.

“He’ll be doing some baseball activities in the next day or so,” Rizzo said.

“There’s always the fear that if he bangs it again it could swell up again so we’re certainly going to be cautious with him,” he added. “Here’s a guy that hasn’t gotten at-bats in the last couple weeks, so he’s going to have to see some live pitching to get his stroke back, and to fully prepare himself to rejoin us.”

The team’s gone 8-12 since May 26, when the 20-year-old slugger last appeared in the lineup.

Rizzo won’t rush to any rash personnel decisions yet though, throwing his support behind hitting coach Rick Eckstein when a caller inquired about his future.

“I’ve fired pitching coaches and managers and directors in my career. It’s never an easy thing to do but it’s something that has to happen when it has to happen,” Rizzo said.

“If it comes to the point where I think that Rick’s not doing his job and needs to be replaced, I would certainly consider it. I’m not in that place. Rick prepares extremely well, he works extremely hard and has helped a lot of our hitters, and I’m certainly not at the point of thinking about that yet.”

You’ll remember back on June 5, when Davey said “if you fire him, you might as well fire me.”

Sounds like they’re both safe for now, but there’s still no answers as to how the Nats will climb out from this hole they’re in.

On Monday evening, there were several reports of a large fight occurring on the Woodley Park Station platform around 6:30 p.m. Witnesses told The Washington Post that attempts to reach the train operator via intercom to report the problem were unsuccessful.

Metro officials said Wednesday that the issue lies with incompatibility between different series of rail cars.

More specifically, engineers found that when 6000-series cars are at the front of the train, intercoms in 1000-series or 4000-series cars farther back on the train will not function.

“Now that the issue has been identified… we are taking appropriate action to immediately mitigate the situation and resolve it as quickly as possible,” General Manager and CEO Richard Sarles said.

Railcars have already been realigned to avoid 6000-series leading 1000-series or 4000-series railcars and random spot-checks began Wednesday morning. Any train found to have a non-functional intercom will be removed from service.

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In a statement released to CNBC following his termination, Zimmer says he expressed concerns to the board over the company’s direction and that the board “inappropriately has chosen to silence my concerns,” by firing him.

The AP could not immediately reach Zimmer for comment.

In a release issued early Wednesday, Men’s Wearhouse declined to say the reason for Zimmer’s dismissal. The firing came the day the company had scheduled its annual shareholders meeting, which it postponed.

Zimmer has for decades been the public face of the company, known for commercials saying, “You’re going to like the way you look. I guarantee it.”

(© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

Virginia State Police spokeswoman Corinne Geller says 44-year-old Karan Batra escaped at about 10 a.m. Wednesday. He was a member of a work release crew landscaping the Shenandoah Valley Regional Airport’s grounds.

Batra is described as an Asian male, 5-feet 5-inches tall and weighing about 165 pounds. He was wearing blue jeans and an orange Virginia Department of Corrections work shirt when he was last seen.

Geller says Batra has connections to the Alexandria area.

She says Batra’s convictions are for non-violent crimes and he isn’t considered dangerous. However, he shouldn’t be approached.

The Virginia Department of Corrections says Batra was assigned to Cold Springs Work Center.

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Murkowski says she believes same-sex marriage will encourage family values. She says she supports the right of all Americans to marry the person they love.

She says allowing gay marriage “keeps politicians out of the most private and personal aspects of peoples’ lives.”

Murkowski previously said she was “evolving” on the issue. She announced her decision in an opinion piece posted on her website Wednesday.

Two other GOP senators — Mark Kirk of Illinois and Rob Portman of Ohio — previously announced their support for gay marriage. Forty-nine Democratic senators and two independents senators also back gay marriage. Two Democratic senators, Joe Manchin, of West Virginia and Mark Pryor of Arkansas, remain opposed.

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WASHINGTON (CBSDC/AP) — Six people, including three pedestrians, were hurt in a crash near Union Station in Northwest Washington.

Police said a vehicle was trying to get through a light at the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and North Capitol Street NW around 8 a.m and hit two pedestrians. A second vehicle hit the first vehicle and another pedestrian was injured.

