Who do Senator John McCain's advisors want him to face in November's presidential election? According to Elisabeth Bumiller, a political affairs reporter for The New York Times, the answer is Illinois Senator Barack Obama. "They feel they have a better case against Obama," said Bumiller, who has covered McCain's campaign ever since he won the New Hampshire primary in January.

As finals week approaches, teaching assistants across the university are probably gearing up for long nights spent answering last-minute questions over e-mails and extra office hours. However, they did have an opportunity to relax with free food and drinks last night at the Graduate Student Center, where the University honored 12 TAs for Excellence in Teaching.

Thanks to a new program by Housing and Conference Services, throwing out unwanted items at the end of the school year has never felt better. In an effort to promote environmental and social responsibility, HCS will be collecting students' old clothes and appliances and donating them to charity during the move-out period.

Former Dean of Admissions Lee Stetson, whose 29-year tenure at Penn ended with an abrupt resignation last semester, is starting his own college consulting company, to the surprise of the admissions community. The company - called Stetson College Advisory - will work with "colleges and universities in evaluating their admissions programs, advising selected high-school students regarding the college search process and conducting searches for secondary schools," according to the description posted on the Harvard Summer Institute on College Admissions's Web site, which lists Stetson as a faculty member.

Giant puppets and a herd of elementary-school students may not seem like the most obvious path for social activism, but a local nonprofit organization is giving it a try anyway. The Spiral Q Puppet Theater, which uses puppets, street theater, parades, and pageants to promote community unity and social activism, will be putting on the first of its three spring parades today.

Despite last week's court ruling blocking the enforcement of new gun-control measures in Philadelphia, some faculty, students and city residents are still calling for what they call "common-sense" firearm laws. The proposed measures, signed into law by Mayor Nutter earlier this month, would limit individuals to one firearm purchase per month, require that owners report lost or stolen guns within 24 hours, ban the possession of automatic weapons and prohibit persons with an order of protection against them and persons deemed dangerous from possessing firearms.

Speed, strength and endurance are on full display this weekend during the finals of the 114th annual Penn Relays. Penn Relays, America's premiere track and field event of the early outdoor season, invited qualifying teams from 950 high schools and 250 colleges worldwide this year, along with professionals from some of the world's top track clubs.

Penn boasts a high percentage of international students in the Ivy League, but that hasn't quenched domestic students' thirst for exposure to the rest of the world. Interest in languages like Arabic and East Asian dialects has increased over the past several years, largely because of the way the international landscape is changing, said College Dean Dennis DeTurck.

If you're stressed or upset, you're not alone. That's the message of the Me Too Campaign, launched by Duke junior Deepika Ravi this past March as an effort to remind students that their peers are dealing with many of the same problems. In addition to handing out 370 T-shirts with the phrase "Me Too" written on them, campaign leaders hung banners and flyers around campus, held a barbecue to raise awareness and created a Me Too blog for students to post their stories, feelings and experiences.

Green is the new red and blue - at least, that's the message Penn is hoping to instill in incoming students before they even set foot here. PennGreen, a new pre-orientation program created by the Undergraduate Assembly earlier this year, will officially debut with a pilot run to train 14 recently-selected freshmen and sophomore leaders this August.

Following a two-hour search, the man suspected of shooting a constable and one other person yesterday in Yeadon was arrested in West Philadelphia. Tamarr Minor, 21, was arrested by Philadelphia police for the shooting, according to Philadelphia Police Lt.

The Undergraduate Assembly elected its new executive board for the 2008-2009 school year last night after a six-hour meeting that was open to the public. College and Wharton junior Wilson Tong will lead the UA as the body's new chairman. Tong, the current vice chairman for external affairs, is also the first Asian-American chairman in the UA's history.

To many schools with less-than-rigorous threat assessment systems, the past year's spate of school shootings have been a wake-up call. Over the past year, many universities around the country have responded to shootings at Virginia Tech and other colleges by forming new groups to monitor students who display troubled behavior and assess whether they pose a wider threat to the community.

The styrofoam hats and wooden canes are back - but not on the usual Friday afternoon. Next Tuesday, the class of 2009 will officially make its passage into seniordom as part of the 93-year-old tradition of Hey Day. Hey Day is traditionally held on the last day of classes, a Friday.

As universities across the country continue to introduce campus-wide Internet access, the University of Chicago Law School is doing the exact opposite. The school recently announced plans to eliminate Internet access in most of its classrooms, but Penn has no plans to implement similar policies.

Some Penn students take classes in Fisher-Bennett Hall or David Rittenhouse Labs. Others head to Philadelphia public schools or community centers to participate in Academically Based Community Service Courses that teach "problem-solving learning." At yesterday's fifth-annual ABCS Summit, students, faculty and administrators gathered in Logan Hall to discuss the future of ABCS courses at Penn and possibilities for integrating them further into the curriculum.

Sipping water out of that Nalgene bottle might not be so good for you. Numerous studies, including one at the University of Cincinnati earlier this year, show that traces of the toxic substance bisphenol-A, commonly called BPA, are released from Nalgene bottles' "unbreakable" plastic.