The nation in brief QUOTE OF THE DAY

“The president and his allies have

taken so many things off the table the only thing left is varnish.” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, RKy., who said the president’s focus on higher tax rates for top earners has made a budget deal tough to reach Article, 1APart of I-77 patched after blast SISSONVILLE, W.Va. - Contractors worked through the night scraping away burned asphalt and repaving an 800-foot swath of Interstate 77 charred by a natural-gas pipeline explosion and fire.

The Tuesday afternoon blast between Sissonville and Pocatalico melted guardrails, cooked the green enamel off highway signs and burned utility poles, while leaving a huge hole in the highway. Four homes were destroyed, while another five were damaged.

Several people were treated for smoke inhalation; however, no serious injuries or deaths were reported.

The northbound lanes of I-77 reopened early Wednesday and traffic began flowing on the southbound lanes a few hours later.

Whites projected to

be minority by ’43

LOS ANGELES - Whites will no longer make up a majority of Americans by 2043 as the United States will for the first time become a majority of minority groups, the Census Bureau projects.

In its first set of projections based on the 2010 Census, officials said the U.S. population will be more racially and ethnically diverse by 2060. The nation is also expected to grow at a slower pace in coming decades. The nation’s population, about 315 million in September, is expected to cross the 400 million threshold in 2051, hitting 420.3 million in 2060.

Demographers have been expecting that the proportion of the white population to decrease over time. Whites are expected to remain the largest single group but no longer constitute a majority by 2043, according to the census.

According to the census, the non-Hispanic white population is projected to peak in 2024 at 199.6 million, up from 197.8 million this year. Unlike other racial or ethnic groups, however, its population is projected to slowly decrease.

Fast and Furious

buyer sentenced

PHOENIX - A man who purchased two rifles found at the scene of the fatal shooting of a Border Patrol agent was sentenced Wednesday to nearly five years in federal prison.

Jaime Avila Jr., 25, received a sentence of 57 months, a penalty on the lower end of federal guidelines, for his acknowledged role in a gun-smuggling ring targeted in a botched federal investigation known as Operation Fast and Furious. He wasn’t charged in Terry’s death.

Two weapons acquired by Avila from a suburban Phoenix gun store were found in the aftermath of a 2010 shootout that mortally wounded Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry near the Arizona border city of Nogales. The firefight was between border agents and five men who had sneaked into the country from Mexico for the purpose of robbingmarijuana smugglers.

Federal authorities conducting the Fast and Furious investigation have faced tough criticism for allowing suspected straw gun buyers for the ring to walk away from gun shops in Arizona with weapons, rather than arrest the suspects and seize the guns there.

Front Section, Pages 2 on 12/13/2012

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