D.C. police spokesman Araz Alali said one of the pedestrians was pinned and trapped under the van and taken to a hospital in critical condition. The other pedestrians and one occupant of a vehicle were also injured.

A witness on the scene told WNEW’s John Domen that an SUV ran through a red light, picked up speed, hit a traffic light pole and then hit the pedestrians. The vehicle did not slow, the witness said, until it t-boned a white catering van.

WNEW’s John Domen contributed to this report. Follow him and WNEW on Twitter.

All-News 99.1 WNEW provides first traffic every 10 minutes on the 1′s. Check traffic on your route before heading out on the road.

(TM and Copyright 2013 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2013 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

Oklahoma’s senior senator made the comments Wednesday in response to President Barack Obama’s call during a speech in Berlin to reduce U.S. and Russian nuclear stockpiles by one-third.

Inhofe in a statement called the president’s announcement an example of the “triumph of hope over experience.”

Among Inhofe’s fears are that there are concerns about Russian compliance with existing nuclear arms control treaties. He also says a commitment by Obama and Congress to modernize the country’s nuclear forces in return for ratification of a new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty remains unfulfilled.

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However, safety has been a headache for the Redskins ever since its most dynamic performer there over the last three and a half decades, Sean Taylor, was shot and killed in November 2007.

Taylor’s death ended his expected long-time partnership with rookie LaRon Landry and began a revolving door at safety that has included now-departed non-luminaries Mike Green, Chris Horton, Kareem Moore, Macho Harris, Oshimogho Atogwe and Madieu Williams as well as long-time Redskin Reed Doughty and third-year man D.J. Gomes.

Signing free agents Brandon Meriweather and Tanard Jackson was supposed to fix that deficiency in 2012.

However, Meriweather, whose freelancing ways led to his quick exits from New England (despite two Pro Bowl selections) and Chicago, injured his right knee three times and played less than a full game. Jackson, who had been suspended for substance abuse violations in Tampa Bay, showed that he hadn’t kicked the habit by being suspended for all of last season, a punishment that has yet to be lifted.

In response, the Redskins signed inexperience free agent Devin Holland and drafted safeties Phillip Thomas and Baccari Rambo. Doughty, Gomes and Jordan Bernstine, who suffered a major, season-ending knee injury in the 2012 opener, are all back. Jackson remains in limbo through August. But as defensive coordinator Jim Haslett said, Washington’s situation at the position “all depends on what happens with Brandon,” who was still unable to practice all spring while recovering from knee surgery.

“If we can get Brandon out there and he can do some of the stuff he did in the Philadelphia game … it will be fun to watch,” said defensive backs coach Raheem Morris.

Meriweather first injured his knee in the second preseason game. He was on the verge of making his Redskins regular season debut when he hurt the knee again during warm-ups in Week 5 at Tampa Bay. Meriweather finally played seven weeks later against the Eagles. He picked off a pass and returned it 25 yards and was in on seven tackles before his season ended with yet another injury to the same knee.

“[Last season] was super-tough, but I’m working hard to get back,” Meriweather said after a typical day of running on the side with cornerback Josh Wilson, who also spent OTAs and minicamp rehabbing. “Every day I try to do something I didn’t do yesterday. I keep trying to get stronger and better. I’ve never had a torn ACL [before] so I don’t know what the timetable’s like, but if you ask me if there’s any doubt [that I'll be ready for training camp], I say no, but you ask the doctors and the trainers they may say yes. So who knows?”

Coach Mike Shanahan expects the 29-year-old Meriweather to be on the field when camp opens on July 25 in Richmond.

“I think Brandon will be fine once we get to camp,” Shanahan said. “He looks pretty good. The one thing you don’t want to do when somebody hurts his knee is get him going too quickly.”

After he played in just two preseason games and one regular season contest in 2012, saying Meriweather is going too quickly is almost an oxymoron. But given his two Pro Bowls in his three years as a starter with the Patriots and the tantalizing tease he offered the Redskins in his stint against the Eagles last Nov. 18 – oddly six years and a week since Taylor played his final game against the same team on the same field – the former first-round pick could well be a difference maker for a secondary that was Washington’s biggest Achilles’ heel in 2012.

