 AP - President-elect Barack Obama plunged into rare pre-inaugural crisis talks with congressional leaders Monday, declaring the national economy was "bad and getting worse" and embracing tax cuts now expected to reach $300 billion. He predicted lawmakers would approve a mammoth revitalization package within two weeks of his taking office.
 AP - President-elect Barack Obama's decision to fill the nation's top intelligence jobs with two men short on direct experience in intelligence gathering surprised the spy community and signaled the Democrat's intention for a clean break from Bush administration policies.
 AP - Israel's expanding ground and air offensive against Gaza's Hamas rulers took a heavy civilian toll Monday, including three young brothers reported killed by a crashing shell and wounded who filled hospital corridors.
 AP - Senate Democrats struggled to avert a showdown steeped in race and corruption Monday as a defiant Roland Burris declared, "I'm a United States senator" despite boiling controversy over his appointment to President-elect Barack Obama's seat in Congress.
 AP - A prosecutor on Monday asked that Bernard Madoff be jailed pending trial, saying the disgraced financier violated an agreement with the court by mailing watches, jewelry, cufflinks and mittens worth more than $1 million to relatives and friends.
AP - Anthrax mailing suspect Bruce Ivins tormented his wife with rudeness and behaved erratically in the weeks before the Army scientist took his own life by overdosing on Tylenol, according to documents released Monday.
 AP - Take that, Andromeda! For decades, astronomers thought when it came to the major galaxies in Earth's cosmic neighborhood, our Milky Way was a weak sister to the larger Andromeda. Not anymore. The Milky Way is considerably larger, bulkier and spinning faster than astronomers once thought, Andromeda's equal.
 AP - Jett Travolta's body shows no sign of head trauma and his death certificate says he was killed by a seizure, an undertaker said Monday, as the 16-year-old's celebrity parents prepared to return his remains to the United States.
AP - Police say a 4-year-old boy in southern Ohio shot his babysitter because the sitter accidentally stepped on his foot. Police said 18-year-old Nathan Beavers and several other teenagers were babysitting several young children in a mobile home in Jackson on Sunday when the shooting occurred.
 AP - The Chicago Cubs and free agent Milton Bradley reached a preliminary agreement Monday on a $30 million, three-year contract, according to a person familiar with the negotiations. The deal is subject to a physical scheduled for Thursday, the person said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the deal had not been finalized.
 Reuters - Israeli troops backed by air strikes fought to seize ground from Hamas militants deep inside the Gaza Strip on Monday despite international calls for a ceasefire in a conflict that has killed more than 540 Palestinians in 10 days.
 Reuters - U.S. prosecutors asked a judge to jail accused swindler Bernard Madoff on Monday, saying he sent jewelry and other items worth more than $1 million to family and friends in violation of his bail.
 Reuters - President-elect Barack Obama has chosen former White House chief of staff Leon Panetta to lead the CIA, which has been widely criticized for harsh interrogation of terrorism suspects, Democratic officials said on Monday.
 Reuters - The prospect of new tax cuts in the United States and Germany injected a measure of New Year cheer on Monday, even as automakers wrapped up 2008 as their worst in more than 15 years with yet another month of slumping U.S. sales.
 Reuters - With the economic outlook darkening, U.S. president-elect Democrat Barack Obama went to Congress two weeks before taking office to try to entice Republican support for a massive stimulus package with talk of big tax cuts.
 Reuters - Apple Inc Chief Executive Steve Jobs sought to soothe investor concerns about his health on Monday, saying his weight loss was caused by a hormone imbalance that is relatively simple to treat.
 Reuters - Democrat Al Franken beat Republican incumbent Norm Coleman to win the U.S. Senate seat from Minnesota, officials conducting a final recount said on Monday, though the loser promised to challenge the result.
Reuters - The abduction of a U.S. anti-kidnap expert in northern Mexico last month remains a mystery with no clues to the man's whereabouts and no ransom demanded by his captors, police said on Monday.
 AFP - The heaviest fighting of Israel's war on Hamas raged in Gaza City early on Tuesday as the Israeli government parried appeals to stop the death toll from mounting further.
 AFP - US president-elect Barack Obama has chosen former White House chief of staff Leon Panetta to head the Central Intelligence Agency, a Democratic Party official told AFP Monday.
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