Prison guard union backs Angelides

SACRAMENTO — The 31,000-member union representing state prison guards, with millions of dollars in reserve for spending on the November election, endorsed Democratic gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides on Wednesday.

The union has tangled with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger since he took office and is in the middle of contract negotiations with the administration. It also helped derail Schwarzenegger’s special legislative session on prison reform this summer and his proposal to spend $6 billion on prison construction./AP

Rumsfeld ‘no confidence’ vote falters in Senate

WASHINGTON — Senate Democrats pushed for a vote Wednesday calling for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to be fired, but Republicans moved to head them off.

Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., submitted the resolution, which blasted the Bush administration’s Iraq policy. “‘Staying the course’ is not a strategy for success,” it said.

Republicans called the move a political stunt and stood by Rumsfeld.

Even Democrats acknowledged that the Rumsfeld resolution, which is nonbinding in the first place, would be struck down on a point of order anyway since it is not germane to the pending legislation, the Pentagon spending bill./AP

Blair faces calls for him to step down

LONDON — Prime Minister Tony Blair was locked in a fight Wednesday to keep control over when he leaves office, with 15 Labour lawmakers demanding he step down. They included seven junior members who resigned to protest his refusal to do so.

Blair warned the rebels that infighting would jeopardize the governing Labour Party’s effort to hold onto power, while top officials sent strong signals that Blair intended to leave office within a year.

The revolt of low-level officials was unlikely to dislodge Blair from office, though it could help force him to speed up his departure and raised fears the eventual change of command in Britain would be rancorous and messy./AP

Beating investigated as hate crime

PETALUMA — Three white men assaulted a young black man in a Petaluma neighborhood early, taunting him with racial slurs and telling him he did not belong there, police said.

The victim told police he was walking in an area near downtown at 12:04 a.m. Monday when he was approached by a white male, who told him he did not belong in the neighborhood and used derogatory racial slurs. A fight broke out between the two men when two others joined in.

The victim was left lying in the street and was later taken to Petaluma Valley Hospital for treatment./AP