David Elfin began writing about sports when he was a junior at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School. He is Washington’s representative on the Pro Football Hall of Fame selection committee and the author of seven books, most recently, “Washington Redskins: The Complete Illustrated History.” A pre-game regular on 106.7-The Fan the last three Redskins seasons, he has been its columnist since March 2011. Follow him on Twitter: @DavidElfin

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.

Senior Chief Petty Officer James Burger and Chief Warrant Officer 3 Mark Smith were named during an Article 32 investigation hearing at Naval Station Norfolk. An Article 32 hearing is the military equivalent to a preliminary hearing or grand jury investigation. The commanding officer of Navy Expeditionary Combat Command will ultimately decide how the case proceeds.

The Navy is pressing charges of involuntary manslaughter and dereliction-of-duty, but has not specified how the two may have committed the offenses. The Navy hearing will help determine whether the charges will be referred to a court-martial, dealt with administratively or dismissed. A decision likely won’t be made for several weeks until after the hearing concludes.

The investigation is focused on the Feb. 26 drowning deaths of Virginia Beach-based Navy Diver 1st Class James Reyher of Caldwell, Ohio, and Navy Diver 2nd Class Ryan Harris of Gladstone, Mo.

They drowned while working at the Super Pond underwater weapons-testing facility.

The Super Pond is used to conduct shock testing of vessels, submarine systems and munitions. With a bottom measuring 300 feet in diameter and a maximum depth of 150 feet, the facility also has been used in testing torpedoes, missiles, warheads, amphibious and remotely controlled vehicles, underwater gun firing and acoustics.

Petty Officer 1st Class Fernando Almazon, who was the diving supervisor during Reyher and Harris’ dive, said the men were supposed to go to the bottom of the pond to see if they could touch or see a helicopter there and come right back up. It should have taken about four minutes each way. But they failed to surface and other divers were sent in on an unsuccessful search for them. About 24 minutes had passed before they were finally pulled up. Both men were unresponsive when they reached the surface. Their deaths were ruled accidental drownings.

Almazon said that everything that could go wrong that day did, although he’s not sure why.

The questions Wednesday delved into whether proper protocol for permitting such a deep dive was followed. Diving deeper than 130 feet requires the approval of a commanding officer. Reyher and Harris reached about 150 feet.

Defense attorneys suggested during witness questioning that the divers’ equipment may not have been working properly. One of the divers sent in to fetch the men after they ran into trouble had ice covering his regulator. Defense attorneys noted that the manufacturer of the equipment the divers were using has said it may not properly work at temperatures below 45 degrees. At the time of the drownings, the water temperature was about 40 degrees.

A team of divers that preceded Reyher and Harris got their tethering line tangled up in something unspecified. There are numerous metal objects on the pond floor.

The sailors belonged to an expeditionary mobile unit whose salvage operations have included TWA Flight 800, Swiss Air Flight 111, the space shuttles Challenger and Columbia, and the Civil War ironclad USS Monitor.

The unit also provided damage assessments and repairs on the USS Cole and participated in humanitarian missions following Hurricane Katrina and the 2010 earthquake that struck Haiti.

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“We need to beat these guys,” Davey Johnson told the Junkies on 106.7 The Fan.

“This is a good hitters ballpark and guys get pumped up, and these guys like to beat us maybe as much as we like to beat them,” Johnson said Wednesday. “But I hate to lose in this ballpark boy. I hate to lose to Philly. They’ve always been a great team, but we’re a better team.”

The Nats offensive woes have been consistent all season, with their .232 team batting average and .291 on-base percentage being the 3rd worst and 2nd worst in the Major Leagues, respectively, something Davey credits to an entire lineup over-analyzing itself.

Related: Davey Johnson is on ‘Monkey Tilt’

“I think guys look at sequences – in, out, in and out – and they start guessing instead of going up there and looking for something hard and swinging the bat,” Johnson said.

Davey says the entire roster, save for Ian Desmond, are actually trying to make in-game adjustments by watching their swing using technology that’s available to the team.

“With all this high-tech stuff, videos and all that stuff, I’ve got guys, regulars, even during the game go in and look at the video,” Johnson said.

“Is that too much?” EB of the Junkies asked.

“Yea I think that’s way too much,” Davey answered. “You can’t think about it too much. Just keep it simple boys.”

