POLITICS-US: Marijuana Legalisation Creates Buzz

Due perhaps in part to the country's economic woes, but also a major shift in political culture, discussion of marijuana legalisation has risen to a level of openness and prominence previously unseen in the United States.

ECONOMY-US: Squatters See Silver Lining in Foreclosed Homes

With foreclosures skyrocketing and U.S. families sinking deeper into poverty, a number of organisations are turning to a new strategy to end homelessness: moving families into vacant, foreclosed houses that are currently owned by banks or the government.

ENERGY-US: Obama Faces Hungry Nuclear Industry

As Democratic President-elect Barack Obama prepares to take office in a few weeks, he faces a hungry nuclear industry that wants to be included in his energy plan.

POLITICS-US: Vote-Flipping Reported on E-Voting Machines

Several U.S. citizens reported watching their votes flip on electronic voting machines in different states during the early voting period, highlighting the continued vulnerability of "e-voting" systems, which about 50 million U.S. citizens will use on Tuesday, despite problems since as early as 2004.

EDUCATION-US: Credit Crunch Hits College Students

The credit crunch is limiting college access for some students in the United States by making it more difficult for them or their parents to obtain student loans to finance the steep cost of a four-year education.

POLITICS-US: Housing Fund Seen as Grassroots Victory

Advocates are calling a new national trust fund to preserve, rehabilitate and build affordable housing, including public housing, a major grassroots victory and key step in addressing the needs of low-income people in the United States.

HEALTH-US: Unions, Groups Coalesce For Universal Coverage

A coalition of over 100 national and local organisations representing labour unions, doctors, nurses, women, small businesses, religious groups, racial minorities, and think tanks has launched a new campaign in 53 U.S. cities to demand quality, affordable health care for every United States citizen.

POLITICS-US: Taking on the Two-Party Monopoly

"Politics in the U.S. is at a crisis level," Green Party presidential hopeful Cynthia McKinney told IPS during a rare sit-down interview. "Disillusionment, lack of participation, and establishment of false choice - what is one to do? For me, I can't give up hope. I said yes when the Green Party said 'okay, now you want to do it?'."

POLITICS-US: Outspoken War Critic Poised for Green Party Run

With media attention focused almost exclusively on the dramatic contest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, millions of U.S. voters probably have no inkling that there is a ballot option beyond the Democratic and Republican Parties.

POLITICS-US: Anti-War Grannies Arrested Trying to Enlist

As part of actions across the United States to mark the fifth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, 10 "Grandmothers for Peace", ranging in age from 57 to 80, were arrested Monday while trying to enlist in the United States Army. Acts of civil disobedience are planned this week in at least 17 other U.S. cities.

WORLD SOCIAL FORUM: Evictions High on Atlanta Agenda

Some 400 activists from Atlanta, Georgia and around the U.S. South gathered for a People's Movement Assembly Saturday, in solidarity with the Global Day of Action organised under the World Social Forum process.

ENERGY: Protests Greet Nuclear Power Resurgence in US South

Residents and environmental activists are in a bitter dispute with large U.S. energy corporations and the federal government over the safety of nuclear power, as more than a dozen corporations plan to, or have filed, paperwork to open new nuclear power plants, primarily in the U.S. South.

RIGHTS-US: Tasering of Student Viewed Round the World

Campus police at the University of Florida tackled, then Tasered - or shocked with high-voltage electricity - a journalism student last week, renewing a vigorous debate in the United States and abroad on police abuses of power and the struggle to preserve free speech.

RIGHTS-US: Low-Income Housing on the Chopping Block

Even as people around the United States and the world recall the horrors of Hurricane Katrina two years ago, which displaced tens of thousands of the Gulf Coast's poorest residents, government-subsidised housing has come under increasing attack by policymakers in the U.S.

DEATH PENALTY-US: Inmate Gets Rare Last-Minute Reprieve

Troy Anthony Davis, a death row inmate in the U.S. state of Georgia whose guilt has been challenged by new evidence, won a 90-day stay of his sentence Monday, just hours before his scheduled execution.

POLITICS: U.S. Social Forum Forges Common Ground

In all, the crowds were huge, the workshops passionate and inspiring, and participants made ideological, relational and personal gains, both large and small.

POLITICS-US: "We&#39re Living a Nightmare Called Katrina"

Under the banner, "If another world is possible, another U.S. is necessary," 10,000 civil society activists gathered in Atlanta, Georgia Wednesday for the beginning of the first U.S. Social Forum.