Massachusetts

Manny Hamelburg, 68, a retired businessman, had fought prostate cancer for years. First, he tried radiation, then a drug with side effects that nearly killed him, and finally Lupron, a drug that blocks production of testosterone, the hormone that can fuel prostate cancer. The cancer disappeared. But life was miserable. Without normal levels of testosterone, Hamelburg says, he had no energy, and "zero libido for seven years. I was like a eunuch. I was chemically castrated. Sex was just hugs."

WASHINGTON - Ten months into his term as Massachusetts governor, Mitt Romney was abruptly confronted with an emotionally charged issue: The state's highest court ruled that gays had the legal right to marry, thrusting the state into the forefront of the same-sex marriage debate. Romney, now the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, faced one of the biggest challenges of his four years in office. His response would alienate constituencies on both sides and contribute to criticisms that he shifted positions for political gain, a charge renewed in his two bids for the White House.

washington -- Mitt Romney twice emphasized his unique business background when he and eight other Republican presidential candidates faced off in a debate last week in Iowa. "I've spent the last, as I've told you, 25 years in the private sector," former Massachusetts Gov. Romney declared at one point. "I understand why jobs come and why jobs go. I've done business in 20 countries."

It looks as if it's going to be Mitt Romney after all. With Paul Ryan, Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush endorsing the former Massachusetts governor last week, there aren't any white knights left to play the role of GOP savior. But that news hasn't reached his competitors yet. Psychoanalyzing the remaining competitors for why they are staying in the race is probably a fool's errand. Ron Paul has never worked under the assumption he might be the nominee, never mind the next president.

First of three parts Tiffany Lee wanted a car. She was weary of the two-hour bus ride to her job at a UCLA Health System clinic. She hated having to ask friends to drive her 7-year-old son to his asthma treatments. But as a single mother with three children, bad credit and a $27,000-a-year salary, she couldn't find a bank or dealership willing to give her a loan. Then a friend steered her to Repossess Auto Sales in Hawthorne. Another buyer might have balked at the deal she was offered.

Mitt Romney coasted to victory in his home state of Massachusetts, easily winning the primary Tuesday over three opponents who did not bother to campaign there. Massachusetts awards its 38 delegates proportionally to candidates who receive 15% or more of the vote, and it appeared Romney was in position to get almost all of them. Romney served as governor of Massachusetts for one term, from 2003-07, and has long been considered a moderate on the political spectrum, though he has emphasized more conservative positions during the Republican primary.

Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown, whose upset victory in early 2010 marked the moment when many started to take the tea party movement seriously, leads his likely 2012 Democratic challenger Elizabeth Warren by 9 percentage points, according to a new survey of voters. Brown has 49% support compared with Warren's 40%, according to a Suffolk University poll released Thursday. Warren, whose reputation as a consumer advocate has made her the darling of progressive activists, holds a commanding lead over her Democratic challengers for the party's nomination, which will be decided in the primary election Sept.

You can bet that political strategists in both parties will be parsing the meaning of the Massachusetts senatorial struggle for some time to come. If there was a slam dunk left in American politics, it should've been the Democrats' ability to easily retain a Senate seat they'd held for 57 years in what has become essentially a sea-blue state. Instead, they lost. Given its importance in the issue of the moment, the Massachusetts vote is going to be analyzed as a referendum on President Obama's healthcare reforms.

— At least two tornadoes swept through western and central Massachusetts on Wednesday, slamming debris into buildings, toppling trees and killing four people, the governor said. The storms did extensive damage in Springfield, the state's third-largest city with 150,000 people. About 40 people were injured, Mayor Domenic J. Sarno said. One person died in Springfield, two in West Springfield and another in Brimfield, authorities said. Tornadoes were reported in several other communities, including Monson and Sturbridge.

Massachusetts, whose 2006 healthcare overhaul provided a template for the landmark national law signed by President Obama last year, has already demonstrated that it is possible to achieve almost universal health coverage. Now, the trailblazing state is providing another clue about what may happen when the federal government begins guaranteeing health insurance for all citizens starting in 2014. Massachusetts community health centers and so-called safety-net hospitals - originally created to serve the poor and uninsured - have seen no let-up in demand, even after the state's reforms, according to new research published Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

There's an old saying in Republican politics: Massachusetts produces only two exports - lobsters and liberals - and neither one travels well. That's what GOP strategists said in 1988 when then-Gov. Michael S. Dukakis was the Democratic presidential nominee, and in 2004, when Sen. John F. Kerry ran and lost. But this year, they're glumly pondering whether that cranky old rule also applies to their own purported front-runner, former Gov. Mitt Romney. COMMENTARY AND ANALYSIS: Presidential Election 2012 Romney's not really a liberal despite what his conservative critics say. But he sure hasn't always traveled well.

Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum face a daunting calendar in the months ahead: a set of far-flung primaries that offers little chance for a knockout punch as they battle for the 1,144 delegates needed to clinch the GOP presidential nomination. In that long slog, little will matter more than an efficient organization and a robust treasury. And in those key areas, the contrast between the two leading GOP contenders could not be more stark. Romney has built an operation unrivaled in its vigilance and precision, which has allowed him to raise more money, reach more voters and rack up more delegates than any other candidate.

Mitt Romney coasted to victory in his home state of Massachusetts, easily winning the primary Tuesday over three opponents who did not bother to campaign there. Massachusetts awards its 38 delegates proportionally to candidates who receive 15% or more of the vote, and it appeared Romney was in position to get almost all of them. Romney served as governor of Massachusetts for one term, from 2003-07, and has long been considered a moderate on the political spectrum, though he has emphasized more conservative positions during the Republican primary.

Hoping to trip up Mitt Romney's momentum, Rick Santorum made a populist plea to Washington state voters to "put your honor at stake" and give him a victory in Saturday's caucuses that will send a message to the "good old boys" of the Republican establishment. "How often has the state of Washington had the ability to reset a presidential race?" he asked in a speech to several hundred supporters at a Pentecostal church in Spokane. "I know you feel like you've been railroaded and bulldozed.

When it comes to U.S. venture capital funding for the most promising new green technology firms, there's California and there's everybody else. California companies raked in $2.8 billion, or 57%, of the $4.9 billion in venture capital offered up in the so-called clean-tech category of funding nationwide last year, according to a recently released analysis from Ernst & Young. Massachusetts companies were a distant second with $465.1 million, followed by Colorado companies, which pulled in $363.3 million.

Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown, whose upset victory in early 2010 marked the moment when many started to take the tea party movement seriously, leads his likely 2012 Democratic challenger Elizabeth Warren by 9 percentage points, according to a new survey of voters. Brown has 49% support compared with Warren's 40%, according to a Suffolk University poll released Thursday. Warren, whose reputation as a consumer advocate has made her the darling of progressive activists, holds a commanding lead over her Democratic challengers for the party's nomination, which will be decided in the primary election Sept.

Three years ago, Massachusetts passed the most sweeping healthcare bill in the country, adopting a plan that closely resembles the proposals being considered by Congress. It is a plan that now offers powerful lessons learned for the whole country. The Massachusetts system, like the proposals moving toward votes in the House and Senate, focused on three goals: making medical insurance almost universal, fostering competition through a regulated insurance exchange, and helping low-income workers pay for coverage.

In a stunning blow to Democrats, Republican Scott Brown on Tuesday seized the Massachusetts Senate seat once held by Edward M. Kennedy, handing the GOP the crucial vote that could thwart President Obama's far-reaching agenda, beginning with healthcare reform. More broadly, Brown's epic upset signals the start of what could be an exceedingly tough year nationwide for Democrats, who are fighting to hang on to their majorities in the House and Senate in a political climate that seems to grow more hostile by the day. "The effort to pass Obama's legislative agenda has grown more difficult, a flood of new Democratic congressional retirements may follow, and Republicans will certainly feel emboldened to expand their list of Democratic targets for the fall election," said Rhodes Cook, an independent campaign analyst.

It's been less than three years since the death of Sen. Ted Kennedy left Massachusetts without a Kennedy in Congress, something that hadn't happened for more than 60 years. Joseph Kennedy III aims to change that this November. The redheaded grandson of the late Robert F. Kennedy has announced his candidacy to replace retiring Rep. Barney Frank in Massachusetts' 4th Congressional District. “My family has had the great privilege of serving Massachusetts before,” Kennedy said in a three-minute Web video titled “I'm Running.” “They taught me that public service is an honor, given in trust, and that trust must be earned each and every day. That's exactly what I intend to do.” Kennedy, 31, is a graduate of Stanford University and Harvard Law School.

Amid the furor over an Obama administration rule on contraceptives, three GOP presidential candidates hammered away at social issues Friday as they sought to appeal to a major gathering of conservative activists. Mitt Romney, reeling from a triple loss to Rick Santorum in voter contests this week, made his most explicit appeal yet to the Republican right. Romney described himself as a "severely conservative Republican governor" in a half-hour speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference that used the words "conservative" or "conservatism" 29 times.