Davey also answered questions about Ryan Zimmerman, and the probability of Harper returning before July.

Listen to all that below. Follow 106.7 The Fan on Twitter.

Related: Davey Says He’s ‘Going Out in a Parade This Year’

Automobile manufacturers and our government are looking for ways to make the automobile more fuel efficient and less impactful to our environment.

We had Kevin Butt, general manager and chief environment officer of Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America (TEMA), on the show today and he spoke about some of the ways Toyota has improved their operations in relation to the environment. During our conversation, Butt said something that really caught my attention: “The Toyota plant in Kentucky produces zero waste to the landfills.” The plant feeds 7,000 people a day and produces more than 500,000 vehicles a year and through recylcing/reuse programs within the facility, they have found a way reuse all of their waste.

Toyota has long been known for producing energy efficient vehicles, namely the Prius, but this added effort to preserve the environment deserves notice. For more information about Toyota’s environmental efforts, visit Toyota’s website.

We had more than a few enthusiastic listeners call to express their theories about our country’s dependency on traditional fuel sources. 

During the second half of the show we spoke about some of the tax advantages to investing in some of the alternate fuel vehicles and I’ve listed two links below to assist in your research:

• Federal Laws and Incentives
• Toyota Green Innovation

Part 1:

Part 2:

Tune into WAOK 1380′s Daryl Killian Saturdays 10 a.m. to noon on CBS Atlanta’s Listen LIVE. Follow Daryl on Twitter @AutoNSider.

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) – It looks like Toyota may have finally figured out a way to make the Avalon, well, cool.

In previous incarnations of Toyota’s take on the big American family car, Toyota put in a lot of functionality, a lot of value and a lot of reliability — and that’s all well and good — but you gotta bring style and soul to the table if you want to go up against the Chrysler 300s and Ford Taurus sedans of the world.

At first drive, Toyota seems to have done a nice job of taking what the Avalon already had and making a much more appealing package out of it, both looks and driving-wise. And I say that motoring around in a hybrid edition of the car.

Outside a more aggressive nose and better designed headlamps, Toyota gave the Av a more muscled up look. A higher rear deck and roofline suggest sports sedan just a bit.

Inside, the Avalon is surprisingly roomy with soft leather seats that give nice support. The interior design is striking with a very nice sweeping line across the dash and nice use of three different colors in the interior. It looks more Lexus than Toyota.

So far it has been both quick and unexpectedly agile, henceforth the driving soul. It seems like a car you want to drive as opposed to one you have to drive.

The model I am driving, the Hybrid XLE Touring model, stickers at $38,270 pretty loaded.

So far the Avalon has been very impressive both inside and on the road.

Get more reviews, news about cars and the people who drive them, interviews and tips on how to get more out of your driving experience all on Drivetime with Vinnie Richichi and Rob Pratte Saturday mornings 7 a.m. to 8 a.m. on NewsRadio 1020 KDKA. Also listen to Vinnie on The Vinnie and Cook Show Monday-Friday 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Sportsradio 93-7 The Fan.

Connect with Drivetime at Facebook.com/DriveTimeRadioandTV and @dttweet. Follow Vinnie @nyvinnie.

Ford says it will soon start adding old fashioned buttons and knobs to its audio systems. This comes as the company takes a closer look at some of the customer complaints involving “MyFord Touch.” The word comes out just a few days before we’re likely to hear more criticism of the system, as J.D. Power releases its annual Initial Quality Study of new cars and trucks.

“We are committed to listening to our customers and improving MyFord Touch to keep drawing in new customers and increasing satisfaction with even higher quality,” says Raj Nair, Ford’s group vice president, global product development.

Ford has already mixed traditional buttons and knobs with computer screens in its F-series pickups. It plans to phase that systems in to other models as they are redesigned.

Nair stands by MyFord Touch as a system that gives buyers a reason to choose Ford products. Ford says 79 percent of buyers opt for the system, double the rate of Honda and Toyota buyers.

Ford cites an internal study that says more than half of Escape buyers cite MyFord Touch as a reason they purchased that particular vehicle.

