AP - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will travel to New York and the United Nations on Tuesday in a bid to broker a sustainable cease-fire as soon as possible to end the crisis in Gaza.

AP - The new Democratic-controlled Congress has opened for business, eager to join President-elect Barack Obama in tackling the worst economic crisis in generations.

AP - President-elect Barack Obama's economic stimulus plan won't include money for politicians' pet projects and will include provisions aimed at ensuring his administration is open and accountable to taxpayers and Congress, a transition official said Tuesday.

AP - No longer a U.S. senator, Republican Norm Coleman was headed to court Tuesday, seeking to overturn a state board's certification that Democrat Al Franken won the U.S. Senate recount.

AP - Roland Burris failed in his bid to take President-elect Barack Obama's Illinois Senate seat on Tuesday in a scripted piece of political theater staged just before the opening of the 111th Congress.

Bloomberg - Jan. 6 (Bloomberg) -- In a mirrored office tower overlooking Caracas, a top Venezuelan official says his government is ready to accept Barack Obama’s offer to talk with U.S. adversaries -- if the president-elect scraps George W. Bush’s division of the world into friends and foes.