Ashley Cowan

National: Veterans constitute a quarter of America's homeless

Today in the United States, veterans make up one in four homeless people. According to a report to be released on Thursday, they are only 11 percent of the general adult population. Even young veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are creeping into shelters. The Veterans Affairs Department has identified 1,500 homeless veterans from the current wars and says 400 of them have participated in its programs specifically targeting homelessness.

Opinion: It breaks my heart to hear that our loyal soldiers are now becoming homeless. It's sad enough to me that all of them are in Iraq, but to hear that when they come home they are forced to go to homeless shelters. I wish that there was some way for these boys to come home to a real home and be honored for their brave duties.

International: High school shooter in Finland leaves suicide note.

On Thursday in Tuusula, Finland, 18-year-old Pekka-Eric Auvinen, opened fire on his high school. Auvinen reportedly killed 6 of his fellow school mates, the school nurse, and the principal, before killing himself. Auvinen was reportedly a bullied teenage outcast and fired nearly 20 rounds into some victims before trying to start a fire. Investigators had found a suicide note and hate-filled Internet postings to find out why Auvinen had gone on the killing spree. The current students at the school mourned the victims killed in the shooting.

Opinion: O my goodness! First of all I'm going to start by saying that all of these crazy columbine kids are the outcasts at school that are bullied. If kids in school were to stop bullying theses kids, I can almost guarantee that the school shooting rate will go down. It's terrible that kids these days have so much hatred in their hearts to go about shooting people like this. It seems that after the Virginia Tech shooting that all of these kids are coming out with all of this anger.

National: San Francisco beaches closed due to oil spill

Due to an oil spill, San Francisco has had to close five beaches. The spill was reportedly caused by oil that leaked form a cargo ship after it bumped into the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. The spill was washing up as far as 40 miles north of San Francisco, the Coast Guard said on Thursday. About 58,000 gallons of oil spilled from the ship when it struck a tower supporting the bridge Wednesday morning. Officials said that the accident caused no structural damage but the lower part of the boat had a large gash.

Opinion: Well all I really have to say is "that sucks." It's not really possible for Arizona to have an oil spill considering the fact that we dont have any ships passing by ha ha ha. I no, I no, that was a pretty amazing joke :). I hope that the Coast Guard can get things under control as soon as possible.