“Ford has launched 60 new technologies the past few years and they are helping attract many new customers in important markets such as the coasts,” says Nair. “SYNC and MyFord Touch are key parts of our innovation strategy, and not only bring more new customers to our brand, but help deliver higher satisfaction with overall vehicle quality.”

Most major car companies now have systems that connect customers’ smart phones with their vehicles. The industry has been struggling with ways to make the systems simple to use, and to minimize distractions in vehicles, instead of adding new ones.

The connectivity systems continue to grow in popularity. Ford’s updated Fiesta small car now has MyFord Touch available, as well as other options like navigation systems and leather seats, things that had previously been unheard of in subcompacts.

Written by Jeff Gilbert. Connect with Jeff at jdgilbert@cbs.com, facebook.com/carchronicles and @jefferygilbert.

The world’s largest automaker rolled out the 2014 version of America’s top-selling compact Thursday night at a splashy event in Santa Monica, Calif., hoping to shed the old version’s no-frills image and attract new, younger buyers.

The 2014 model, which goes on sale in September, is longer and sits lower, with an athletic look that’s much closer to a sports car than the econobox it replaces. It also gets a new transmission, suspension and interior that Toyota says will make the car quieter and more luxurious, with better handling than the current version. It’s the 11th generation of a car that Toyota has been selling worldwide since 1966.

“It’s a huge car for us. It helped really identify the company and the brand and what we’re all about,” says Bill Fay, group vice president of the Toyota Division in the U.S. “We should appeal to a little younger buyer and broaden out the appeal of the car to more than what it is today.”

The car’s bold design is unusual for Toyota, which in the past made few changes to its cars with each update. But the new version is badly needed. The Corolla, with a reputation for sterling dependability, is still America’s No. 1 compact. But dealers have had to cut its selling price and offer big discounts to compete against sleek new versions of the Honda Civic, Ford Focus, Hyundai Elantra and Chevrolet Cruze.

“They clearly here are saying ‘we’ve got to give the Corolla more personality and more life,’ given the way the competition is,” says Tim Calkins, a marketing professor at Northwestern University. “I certainly understand why they are pushing it here.”

Toyota sold 132,514 Corollas this year through May, beating the No. 2 Civic by 3,500. But the Corolla’s average selling price of $18,464 is the lowest of the five top-selling compacts. It sells for almost $1,600 less than a Civic, according to the TrueCar.com auto pricing site. And Toyota is second only to Ford’s Focus in discounts per car at $2,072.

The Corolla’s looks really haven’t changed much in the past decade, even with an update five years ago. Meanwhile, competitors spent money on leather interiors, touch-screen systems, new transmissions and powerful yet efficient engines for their compacts.

Those rivals now pose a challenge in a segment long ignored by Detroit and dominated by Honda and Toyota. In the past, all it took was a decent, reliable car to gain buyers. But industry analysts say reliability is now easy to come by. Companies have to set themselves apart with style, fuel economy or performance.

Toyota didn’t disclose the new Corolla’s price, or its fuel economy numbers, although it did say an Eco version should get over 40 miles per gallon on the highway. The current version starts around $18,000 with an automatic transmission. Fay says Toyota’s goal is to keep the new version close to that price.

As customers see the value of the updated version, Toyota expects transaction prices to rise, with an uptick in sales predicted for early next year, Fay says.

The new version will certainly get better gas mileage. The current car falls near the back of the class with an estimated 34 mpg on the highway, due in part to an outdated four-speed automatic transmission. The Civic, Corolla’s closest competitor, gets an estimated 39 mpg on the highway with its five-speed transmission. With more gears, engines generally don’t have to work as hard at freeway speeds.

Toyota is offering two engines in the latest version, a 1.8-liter, 132 horsepower four-cylinder that carries over from the current model, and the same engine with new valve technology that adds eight horsepower to reach 140. The newer engine comes only on the Eco version.

The base engine is less powerful than the Corolla’s main competitors. The Civic has 140 horsepower, while the Focus has 160 and the Elantra is rated at 148.

Toyota is giving the new version a continuously variable transmission that has seven “shift points” that mimic a conventional automatic. CVTs don’t usually shift gears, instead allowing the engine to operate efficiently at most speeds.

The new Corolla also is nearly four inches longer than the current version. That gives passengers more room in both the front and back, Toyota says.

