Top Stories - AP

WASHINGTON - Failure is not an option on health care, a leading Democratic senator said Monday, even as Republicans turned up the heat on moderates who hold the fate of the legislation in their hands.

WASHINGTON - A lot more Americans are feeling stressed out by debt this holiday season, raising the glum likelihood they'll behave like Scrooge rather than Santa.

WASHINGTON - Two Senate leaders trying to steer a pair of President Barack Obama's high-stakes initiatives through Congress are being dogged by re-election worries, and it's not clear whether their legislative prominence will help or hurt them.

COLUMBIA, S.C. - Gov. Mark Sanford is accused of breaking 37 ethics laws regarding campaign finances and travel, including using taxpayer money for high-priced airplane tickets that took him around the world and to Argentina for a rendezvous with the woman he once called his "soul mate."

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - A Pennsylvania lawmaker defended Rep. Patrick Kennedy on Monday against a bishop who has acknowledged asking the Rhode Island congressman not to receive Holy Communion because of his support for abortion rights.

BRUSSELS - For 23 torturous years, Rom Houben says he lay trapped in his paralyzed body, aware of what was going on around him but unable to tell anyone or even cry out.

NEW YORK - Complaints poured in Monday about Adam Lambert's sexually charged performance at the American Music Awards, including criticism of his kiss with a male keyboard player that was left out of rehearsals for the show.

REHOBOTH, Mass. - A Massachusetts woman is seeking donations from fellow pet lovers to help pay for eye surgery for her turkey named Jerry. Lyndsey Medeiros and her husband adopted three-year-old Jerry and another turkey from a Rhode Island farm last week. But Jerry has cataracts, and the eye problems mean he can't eat independently or join his female companion, Penelope, in flying.

NEW YORK - Joe Mauer sat behind a table on a podium in a conference room at the Metrodome when Justin Morneau shouted out the last question of the day. "Are you finally going to buy dinner now?" Morneau said to his teammate from the audience, one MVP to another.

WASHINGTON - More than 2.1 million drop-side cribs by Stork Craft Manufacturing are being recalled, the biggest crib recall in U.S history, following reports of four infant suffocations.

FORT BRAGG, N.C. - Sarah Palin brought her book-signing tour to North Carolina's Fort Bragg on Monday as thousands greeted the former Republican vice presidential candidate in a campaign-like gathering that tested military rules involving politicians.

GENEVA - The world's largest atom smasher made another leap forward Monday by circulating beams of protons in opposite directions at the same time and causing the first particle collisions in the $10 billion machine after more than a year of repairs, organizers said.

MELBOURNE, Australia - A kangaroo startled by a man walking his dog attacked the pair, pinning the pet underwater and slashing the owner in the abdomen with its hind legs. The Australian, Chris Rickard, was in stable condition Monday after the attack, which ended when the 49-year-old elbowed the kangaroo in the throat.

KABUL - Bombings and shootings killed 12 people across Afghanistan, including four American troops and three children, as President Barack Obama convened his war council again Monday to fine-tune a strategy to respond to the intransigent violence.

WASHINGTON - First-time buyers taking advantage of a special tax credit gave sales of existing homes in October their biggest surge in a decade, raising hopes for a turnaround in the housing market and pleasing Wall Street.

Economists expect the joblessness that has weighed down the nation's economic recovery will start to slowly abate in 2010, but they predict consumers will continue to keep a tight rein on spending, according to a new survey.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - A pair of astronauts zipped through the third and final spacewalk of their mission Monday, helping to install a 1,200-pound oxygen tank at the International Space Station and accomplishing everything else on their list.

MONTREAL - A Canadian woman on sick leave for depression said Monday she would fight an insurance company's decision to cut her benefits after her agent found photos on Facebook of her vacationing, at a bar and at a party.

ALLENTOWN, Pa. - Jon Gosselin offered his estranged wife a bouquet of red roses at their divorce arbitration hearing over the weekend. She evidently turned them down. Despite the snub, the marathon session went so well that the feuding stars of "Jon & Kate Plus Eight" could be divorced by the end of the year, his attorney said Monday.

Syracuse was so impressive in the 2K Sports Classic that it made one of the best entrances ever into The Associated Press' college basketball poll.

San Diego State cracked the AP women's basketball Top 25 for the first time in 14 years, while Connecticut remained a unanimous No. 1 for the 18th consecutive poll.

WASHINGTON - Home sales surged for the second month in a row in October, climbing to the highest level in 2 1/2 years as first-time buyers rushed to take advantage of an expiring tax credit.

HEGANG, China - The coal mine that exploded in northern China, killing 104, had too many workers underground in an effort to increase output, a government official said Monday, exposing the risks often taken to meet the country's insatiable energy demands.

LONDON - Rafael Nadal lost to Robin Soderling for the second straight time, falling 6-4, 6-4 Monday in their opening round-robin match at the ATP World Tour Finals.

The Indianapolis Colts are two wins away from the longest winning streak in NFL history.

LOS ANGELES - The King of Pop is still winning awards and setting records doing it.

MANILA, Philippines - Gunmen ambushed a caravan of political supporters and journalists on their way to file election papers Monday, killing at least 21 people in a massacre considered shocking even for a region notorious for violence between rival clans.

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia - The genocide trial of a prison chief for Cambodia's Khmer Rouge entered its final stage Monday, as closing arguments began in the historic effort to assign responsibility for the deaths of 1.7 million people three decades ago.