WASHINGTON (AP) — There’s an irony in the Internal Revenue Service’s crackdown on conservative groups.The nation’s tax agency has admitted to inappropriately scrutinizing smaller tea party organizations that applied for tax-exempt status, and senior Treasury Department offici...

The team of Trash Can Cookers from Corpus Christi, Texas, was awarded the Governor's Cup and title of ‘World’s Greatest Steak Cookers’ at the 2013 World Championship Steak Cook-off, part of the 25th Magnolia Blossom Festival on Saturday. The team was awarded a $4,000 cash prize. Pi...

Dr. John Spencer serenades the audience in the Thursday Musicale Club, in Camden. He played ‘Blackbird’ by John Lennon and Paul McCartney. The South Arkansas Chamber Singers sang a jazz arrangement of the song after Spencer finished.

LITTLE ROCK (AP) — The owner of a pipeline that supplies diesel and jet fuel to three locations in Arkansas — El Dorado, North Little Rock and Jonesboro — has notified a federal agency that it plans to make changes in the pipeline.The changes could affect the central Arkansas econo...

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — It’s all about the odds.With the majority of possible combinations of Powerball numbers in play, someone is almost sure to win the game’s highest jackpot during Saturday night’s drawing, a windfall of hundreds of millions of dollars — and that&rs...

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Sunbathers flocking to Southern California beaches are used to feeding the meter or paying a parking attendant. Not so along the less developed north coast where it’s customary to ditch cars on the shoulder of Highway 1 to surf, swim or picnic.That sandy line that long...

The National Weather Service forecast for South Arkansas today includes partly cloudy skies, highs in the upper 80s and south winds 5 to 10 mph.Tonight will be mostly clear in the evening, then will become mostly cloudy. Lows will be in the upper 60s. South winds will be around 10 mph.Monday, skies...

BRIDGEPORT, Conn. (AP) — The commuter train derailment and collision that left dozens injured outside New York City was not the result of foul play, officials said Saturday, but a fractured section of rail is being studied to determine if it is connected to the accident.National Transportation...

LITTLE ROCK (AP) — Arkansas Treasurer Martha Shoffner, who has faced questions about her management of state investments, was arrested for extortion Saturday by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and is being held in Pulaski County Jail.FBI spokeswoman Kimberly Brunell said Shoffner was arres...

WALNUT RIDGE (AP) — The Lawrence County Sheriff’s Department says the body of a young woman has been found in the Black River but her name is not yet known.The sheriff’s office said Saturday evening that the body would be sent to the Arkansas Crime Laboratory in Little Rock for an...

SALLISAW, Okla. (AP) — A judge has ruled there is enough evidence to put a Sallisaw man on trial for a 1997 beating death during a robbery.During a preliminary hearing Friday, Sequoyah County Special Judge Larry Langley ordered 38-year-old Rex Richard Robbins III to be tried on a first-degree...

CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. (AP) — Ron Poirier couldn’t escape the feeling that his cancer was somehow a punishment.As a young Marine electronics technician at Camp Lejeune in the mid-1970s, the Massachusetts man figured he’d dumped hundreds of gallons of toxic solvents onto the ground. It...

CAIRO (AP) — The pale, young Christian woman sat handcuffed in the courtroom, accused of insulting Islam while teaching history of religions to fourth-graders. A team of Islamist lawyers with long beards sang in unison, “All except the Prophet Muhammad.” The case against Dimyana Ab...

BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian President Bashar Assad said in a newspaper interview Saturday he won’t step down and will instead “face the storm,” raising new doubts about a U.S-Russian effort to get Assad and his opponents to negotiate an end to the country’s civil war.In the Sy...

Mayor Frank Hash, left, presents keys to the city to retiring Fire Chiefs Jim Davis, center, and Bobby Braswell at a party in their honor at the El Dorado Central Fire Station.