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Brisk book sales lifted President Obama's income to $5.5 million in his first year in office, an amount that dwarfs that of his recent predecessors while in power and reflects the public's continued willingness to pay to read his writings. On tax day, the White House released 2009 returns showing that the Obamas' income more than doubled from the year before. They collected $2.7 million in 2008, and $4.2 million in 2007. Obama paid nearly $1.8 million in federal taxes and $163,000 in Illinois state taxes.

Many seniors today find themselves unable to afford prescription drugs even if they have a drug benefit plan under Medicare. The healthcare bill that became law last month aims to fix this problem. But many of those provisions won't be fully implemented for years. What is the "doughnut hole," and how do I know if I'm in it? Seniors who are enrolled in a Medicare Part D plan pay 25% of the cost of prescription drugs until the total reaches $2,830. At that point, enrollees must pay the full cost of their drugs until their total out-of-pocket spending reaches $4,550, when catastrophic coverage kicks in and the enrollee pays 5% of drug costs for the rest of the year.

As President Obama began selling his new jobs package, he was pressed Wednesday from both the left and the right, with Republicans warning about ballooning deficits and black lawmakers seeking bolder action on an unemployment rate that approaches 16% for African Americans. Partisan tensions surfaced at a private White House meeting with congressional leaders of both parties. In an unusually aggressive move, Obama opened the meeting by accusing Republicans of "rooting against" an economic recovery, according to an account provided by Republican aides.

Federal officials issued a scathing report Thursday showing a sky-high rate of violations by the West Virginia mine where a deadly explosion killed 29 miners last week, prompting President Obama to order the Justice Department to join the investigation and raising the specter of criminal charges. In 2009 alone, the report notes, the Mine Safety and Health Administration issued 48 orders that workers be removed from parts of Massey Energy Co.'s Upper Big Branch mine for "repeated significant and substantial violations that the mine operator either knew, or should have known, constituted a hazard."

The White House is poised to order all federal agencies to evaluate any major actions they take, such as building highways or logging national forests, to determine how they would contribute to and be affected by climate change, a step long sought by environmentalists. Environmentalists say the move would provide new incentives for the government to minimize the heat-trapping gas emissions scientists blame for global warming. Republicans have opposed it as potentially inhibiting economic growth.

More than a month after the FBI announced it had rescued 52 children from "sexual slavery" in a nationwide crackdown on child prostitution, none of the victims is receiving the help experts say is necessary to overcome such trauma and rejoin society. At least one, a 15-year-old Sacramento girl held on an unrelated charge, remains in a juvenile detention center, according to a Los Angeles Times check of the children's situations. Others have been sent home or into foster care. The victims need intensive residential treatment, experts say, and only three such programs exist in the country.

Any final healthcare bill is likely to require that virtually all Americans obtain insurance. This "individual mandate" has stirred some controversy and confusion. Here are some questions and answers. Why require everyone to buy insurance? All insurance is based on the idea that most of the time, most people are not filing claims. As it applies to healthcare, supporters say, most people are pretty healthy most of the time, but eventually almost everyone incurs major medical expenses.

The government has promised more and better security at airports following the near-disaster on Christmas Day, but privacy advocates are not prepared to accept the use of full-body scanners as the routine screening system. "We don't need to look at naked 8-year-olds and grandmothers to secure airplanes," Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said last week. "I think it's a false argument to say we have to give up all of our personal privacy in order to have security." After each major terrorism incident, the balance between privacy and security tilts in favor of greater security.

The Supreme Court on Monday threw out a death sentence for a decorated Korean War veteran, ruling for the first time that combat stress must be considered by a jury before it hands down the harshest punishment. "Our nation has a long tradition of according leniency to veterans in recognition of their service, especially for those who fought on the front lines as [George] Porter did," the justices said in a unanimous, unsigned opinion. "Moreover, the relevance of Porter's extensive combat experience is not only that he served honorably . . . but also that the jury might find mitigating the intense stress and mental and emotional toll that combat took on Porter."

An individual's responses to census questions are confidential, but one of President Obama's answers on the 10-question form adds more fodder to the ongoing conversation about how America sees itself. After media inquiries, the White House confirmed that Obama checked only the racial box that says: "Black, African Am., or Negro," the Associated Press reported. Obama could have checked more than one racial box, given that his father was an African from Kenya and his mother was a white woman from Kansas.

