Darius Rucker becomes first black singer to win new artist honor

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - It’s been Taylor Swift’s year, and Wednesday was her night as she became the youngest person and the first solo female act in a decade to win the Country Music Association’s entertainer of the year award.

Swift won all four awards for which she was nominated, making history on a historic night that included Darius Rucker’s win as new artist.

“I’ll never forget this moment because in this moment everything that I have ever wanted has just happened to me,” Swift said through tears as she accepted the association’s highest honor during ceremonies at Sommet Center. The 19-year-old crossover sensation beat the biggest names in country and snapped Kenny Chesney’s stranglehold on the category: He won three straight and four of the last five. She also ended Carrie Underwood’s three-year dominance in the female vocalist category.

Chesney hugged and kissed Swift on the cheek, then whispered a message in her ear before she received the trophy. She called her band on stage and was the center of a group hug as fans cheered wildly, holding signs that said, “We love you, Taylor”; her father cried in the audience.

“Every single person in that category let me open up for them this year,” Swift said. “Thank you all so much. I love you.”

Historic honor for Hootie frontman
Rucker was also a fan favorite, running into the crowd during his performance of “Alright.” The Hootie and the Blowfish frontman, who has sold 1 million copies of his first country album, “Learn to Live,” became the second African-American to win a major individual CMA.

He joins Charley Pride, who won entertainer of the year in 1971 and male vocalist in 1971-72.

“First of all, to the fans, thank y’all for accepting me,” the jubilant Rucker said. “And I think most importantly, to country radio, you took a chance on a pop singer from Charleston, S.C. Thank you so much for that!”

Swift also won album of the year for “Fearless,” the top-selling CD of the year, and video of the year for “Love Story.”

“You guys, this album is my diary and so to all the people who voted for me for this is a thank you for saying you love my diary because that’s the nicest compliment,” Swift said.

Brad Paisley, who led all nominees with seven, won two awards, including his third straight male vocalist of the year.

“This was the best time I’ve ever had at an awards show,” said Paisley.

Lady Antebellum also won two awards, for vocal group and single of the year. The win in the vocal group category ended Rascal Flatts’ six-year dominance.

“Rascal Flatts, you’ve inspired us for such a long time,” Lady Antebellum singer Charles Kelly said. “Thank you so much for letting us be up here.”

Jamey Johnson, along with James Otto and Lee Thomas Miller, won song of the year for “In Color.”

“I never thought you guys would even let me come to things like this,” Johnson, the country outlaw with the scruffy beard, joked as the audience laughed.

Swift kicked off the show with a playful version of her song, “Forever & Again,” throwing a chair off a raised podium, sliding down a pole and dropping to her knees to the delighted cheers of the crowd.

It was the Zac Brown Band that set the room on fire, though, with its high-rev version of Charlie Daniels’ “The Devil Went Down to Georgia.”

Poking fun at Kanye West
Co-hosts Paisley and Underwood opened the show with a few new songs of their own, skewering Kanye West for his interruption of Swift’s MTV Video Music Awards win — “Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be Kanye” — and lamenting the break up of Brooks & Dunn.

Later in the show, telecast on ABC, country novelty singer Little Jimmy Dickens interrupted Paisley after Underwood told him that “Welcome to the Future” was one her favorite videos.

“Excuse me sir, excuse me. I’ll let you finish later. Now, Brad Paisley, I know you had a nice video, but … Taylor Swift made the best video in her time. You go girl,” the diminutive Dickens said, goofing on West, who famously took the stage during Swift’s acceptance speech to say that Beyonce deserved Swift’s prize.

Brooks & Dunn, the best-selling duo who announced their split earlier this year, teamed with ZZ Top guitarist Billy Gibbons on a scorching version of “Honky Tonk Stomp” in what was billed as their last performance at show.

But CMA voters weren’t moved by sentiment in the vocal duo of the year category, awarding Sugarland the honor for the third straight year.

“We don’t usually expect this but we obviously didn’t this year,” said Jennifer Nettles, half of the duo that extended an invitation to Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn to come up and speak to their fans, but they declined.

Australian bomb-sniffing black lab disappeared after battle with militants

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, front left, and U.S. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, pat explosive detection dog Sabi in Tarin Kowt, Uruzgan, on Wednesday. Sabi, who disappeared during a fierce battle between Australian troops and militant fighters, has been found and returned to its unit after more than a year.

SYDNEY - A bomb-sniffing dog that disappeared during a fierce battle in Afghanistan between Australian troops and militant fighters has been found and returned to its unit after more than a year.

And Sabi the black labrador is getting a celebrity welcome home.

Sabi was with a joint Australian-Afghan army patrol ambushed in restive Uruzgan province in September 2008, triggering a gunfight that wounded nine troops and earned one Australian soldier the country’s highest bravery medal.

But there was no sign of Sabi after the battle, and months of searching failed to find any sign of the retriever — until now.

Defense officials said Thursday that a U.S. soldier recovered Sabi at an isolated patrol base elsewhere in Uruzgan. Further details about the base were not given.

‘Genuinely nice pooch’
The dog was returned to the Australians’ base in the province just in time for a visit by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who was photographed Wednesday along with the U.S. commander in Afghanistan Gen. Stanley McChrystal petting Sabi.

“Sabi is back home in one piece and is a genuinely nice pooch as well,” Rudd told reporters.

Exactly where Sabi has been or what happened to her during the past 14 months will probably never be known, though that she was in good condition when she was found indicated somebody had been looking after her, military spokesman Brig. Brian Dawson told reporters in Canberra.

