The broad smile, a trademark of his 20 years of representing the North Coast in Congress, still flashes across Don Clausen’s face.

Retired Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey of Petaluma will help preside over a five-day media event aimed at revealing evidence of an ‘extraterrestrial presence’ and a decades-long government effort to cover it up.

Rep. Jared Huffman, just three months into his first term as the North Coast’s representative in Congress, is already building a war chest for his 2014 re-election campaign.

Veteran Rep. Mike Thompson and House newcomer Jared Huffman both cracked the million-dollar mark in last year’s campaign and are regarded as formidable North Coast political fundraisers. But compared to their colleagues on Capitol Hill, the two Democrats were in middle of the pack in the 2012 money race in which 439 House winners, including six delegates, raised nearly $742 million.

The air traffic control tower at Sonoma County’s regional airport may be shut down if the nation’s elected leaders can’t reach a budget deal by Friday, a scenario some fear could limit commercial passenger flights in and out of Santa Rosa or halt them entirely.

Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, on Thursday released a set of 15 policy recommendations on preventing gun violence, including a federal ban on assault weapons and background checks for most gun buyers, as well as proposals regarding mental health, school safety and media portrayals of violence.

Across the nation Wednesday, people absorbed the news that the Postal Service plans to stop delivering mail on Saturdays as a cost-savings measure. The change will take effect in August.

Freshman Rep. Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, has been appointed to House committees on natural resources and the budget, his office said Wednesday.

Hollywood studios, NASCAR, Goldman Sachs and rum distillers are among the hidden winners in this week’s “fiscal cliff” vote.

If the country heads over the fiscal cliff Tuesday, Californians will be slapped simultaneously with a slew of federal tax increases and higher state income and sales taxes from Proposition 30. Absent a last-minute deal, the federal tax increases alone will hit the average family with more than $3,500 in higher taxes in 2013.