“Not only will the interior be a lot more comfortable and have more of a premium feel, it’s going to be quieter,” Fay says. “It’s going to have a lot different feel.”

The average age of a Corolla buyer is 53, about the average for the whole compact segment, Fay says. The new car’s sporty look and digitial technology should help lower that figure. “We’re going to be able to get on (more) people’s shopping lists,” Fay says.

Northwestern’s Calkins says the radical styling runs the risk of turning off longtime buyers who are used to a more conservative look. But Tom Libby, lead North American analyst for the Polk automotive research firm, says traditional Toyota buyers are extremely loyal.

“The propensity of a Toyota owner to stay with the Toyota brand is pretty high relative to other makes,” Libby says.

(© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

Authorities stopped the dig after just a few hours on the third day.

“We did not uncover any evidence relevant to the investigation on James Hoffa,” said Robert Foley, head of the FBI in Detroit.

“I am very confident of our result here after two-days-plus of diligent effort,” he said. “As of this point, we’ll be closing down the excavation operation.”

Authorities have pursued multiple leads as to Hoffa’s whereabouts since his disappearance in 1975. He was last seen outside an Oakland County restaurant where he was to meet with a New Jersey Teamsters boss and a Detroit Mafia captain.

The latest tip about Hoffa’s remains came from reputed Mafia captain Tony Zerilli, who, through his lawyer, said Hoffa was buried beneath a concrete slab in a barn in Oakland Township, north of Detroit.

The barn is gone, but FBI agents on Monday starting poring over the field where it used to stand.

On Tuesday, authorities used a backhoe to dig and move dirt around in the section of land. Authorities also called in forensic anthropologists from Michigan State University and cadaver dogs from the Michigan State Police.

“Certainly, we’re disappointed” in the results, Foley told reporters Wednesday.

He said about 40 agents were involved in an operation that covered about an acre. The FBI has not put a cost on the search, but Foley said it’s more important to solve a case.

“With any investigation we consider cost-benefits analysis,” he said. “The FBI and its partners are no corporations. We do not have a profit margin as a bottom line.”

Detroit FBI spokesman Simon Shaykhet said Wednesday that there was no connection between the dig for Hoffa’s remains and an excavation on Tuesday at the house in New York once occupied by gangster James Burke. Burke, a Lucchese crime family associate known as “Jimmy the Gent,” was the inspiration for Robert De Niro’s character in the 1990 Martin Scorsese movie “Goodfellas.”

Hoffa’s rise in the Teamsters, his 1964 conviction for jury tampering and his presumed murder are Detroit’s link to a time when organized crime, public corruption and mob hits held the nation’s attention. Over the years, authorities have received various tips, leading the FBI to possible burial sites near and far.

In 2003, a backyard swimming pool was dug up 90 miles northwest of Detroit. Seven years ago, a tip from an ailing federal inmate led to a two-week search and excavation at a horse farm in the same region. Last year, soil samples were taken from under the concrete floor of a backyard shed north of the city. And detectives even pulled up floorboards at a Detroit house in 2004.

No evidence of Hoffa was found.

Other theories have suggested he was entombed in concrete at Giants Stadium in New Jersey, ground up and thrown in a Florida swamp or obliterated in a mob-owned fat-rendering plant.

Zerilli, now 85, was in prison for organized crime when Hoffa disappeared. But he told New York TV station WNBC in January that he was informed about Hoffa’s whereabouts after his release. His attorney, David Chasnick, said Zerilli is “intimately involved” with people who know where the body is buried.

Details are in a manuscript Zerilli is selling online.

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(© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

During a ceremony unveiling a statue of Douglass in the Capitol, Biden hailed Douglass’ work advocating equal justice, and noted that Douglass supported complete voting rights for residents of the District of Columbia, where Douglass once lived.

Although each of the 50 states was allowed two statues of notable citizens in the Capitol, the District of Columbia was not allowed any statue until a measure passed by Congress last year. Residents chose to honor Douglass, whose home near the Anacostia River is a national historic site.

Biden said he and President Barack Obama back Eleanor Holmes Norton, the District’s nonvoting delegate to Congress, in her effort to bring statehood and full voting rights to the city.

