U.S. District Judge Keith P. Ellison made the comment after a nearly two-hour hearing in which attorneys for both sides reiterated arguments they had already briefed in court filings over the last few months.

The issues before Ellison are whether or not he should throw out the lawsuit and if he doesn't, whether it should stay in Texas.

"I really have been agonizing over these claims," Ellison said.

Clemens sued Brian McNamee in January after the pitcher's former trainer told baseball investigator and former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell that the seven-time Cy Young Award winner used steroids and human growth hormone.

Clemens' attorney, Joe Roden, said his client had agreed to drop one claim against McNamee, for intentional infliction of emotional distress, because it was covered in other parts of the lawsuit.

A 354-game winner, Clemens is under investigation by the FBI after denying McNamee's claims while under oath during a deposition and public testimony before a congressional committee.

The dispute between the broadcast networks and the Federal Communications Commission is the court's first major broadcast indecency case in 30 years.

At issue is the FCC's policy, adopted in 2004, that even a one-time use of profanity on live television is indecent because some words are so offensive that they always evoke sexual or excretory images. So-called fleeting expletives were not treated as indecent before then.

The words in question begin with the letters "F" and "S." The Associated Press typically does not use them.

Chief Justice John Roberts, the only justice with young children at home, suggested that the commission's policy is reasonable. The use of either word, Roberts said, "is associated with sexual or excretory activity. That's what gives it its force."

Justice John Paul Stevens, who appeared skeptical of the policy, doubted that the f-word always conveys a sexual image.

Levine, once a professional guitar player and pianist, now plays with one hand and sings. "It's about getting my glow back," she said recently as she was awaiting a hearing Monday before the U.S. Supreme Court, where Wyeth is appealing a $6.7 million verdict in her favor.

The outcome of Levine's case could have major ramifications for drug makers and consumers. The court is expected to decide whether people can sue under state law — or are pre-empted from doing so — for harm caused by a drug approved by the federal Food and Drug Administration.

Maureen Stevens' husband, Robert, was a photo editor who was exposed to anthrax mailed to the Boca Raton office of American Media Inc., a supermarket tabloid publisher, in 2001. He was the first of five people killed and 17 others sickened in a series of similar attacks.

Justices ruled 4-1 that the defendants had a duty under Florida law to protect the public against the unauthorized release of lethal materials. It's an important, although preliminary, victory for the widow whose $50 million federal lawsuit also alleges the government and Battelle Memorial Institute, a private laboratory in Columbus, Ohio, were the source of the anthrax.

"We have no way of knowing whether Stevens will ultimately be able to prove a case against the defendants," Justice Harry Lee Anstead wrote in the majority opinion. "However, we concluded that Stevens' allegations are sufficient to open the courthouse doors."

Marc M. Keyser, 66, was interviewed by the FBI in January 2007 for allegedly sending a package containing a small aerosol can labeled "Anthrax," along with a compact disc, to the Sacramento News and Review newspaper, according a criminal complaint filed Thursday in federal court.

Keyser told agents then that he was using the mailing as a publicity stunt for a novel he had penned, and "to model what would happen if terrorist were to use anthrax ... to show the amount of anthrax a terrorist might spray into the air conditioning system in a shopping mall." The can did not contain anthrax.

Agents warned Keyser that he violated federal law and could be prosecuted, but they didn't arrest him. Agent Filip Colfescu said in the complaint that Keyser at the time apologized for the hoax "and told agents they should not worry, that he would not be doing it again."

Sen. Dianne Wilkerson was charged with attempted extortion as a public official and theft of honest services as a state senator. She did not enter a plea during an initial court appearance Tuesday.

She faces up to 20 years in prison and $250,000 in fines on each count.

Wilkerson, 53, lost the Democratic primary in September to former teacher Sonia Chang-Diaz despite support from Mayor Thomas Menino and Gov. Deval Patrick. She is running a write-in campaign for the Nov. 4 election, in hopes of retaining the seat she has held since 1993.

Wilkerson was ordered Tuesday to have no contact with witnesses and retain any documents related to the extortion case or to her personal finances.

In asking for those conditions, Assistant U.S. Attorney John McNeil said Wilkerson has a "long history of acting as if she is above the law."

Wilkerson's attorney, Max Stern, said she would obey the judge. She has been released on an unsecured $50,000 bond.

"I believe it's finally going to be over. I'm getting myself prepared to be done and get it over with," Marco Allen Chapman told The Associated Press.

Defense attorneys this week asked the state Supreme Court to stay the 36-year-old's execution, set for Nov. 21. Even though Chapman dismissed his lawyers in 2004 before pleading guilty to murder, public defenders have continued to file motions on his behalf, questioning his competency.

Attorneys have also filed motions arguing that he shouldn't be put to death until appeals are exhausted in a separate case questioning Kentucky's execution protocol. That case is pending before the state Supreme Court.

Chapman has been found competent three times. He has sued public defenders, seeking an order to stop them from filing additional appeals. He says he wants to be executed for murdering 6-year-old Cody Sharon and 7-year-old Chelbi Sharon in the northern Kentucky town of Warsaw in August 2002.

The Kentucky Attorney General's office asked the state's high court on Tuesday to call off any more competency tests and allow Chapman to be executed.

If the lethal injection goes forward, he would become the first Kentucky inmate put to death since 1999.

Chapman remains hopeful that the court proceedings are swiftly concluded and says he's sorting through what could be the final details of his life.

"We're still working on things, like what to do with my remains," Chapman said.