Politico - Once upon a time, the thought of Barack Obama becoming president was downright audacious.

AP - A triumphant Barack Obama vowed to be a president for all America, even those who voted against him, and asked for patience to address the nation's problems of war and finance that he called the greatest challenges of a lifetime.

AP - Heavyweight boxer Joe Mesi has lost in his bid for election to the New York Senate.

Reuters - U.S. voters firmly rejected two state proposals to limit abortion rights on Tuesday, undermining an attempt to force the issue to the U.S. Supreme Court.

AP - In a bid to improve strained Catholic-Muslim relations, the Vatican hosted scholars, imans and clerics from both religions Tuesday as it opened a three-day religious conference.

Politico - Barack Obama’s sweeping victory as president of the United States sends him to the White House to face what may be the worst national financial crisis since the time of Franklin Roosevelt’s election in 1932.

AP - After a sometimes thrilling, sometimes bumpy run in the national spotlight, Alaska saw its governor defeated for vice president Tuesday. Still uncertain was the future of the state's senior senator, his standing as a political giant hammered by corruption convictions.

Reuters - Ballot initiatives allow voters to directly decide whether to change state laws or amend state constitutions.

Reuters - The United Nations said on Tuesday that a Somali stoned to death by Islamists on accusations of adultery was a 13-year-old girl who had apparently been raped while visiting her grandmother.

Politico - More than 130 million people turned out to vote Tuesday, the most ever to vote in a presidential election.

AP - Audacity won. Now Barack Obama must validate the hope and deliver the change he promised.

AP - Alarmingly inexperienced. So liberal he's practically a socialist. A sure-fire tax raiser. And an agent of the wrong kind of change.

AP - A homemade bomb exploded Tuesday at a hotel in the central Swedish city of Vasteras, seriously injuring one person, police said.

Politico - With his party in tatters, Mitch McConnell is now the most powerful Republican in the country – the lone GOP senator who can stand in the way of an unfettered liberal agenda in Washington, and a key go-to man to rehabilitate his party. 

AFP - Democrats surged to a 56-seat majority in the US Senate, wresting five seats from the Republicans as voters approved a mandate for change with the election of Barack Obama as president.Leading lawmakers hailed their expanded control of the 100-member Senate as the start of a new chapter in history, even as they fell short of a 60-seat margin that would have given them power to overcome Republican delaying tactics.

AP - He spoke about posterity, and for it. But in looking forward at his finest hour, Barack Obama never forgot to look back.

AP - President Bush embraced Barack Obama's election victory Wednesday, saying he understands the message of change that was the centerpiece of his campaign.

Politico - After one of the most negative campaigns in Minnesota history, Republican Sen. Norm Coleman appears to have defeated comedian Al Franken by fewer than 1,000 votes in one of the nation’s most closely watched senate battles.

AP - The Associated Press is uncalling the Minnesota Senate race.

AP - European Union officials hailed Barack Obama's election victory Wednesday as an opportunity to renew a tenuous trans-Atlantic relationship and join forces in 'a new deal for a new world.'

AP - Vice President-elect Joe Biden plans to be back in his home state of Delaware to take part in a quirky political tradition.

Politico - If Republicans are searching — Reagan-style — for the pony in the pile of manure, perhaps they can find it in this: The double-whammy wipeout many of them were expecting didn’t materialize on election night.

AP - President-elect Barack Obama chose Illinois Rep. Rahm Emanuel to be his White House chief of staff, his first selection for the new administration, Democratic officials said Wednesday.

AP - 'My presence on this stage is pretty unlikely,' Barack Obama began.

AP - California voters have approved a constitutional amendment outlawing same-sex marriage, overturning the state Supreme Court decision that gave gay couples the right to wed just months ago.

AP - Two difficult wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. A simmering nuclear crisis with Iran. Renewed rivalries with Russia and China. A global financial meltdown spawned on Wall Street. Terrorists almost certainly looking for ways to mount a fresh attack in the U.S.

AP - So much for a lasting Republican majority.

AP - Barack Obama hardly marched across the South like Sherman. But he certainly made some inroads.

AP - Before resting from the grueling presidential race, John McCain began discussing with senior aides what role he will play in the Senate now that he has promised to work with the man who defeated him for president.

AP - John McCain has won Georgia's 15 electoral votes, keeping the state in the GOP column for the fourth consecutive presidential election.

Politico - Unshackled from her role as John McCain's running mate, Sarah Palin chatted at length with CNN's Dana Bash this morning in the Biltmore lobby here in Phoenix.

AP - Russian youths killed two people from Central Asia and assaulted two others, including a Turkmen diplomat, in separate attacks that came on a national holiday celebrating Russian unity, officials said Wednesday.

AP - Nothing quite like Russian missiles to stomp on a guy's big election buzz. Before Barack Obama even got up to savor a first day as president-elect, Russia threatened to station missiles alongside U.S.-ally Poland.

AP - Barack Obama's formula for victory included a coalition of unmarried women, minorities and young whites and coaxing more votes from them than Democrats did in their 2004 presidential defeat, according to national exit polls of voters.

AFP - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced plans Wednesday to deploy missiles on the EU's doorstep in a warning shot to US president-elect Barack Obama and Washington's allies in central Europe.

AP - They captured the White House under a mantra of 'change' and scored big House and Senate gains promising a 'new direction.'

Politico - On the face of it, Tuesday’s winners seem obvious: Barack Obama, congressional Democrats, Big Labor, liberals.

AP - President-elect Barack Obama is facing a Congress with bulked-up Democratic majorities in both the House and Senate to put much of his agenda into law.

AFP - Despite a landslide for Democrats in the White House race, Americans voted more conservatively on Tuesday in a myriad of referendums on banning gay marriage and abortion.

AP - She was a stranger, and she kissed me. Just for being an American.

Politico - On the face of it, Tuesday’s winners seem obvious: Barack Obama, congressional Democrats, Big Labor, liberals.

AP - Democrats broadened their control of Congress, though in the Senate they fell short of the 60 votes needed for a filibuster-proof majority that would have given them almost unbridled power over legislation.

AFP - The European Commission on Wednesday urged member states to agree next week to resume EU-Russia partnership talks, frozen over the Georgia conflict.