“The people of the District made the right choice in selecting Frederick Douglass as their representative, and they put both Eleanor Holmes Norton and Frederick Douglass in this Capitol and, quite frankly, I don’t see either of them leaving until all the District residents get their voice,” the vice president said.

House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, called the statue “a fitting tribute to one of the greatest Americans and voices for freedom who ever lived.” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., joined Biden in saying that Douglass initiated a movement that has yet to come to fruition.

“His voice is still being heard,” Pelosi said of Douglass. “We need full representation in the halls of Congress.”

Douglass was born a slave in 1818 in Talbot County, Md. He was a writer who advised President Abraham Lincoln and was a voice for women’s rights as well as those of black Americans. In 1872, Douglass became the first African-American nominated for vice president, and he went on to serve as U.S. consul-general to Haiti. He died in 1895.

The 7-foot bronze likeness of Douglass joins sculpted statues of fellow blacks Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr. and Sojourner Truth in the Capitol’s Emancipation Hall.

In 2007 Maryland artist Steve Weitzman completed the statue, which portrays Douglass in his 50s as an orator and writer. It was commissioned by the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities.

WNEW’s Karen Adams contributed to this report. Follow her and WNEW on Twitter.

(TM and Copyright 2013 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2013 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

Speaking in front of the German capital’s Brandenburg Gate, President Obama echoed John F. Kennedy’s famous speech almost exactly 50 years prior, when he asked of Berliners to “lift [their] eyes beyond the dangers of today, and beyond the freedom of merely this city, look to the day of peace with justice.”

Obama’s speech comes at a time when he is responding to government privacy concerns in the US, along with a continued war in Iraq and lingering terrorist concerns.

Obama stressed a balance of security and personal freedom.

“Security and openness are both necessary for peace with justice,” said Obama. “Government serves the power of the individual, and not the other way around.”

“We must move beyond the mindset of perpetual war: Closing the prison in Guantanamo, tightly controlling use of new technology like drones, security with the balance of the protection of privacy — I’m confident that balance can be struck.”

Obama stated that technology can help preserve security, but not at the expense of personal freedoms, and that security precautions “confront real dangers, not ordinary people.”

Obama followed in the footsteps of past U.S. leaders, asking Russia and the rest of the world to reduce nuclear capabilities. Obama said a review of the U.S. nuclear capability showed that stockpiles can be reduced by up to a third while maintaining the necessary deterrent.

“We are not truly safe as long as nuclear weapons exist,” said Obama. “The fate of this city came down to a simple question: will we live free or in chains?”

Obama’s latest proposals come two years after New START — a nuclear agreement between the United States and Russia — went into effect. New START, which stands for strategic arms reduction treaty, calls for each country to limit its nuclear warhead arsenal to 1,550 by the year 2018.

Obama’s foreign policy statements also included his challenge to tear down walls “in our own hearts,” by promoting peace across the world, including a solution for Israel and Palestinians.

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“Peace with justice means pursuing a world without nuclear weapons,” Obama told the 6,000 people in attendance while behind bullet-proof glass.

With German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Berlin Mayor Klaus Wowereit looking on, Obama signaled that the nuclear stockpiles should be cut by one-third.

Obama added that he intends to move the U.S. “beyond a Cold War nuclear posture” with Russia by seeking negotiated cuts of nuclear arsenals between the two nations.

Obama is pledging to work with NATO allies to forge a new international framework for peaceful nuclear power. He says the U.S. will hold a summit in 2016 on securing nuclear materials around the world.

Obama called for a treaty to end production of fissile material.

Obama also called for the closure of Guantanamo Bay and said that climate change is “the global threat of our time” during his speech in Berlin.

(TM and © Copyright 2013 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2013 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)

Nobody wants to be remembered for choking? Just ask Bill Buckner.

Last night, the San Antonio Spurs possibly choked away a championship. They led the Miami Heat by 5 points with 20 seconds to play and lost in OT. That’s a choke. You don’t blow 5 point leads with 20 seconds to play. You just can’t do that. Not with a title on the line!

I’ll argue that the Spurs’ choke job last night might be the 2nd biggest choke in the history of sports. Why? Because of what they potentially lost.

Read more here

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.