CEDAR FALLS, Iowa (Reuters) – Tea Party activist Judd Saul admits that he can sound a little unhinged when he gets talking about an issue close to his heart that most Americans have never heard of.

“Agenda 21 is an elusive enemy that floats in and chokes you gradually,” said Saul, of the Cedar Valley Tea Party in Cedar Falls, Iowa. “They want to destroy the middle-class way of life.”

CEDAR FALLS, Iowa, Oct 15 (Reuters) – Tea Party activist
Judd Saul admits that he can sound a little unhinged when he
gets talking about an issue close to his heart that most
Americans have never heard of.

“Agenda 21 is an elusive enemy that floats in and chokes you
gradually,” said Saul, of the Cedar Valley Tea Party in Cedar
Falls, Iowa. “They want to destroy the middle-class way of
life.”

RINGSTED, Iowa (Reuters) – Democrats fighting an uphill battle to win a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives are trying to use rural angst over the failure of congressional Republicans to pass a farm bill to win some Midwestern seats in the November 6 election.

The farm bill, which sets subsidies for everything from crop insurance to milk production, expired on October 1 after the Republican majority in the House could not muster enough votes to pass a new law.

JEFFERSONVILLE, Indiana (Reuters) – Indiana Republicans last spring spurned long-time Senator Richard Lugar for a more conservative candidate, but now supporters of the soft-spoken moderate may tip the balance in the race that could determine which party controls the U.S. Senate.

Republican Richard Mourdock, the state treasurer, and his Democratic opponent, Congressman Joe Donnelly, are wooing not just independent voters but disaffected and angry “Lugar Republicans.”

WEST SALEM, Wisconsin (Reuters) – Fresh off a nasty battle to recall Wisconsin’s governor in the spring, the state has another high profile political fight on its hands for the U.S. Senate.

But after an expensive four-way Republican primary that he won narrowly, Senate candidate and former governor Tommy Thompson was left “broke” – forcing him to raise more money and campaign less. Poor polling for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who is an average of 8 points behind Democratic President Barack Obama in the state, has not helped.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – There is room to debate who won the battle between Chicago and its striking teachers union but there is little disagreement the strike and the deal approved by union members on Tuesday mark a personal loss for Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

University of California-Berkeley professor and labor historian Harley Shaiken described the deal as a win for both sides, saying the teachers “won overall on points” because they maintained public support and got a compromise deal.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – The attorney for an 18-year-old man charged with attempting to detonate what he thought was a car bomb outside a Chicago bar said his client was a “immature kid” who is not a danger to the public during the defendant’s first court appearance on Monday.

Adel Daoud appeared nervous in federal court, dressed in bright orange prison clothing with a big mop of frizzy hair and a sparse beard and mustache. His legs jiggled nervously throughout proceedings.

CHICAGO, Sept 12 (Reuters) – Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel
received far more money in campaign donations from wealthy
financiers and entrepreneurs backing school reform than from
unions, leaving him freer to confront the city’s teachers than
some fellow Democrats, an examination of donations to his 2011
campaign shows.

The city’s 29,000 teachers have been on strike since Monday,
halting classes in the country’s third-largest school district,
over contract negotiations that are snagged on job security and
Emanuel’s plan to rate teachers based on students’ standardized
test scores.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and unionized teachers argued publicly on Tuesday over how to improve struggling inner-city schools as negotiations remained deadlocked on the second day of a strike that has closed the nation’s third-largest school district.

The two sides could not even agree on how far apart they were in the bitter negotiations over a new contract for some 29,000 teachers and support staff who went on strike for the first time in a quarter century.

CHICAGO, Sept 11 (Reuters) – Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and
unionized teachers argued publicly on Tuesday over how to
improve struggling inner-city schools as negotiations remained
deadlocked on the second day of a strike that has closed the
nation’s third-largest school district.

The two sides could not even agree on how far apart they
were in the bitter negotiations over a new contract for some
29,000 teachers and support staff.