USA

August 7, 2007

President Bush took time out from talks with visiting Afghan President Hamid Karzai Sunday to sign into law a measure authorizing greater warrantless surveillance of phone calls, e-mails, and other communications of foreign nationals suspected of terrorism.

The National Transportation Safety Board said Minneapolis could begin removing remnants of the Interstate 35W Bridge, which collapsed Aug. 1, from the Mississippi River. Clearing the river could aid in the investigation of the accident, which killed five people and left eight missing, and open a channel for boat traffic.

In a debate among nine Republi-can presidential hopefuls Sunday in Des Moines, Iowa, only Rep. Ron Paul of Texas called for a speedy recall of US troops from Iraq. The issue that produced the most verbal sparring was abortion.

During a weekend marked by special sports achievements:

• Alex Rodriguez of the New York Yankees became the youngest player, at 32, to hit 500 career home runs.

• Pitcher Tom Glavine of the New York Mets joined Roger Clemens and Greg Maddux as the only active players to record 300 career wins.

• In swimming, Dara Torres, who's now a mother, became the oldest national champion ever, at 40, by beating her US record to win the 50-meter freestyle.

The board of Chrysler LLC, which is under new private ownership, named former Home Depot boss Bob Nardelli Monday to head the No. 3 US automaker. He resigned from Home Depot in January after criticism over his pay and the company's slumping share price.

Delphi Corp., the former parts division of General Motors Corp., reached tentative agreements Monday with four more unions, after recently securing wage cuts from the United Auto Workers, its largest union. The pacts should help Delphi emerge from bankruptcy protection.

In what preservationists are calling a new era in Houston's cultural consciousness, the City Council has created the city's first protected historic district, in the Old Sixth Ward, an area with many 19th-century homes. the Houston Chronicle reported.

Civil rights lawyer Oliver Hill, who died Sunday in Richmond, Va., was best known for advancing the cause of school integration by participating in a series of lawsuits that led to the US Supreme Court's 1954 landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision.