AP News in Brief at 5:58 p.m. EST

FORT HOOD, Texas (AP) - A soldier opened fire at a U.S. Army base in Fort Hood, Texas on Thursday, unleashing a stream of gunfire that left 12 people dead and 31 wounded. Authorities killed the gunman, and apprehended two other soldiers suspected in what appears to be the worst mass shooting at a U.S. military base.

The shooting began around 1:30 p.m., Lt. Gen. Bob Cone said at a news conference. He said all the casualties took place at the base's Soldier Readiness Center, where soldiers who are about to be deployed or who are returning undergo medical screening.

"It's a terrible tragedy. It's stunning," Cone said.

A law enforcement official identified the shooting suspect as Army Maj. Malik Nadal Hasan. The official said Hasan, believed to be in his late 30s, was killed after opening fire at the base. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the case publicly.

The official says investigators are trying to determine if Hasan was his birth name, or if he changed his name and converted to Islam at some point in his life.

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Obama confident, House leaders predicting victory on health bill as vote nears

WASHINGTON (AP) - Buoyed by two major endorsements, House Democratic leaders on Thursday predicted swift passage of President Barack Obama's historic health overhaul initiative. The president himself declared, "We are closer to passing this reform than ever before."

With a vote set for Saturday, momentum gathered behind the sweeping legislation to remake the U.S. health care system and extend coverage to millions of the uninsured. The American Medical Association and the powerful seniors' lobby AARP both threw their weight behind the bill Thursday. AARP, with its 40 million members, promised to run ads and contact activists to gin up support.

"I urge Congress to listen to AARP, listen to the AMA, and pass this reform for hundreds of millions of Americans who will benefit from it," Obama told reporters during an unannounced visit to the White House briefing room after the endorsements were announced.

At the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, Democrats were listening.

"We are right on the brink," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. "We have an historic opportunity for us to again provide quality health care for all Americans. It is something that many of us have worked our whole political lifetimes on."

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Relief as Fla. infant missing for 5 days is found alive, hidden in box under baby sitter's bed

CHIPLEY, Fla. (AP) - Investigators spent five days searching dense vines and marshes for a missing infant, only to find her lying quietly in a 2-foot by 3-foot cedar box that had been shoved under her baby sitter's bed.

Clothing was packed around it to muffle any sounds and baking powder placed inside to mask the stench of dirty diapers.

Authorities said the baby's mother, Chrystina Lynn Mercer, gave the infant to baby sitter Susan Elizabeth Baker early Saturday, then reported her missing about 10 hours later.

Washington County Sheriff Bobby Haddock choked up Thursday as he described how 7-month-old Shannon Dedrick was stashed in the box for 12 straight hours before investigators discovered her late Wednesday. They believe she had been in the box on and off for several days.

"She was way back under the bed," he said. "But she was not crying."

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Democrats ignore Republican boycott, push climate bill through a key Senate committee

WASHINGTON (AP) - Senate Democrats sidestepped a Republican boycott Thursday, pushing a climate bill out of committee in an early step on a long and contentious road to passage. Other committees still must weigh-in on the measure, but the partisan antics early on threatened to cast a pall over the bill - one of President Barack Obama's top priorities - as it makes its way to the Senate floor and as nations prepare to meet in Copenhagen, Denmark, next month to hammer out a new international treaty to slow climate change.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, chairman of the Senate Environment & Public Works Committee, had delayed the crucial vote for days because of a Republican protest over whether the cost of the legislation had been fully examined. But the California Democrat moved quickly to pass the bill Thursday, which for the first time would set mandatory limits on heat-trapping gases, without any of the seven GOP senators on the panel present. The measure cleared the panel on a 11-1 vote.

Boxer said the Republican demand for more analysis was "duplicative and waste of taxpayer dollars." Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has agreed to do a full analysis on the final version of the legislation.

"Advancing the bill is a necessary step on the road to garnering the 60 votes we need," said Boxer, who introduced the bill along with Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. in late September. "We are pleased that despite the Republican boycott, we have had the will to move this bill forward."

Former Vice President Al Gore, in town to promote his new global warming book, "Our Choice," said in an interview with The Associated Press that he doubted Boxer's move would have any lingering consequences.

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Chanting 'Kill the bill,' thousands rally at Capitol to protest health care overhaul bill

WASHINGTON (AP) - Chanting "Kill the bill," thousands of conservatives incensed over the Democrats' health care overhaul protested at the Capitol on Thursday, arguing that the legislation amounts to a government takeover of the nation's medical system.

The crowd, invited on national television by Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., was staunchly anti-government - "Politicians lie, people die," read one sign - but loudly cheered the House Republicans who hosted the event. The protest attracted many of the so-called Tea Party demonstrators angry with increased spending and an expanded government role under the Obama administration.

"This bill is the greatest threat to freedom that I have seen," House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio told the crowd.

"We're not going to leave this Hill until we kill this bill," declared Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa.

That's highly unlikely. House Democrats hope to pass the sweeping legislation on Saturday, buoyed by endorsements on Thursday from the American Medical Association and the AARP, the powerful seniors lobby. President Barack Obama makes a final appeal to Democrats during a rare visit to the Capitol Friday.

