By LISA HOFFMAN, Scripps Howard News Service

WASHINGTON - To the Pentagon, they're "equipment." But to the U.S. troops who have served with the military's working dogs, they are the unsung heroes of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

WASHINGTON - You might think that, in a time when heinous murders, violent drug lords and brazen bank robberies are not uncommon, it would be easy to find two bad guys on the lam to designate as the "worst of the worst."

WASHINGTON - If it hasn't already, your cellphone service provider will soon notify you that it has hooked up with a new government emergency system that will send direct text messages to alert you to missing kids, impending bad weather and, most ominously, word from the president about a national cataclysm.

WASHINGTON - The investigation into the operation of Arlington National Cemetery and the discrepancies in thousands of death records there has unearthed a little-known, but revealing, piece of American cultural history: Call them the "tombs of the unnamed."

WASHINGTON - It's been a tough year for global dictators and major-league bad guys.

Those who died, were arrested or otherwise forced from power in 2011 after years of repressive rule include: North Korea's Kim Jong Il; Libya's Moammar Gadhafi; Egypt's Hosni Mubarak; Tunisia's Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali; Yemen's Ali Abdullah Saleh; and Ivory Coast's Laurent Gbagbo.

WASHINGTON - One of the last legal loopholes for federal workers who smoke would be closed under a measure newly introduced in the House.

Since a 1997 Clinton administration executive order, smoking has been banned in most areas of many federal buildings. But, until 2008, smoking was allowed in some indoor and outdoor designated areas.

WASHINGTON - Hollywood gossips say Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt intend to adopt another child from Ethiopia. If they succeed, the movie-star couple will be among the lucky few who do.

WASHINGTON - For Tea Partiers and others disenchanted with the GOP stable of presidential candidates -- not to mention President Barack Obama -- now comes a movement to draft Rick Santelli, the CNBC star whose red-faced, on-air rant in 2009 is credited with inspiring the birth of the renegade movement.

WASHINGTON - Since 9/11, the size of the FBI has mushroomed along with its mission, with the bureau's offices in Washington spreading far beyond the confines of the J. Edgar Hoover headquarters building.

WASHINGTON - National Football League teams don't just deliver big bucks to their players. They also drop substantial sums into the pockets of politicians.