Brisk book sales lifted President Obama's income to $5.5 million in his first year in office, an amount that dwarfs that of his recent predecessors while in power and reflects the public's continued willingness to pay to read his writings. On tax day, the White House released 2009 returns showing that the Obamas' income more than doubled from the year before. They collected $2.7 million in 2008, and $4.2 million in 2007. Obama paid nearly $1.8 million in federal taxes and $163,000 in Illinois state taxes.

The Obama administration is for the first time drafting classified guidelines to help the government determine whether newly captured terrorism suspects will be prosecuted or held indefinitely without trial, senior U.S. officials said. The draft document envisions that a small number of suspected terrorists captured in the future could be detained and interrogated in an overseas prison, several of the officials said. At least in the short term, Bagram air base in Afghanistan would be the most likely prison to hold the suspects, they said.

A civilian trial in New York for Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and his codefendants in the Sept. 11 terrorism case is still a possibility, Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. told senators Wednesday. Testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Holder also said the U.S. would like to capture and question Osama bin Laden, but expects the Al Qaeda leader won't be taken alive.

Like President Obama, Senate Republicans are facing a crucial decision regarding the next nominee for the Supreme Court. No one expects the GOP to simply rubber-stamp Obama's nominee, but the degree of its response could have implications in the November midterm elections and beyond. This time, Republicans have a weapon they lacked last year when Sonia Sotomayor was tapped for the court. They have enough votes to conceivably mount a filibuster and block the nominee outright. But they'll have to decide whether to use that weapon now or wait until the Supreme Court stakes may even be higher.

The winners PUBLIC SERVICE The Bristol (Va.) Herald Courier BREAKING NEWS REPORTING The Seattle Times staff INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING Barbara Laker and Wendy Ruderman of the Philadelphia Daily News, and Sheri Fink of ProPublica, in collaboration with the New York Times Magazine EXPLANATORY REPORTING Michael Moss and members of the New York Times staff LOCAL REPORTING Raquel Rutledge of the Milwaukee...

According to many writers in the conservative blogosphere, the census taker is second only to the tax man as the preeminent symbol of government intrusion. Now several prominent Republicans, fearing the rhetoric could result in an undercount of their ranks, are trying to tamp down the census critics. Former White House advisor Karl Rove recently made a public service announcement urging participation in the decennial head count. Rep. Patrick T. McHenry, the ranking Republican on the House committee that oversees the census, issued a statement criticizing claims that the survey is unconstitutional.

Three men alleged to be Al Qaeda associates were charged Friday with conspiring to smuggle cocaine through Africa -- the first U.S. prosecution linking the terrorist group directly to drug trafficking. The three suspects, who were charged in federal court in New York, are believed to be from Mali and were arrested in Ghana during a Drug Enforcement Administration sting. Although U.S. authorities have alleged that Al Qaeda and the Taliban profit from Afghanistan's heroin trade, the case is the first in which suspects linked to Al Qaeda have been charged under severe narco-terrorism laws, federal officials said.

Sen.-elect Scott Brown -- the truck-driving, "tea party"-backed Republican who scored an upset victory in Massachusetts -- visited Capitol Hill on Thursday and quickly picked up a nickname: 41. That is the number of senators it takes to sustain a filibuster, the GOP's delaying tactic of choice. And Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), a canny insider, was delighted with the moniker: "This is a man who understands how the Senate operates. So henceforth, I will always think of him as 41."

The leaders of more than 40 nations agreed Tuesday to a voluntary but far-reaching program to prevent thousands of tons of weapons-grade nuclear materials from falling into the hands of terrorists. World leaders, called to Washington by President Obama to take action on one of his signature issues, also agreed to step up the sharing of nuclear information and help develop common standards and procedures for the security of fissile materials. Obama said the agreement recognized a "cruel irony of history": After surviving a Cold War arms race and the threat of nuclear war, the world now must confront the even larger danger of nuclear terrorism.

Public outrage over double-digit rate hikes for health insurance may have helped push President Obama's healthcare overhaul across the finish line, but the new law does not give regulators the power to block similar increases in the future. And now, with some major companies already moving to boost premiums and others poised to follow suit, millions of Americans may feel an unexpected jolt in the pocketbook. Although Democrats promised greater consumer protection, the overhaul does not give the federal government broad regulatory power to prevent increases.