There will be five films vying to win the Oscar for best animated film next year after a record 20 movies were submitted for consideration.

Most years only see three nominations, as under Academy rules at least 16 eligible films must be submitted to expand the category to five runners.

Box office hit Up, Fantastic Mr Fox, Monsters vs Aliens and Coraline are all on the list of hopefuls.

The nominations will be announced on 2 February with the ceremony on 7 March.

Best picture

Also in the running include Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, A Christmas Carol, Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs and Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel.

Since the best animated film category was introduced in 2002 - which was won by Shrek - there has only been one year where five films have been nominated for the award.

In 2003, 17 films qualified and Japanese film-maker Hayao Miyazaki’s fantasy Spirited Away claimed the Oscar.

Films submitted in the animated feature film category can also run in other categories including best picture, but the only film ever to do so to date was Disney classic Beauty and the Beast in 1991.

Officials say one option would target income above $250,000 a year

WASHINGTON - Majority Leader Harry Reid is considering a plan for higher payroll taxes on upper-income earners to help finance health care legislation he intends to introduce in the Senate in the next several days, Democratic officials said Wednesday.

These officials said one of the options Reid has had under review would raise the payroll tax that goes to Medicare, but only on income above $250,000 a year. Current law sets the tax at 1.45 percent of income, an amount matched by employers.

It was not known how large an increase Reid, D-Nev., was considering, or whether it would also apply to a company’s portion of the tax. President Barack Obama has said he will not raise taxes on wage earners making less than $250,000.

The officials spoke only on condition of anonymity, saying they were not authorized to disclose details of private deliberations.

No final decisions made
Reid’s spokesman, Jim Manley, said the majority leader has made no final decisions and is awaiting detailed information from the Congressional Budget Office about the cost and coverage implications of the proposals he has drafted.

Reid sent his proposals to the CBO more than two weeks ago and recently took the first step on the Senate floor to begin a debate on health care as early as next week.

The House passed its version of the legislation late last week on a near party line vote of 220-215, a victory for Obama as well as his allies in Congress.

In general, the House-passed measure and the one Reid is expected to propose are designed to expand coverage to tens of millions of uninsured, eliminate insurance industry practices such as denying coverage on the basis of pre-existing medical conditions, and slow the overall rate of growth in health care spending nationally.

Reid has been merging bills cleared earlier by two separate committees but has a virtual free hand in the bill he crafts.

Public option
On one contentious issue, he has already said his measure will include an option for consumers to purchase health care from the government as a way to create competition with private companies. States could drop out of the system.

The House bill is significantly more generous in providing subsidies to help lower-income individuals and families afford coverage, and Reid is under pressure to find additional financing. Additionally, a Senate Finance Committee-approved proposal to tax very high-cost insurance policies has drawn criticism from organized labor, which wants it either modified or dropped altogether.

Ambassador in Afghanistan reportedly questions country’s stability

WASHINGTON - The U.S. envoy in Afghanistan, a former Army general who once commanded troops in the country, has objected strongly to emerging plans to send tens of thousands of additional forces to the country, a senior U.S. official said Wednesday.

Ambassador Karl Eikenberry resigned his Army commission to take the job as U.S. ambassador in Kabul earlier this year, and his is an influential voice among those advising President Barack Obama on Afghanistan. Eikenberry sent multiple classified cables to Washington over the past week that question the wisdom of adding forces when the Afghan political situation is unstable and uncertain, said an official familiar with the cables. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal administration deliberations and the classified documents.

Cables are diplomatic messages that may or may not be classified and carry greater heft than other forms of communication such as e-mail.

Eikenberry made the point that the administration should step cautiously in planning for any troop buildup while there are still so many questions surrounding Afghan President Hamid Karzai, the official said. Eikenberry is the front line U.S. official dealing with Karzai, the U.S.-backed leader whose administration was stained by corruption and mismanagement.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Thursday that she is concerned about Afghanistan’s “corruption, lack of transparency, poor governance (and) absence of the rule of law.”

“We’re looking to President Karzai as he forms a new government to take action that will demonstrate — not just to the international community but first and foremost to his own people — that his second term will respond the needs that are so manifest,” Clinton said during a news conference in Manila with Philippine Foreign Secretary Alberto Romulo.

Wild card
It was a visiting senior senator, Democrat John Kerry, who was instrumental in persuading Karzai last month to accept the findings of a U.N. panel that his re-election vote in August was too marred by fraud to stand.

Karzai agreed to a second round of voting but was elevated to a second term as president without a runoff election when his challenger dropped out. Since then, U.S. officials have been alarmed at some of Karzai’s remarks and the lack, so far, of meaningful steps to clean house.

Eikenberry’s objections were a wild card in the midst of what had appeared to be the final days of Obama’s long decision-making process on how to revamp U.S. strategy in the 8-year war. Eikenberry has participated in some of Obama’s war council sessions over the past several weeks.

A senior U.S. official told The Associated Press that Obama rejected all four options presented to him at what had been expected to be the last of those sessions Wednesday. Those options started from the premise that some addition of U.S. forces is necessary, and included ways that Obama could meet or nearly meet war commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s preference for about 40,000 additional troops.

It is not clear whether Eikenberry’s objections played a part in Obama’s decision not to accept any of the choices prepared by military planners Wednesday.

At his Senate confirmation hearing in March, Eikenberry underscored what he called the urgency of the requirement to turn around the war effort, which has evolved into a stalemate in key parts of Afghanistan as the Taliban-led insurgency has gained clout.