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Using 3-D modeling, Dartmouth computer scientist says infamous photo of JFK assassin is real

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) - The infamous photograph of Lee Harvey Oswald holding a rifle in his backyard would have been nearly impossible to fake, according to a new analysis by a Dartmouth College professor.

Oswald, who was shot to death days after being charged with the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy, claimed the photo of him holding a rifle in one hand and Marxist newspapers in the other had been doctored. Over the years, many others have pointed out what appear to be inconsistent lighting and shadows.

But Hany Farid, director of the Neukom Institute for Computational Science at Dartmouth, said the shadows are exactly where they should be.

"You can never really prove an image is real, but the evidence that people have pointed to that the photo is fake is incorrect," Farid said Thursday. "As an academic and a scientist, I don't like to say it's absolutely authentic ... but it's extremely unlikely to have been a fake."

Farid, whose work using digital forensic tools to analyze images often has been used by law enforcement, said he has been getting requests from conspiracy theorists to analyze the photo for years. He said he held off until he had the appropriate software to create three-dimensional models of Oswald's head and surroundings.

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Saudi Arabia launches large military offensive against Yemen Shiite rebels

SAN'A, Yemen (AP) - Saudi Arabia sent fighter jets and artillery bombardments across the border into northern Yemen Thursday in a military incursion apparently aimed at helping its troubled southern neighbor control an escalating Shiite rebellion, Arab diplomats and the rebels said.

The Saudis - owners of a sophisticated air force they rarely use - have been increasingly worried that extremism and instability in Yemen could spill over to their country, the world's largest oil exporter. The offensive came two days after the killing of a Saudi soldier, blamed on the rebels.

Yemen denied any military action by Saudi Arabia inside its borders. But Yemen's president is a key ally of the Saudis, making it highly unlikely the kingdom would have launched the offensive without tacit Yemeni agreement.

A U.S. government official said the Yemenis were not involved militarily in the fighting. The official spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

The offensive immediately raised concerns of another proxy war in the Middle East between Iran and Saudi Arabia, a key U.S. ally. Shiite Iran is believed to favor the rebels in Yemen while Saudi Arabia, which is Sunni, is Iran's fiercest regional rival.

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Oprah Winfrey keeps singer BeBe Winans off show until domestic charges against him are resolved

NEW YORK (AP) - Oprah Winfrey is removing gospel singer BeBe Winans from her show's "karaoke challenge" until charges against him for allegedly pushing his ex-wife to the ground are resolved.

Winans appeared on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" last week and was seen in promos for future appearances. Now he'll be cut out of the segment, said Winfrey spokesman Don Halcombe on Thursday.

Winfrey was criticized by some bloggers this week for including Winans after she had taken a strong stand against domestic violence earlier this year. She did a show on the topic when singer Chris Brown assaulted his then-girlfriend Rihanna.

The daytime TV leader said at the time: "Domestic violence is something that I wouldn't tolerate. Period."

Halcombe would only say that the decision to eliminate Winans was made this week. It was not clear if Winfrey had been aware that Winans was charged with misdemeanor domestic assault in the Feb. 13 incident, where Winans and his ex-wife Debra were allegedly arguing about their children. Winans has a court date set for Jan. 20.

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`You hit a what?' Oklahoma couple nearly slams into wayward elephant on way home from church

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) - It's not unusual to see a deer or a cow crossing Oklahoma's rural highways. But an elephant? A couple driving home from church nearly slammed into a giant pachyderm that had escaped from a nearby circus late Wednesday.

"Didn't have time to hit the brakes. The elephant blended in with the road," driver Bill Carpenter said Thursday. "At the very last second I said 'elephant!'"

Carpenter, 68, said he swerved his SUV at the last second and ended up sideswiping the 29-year-old female elephant on U.S. 81 in Enid, about 80 miles north of Oklahoma City.

"So help me Hanna, had I hit that elephant, not swerved, it would have knocked it off its legs, and it would have landed right on top of us," he said. "We'd have been history."

The couple, who own a wheat farm, weren't injured. But the 8-foot, 4,500-pound elephant was being examined Thursday for a broken tusk and a leg wound. A local veterinarian said it appeared to have escaped major injury.

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NOW calls for Cable to be suspended while Raiders investigate domestic violence charges

ALAMEDA, Calif. (AP) - The National Organization for Women called on the Oakland Raiders to suspend coach Tom Cable while the team investigates allegations he has a history of violent behavior toward women.

NOW president Terry O'Neill praised the Raiders in a statement for undertaking a "serious evaluation" of charges made by Cable's first wife, Sandy Cable, and former girlfriend, Marie Lutz, that the coach physically abused them at various times during their relationships.

But she said that Cable should be suspended while that investigation proceeds. The Raiders had no comment.

"This is the National Football League. Boys and girls around the country, as well as many women, look to the leaders of the NFL as our role models," O'Neill said in a phone interview. "Why would the NFL tolerate having a man who admits to having battered his wife."

Cable has acknowledged striking Sandy Cable with an open hand more than 20 years ago and said it was the only time he's ever touched a woman inappropriately. Marie Lutz accused Cable of assaulting her as recently as last January, but Cable said previously he was cleared by police of any wrongdoing in that case.