AP - U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates arrived in Afghanistan early Monday as coalition forces continue to restore order in the town of Marjah, the first major test of the U.S. and NATO counterinsurgency strategy since President Barack Obama ordered 30,000 new American troops to blunt the Taliban's momentum.

AFP - European foreign ministers Saturday gave a show of support for beleaguered EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton, hoping to move forward with the building of a new diplomatic service.

AFP - 5.58 p.m. The sun is setting over Baghdad at the end of another historic, and bloody, day in Iraq?s tumultuous history.

AFP - Kosovo will join the European Union and NATO as a whole, Prime Minister Hashim Thaci said, brushing off any new talks over its status, disputed by Serbia, Beta news agency reported on Saturday.

AP - President Barack Obama plans to appoint a former senior Army official with a career in intelligence to lead the Transportation Security Administration.

Politico - Axelrod says he can see reporters and pundits trying to detect tension between himself and Emanuel.

AP - Consumed by domestic battles over health care and the ravaged economy, President Barack Obama had nearly fallen silent on foreign policy — until Sunday, when several things began breaking his way. First among them: the Iraq election.

AFP - Indonesia said Monday that raids against militants in Aceh province would not affect US President Barack Obama's planned visit to the country this month as police rounded up more terror suspects.

Politico - Retiring Dem: Leaders want him out of Congress because he's a 'no' vote on health care reform.

Politico - Ken Starr, Larry Thompson and others say attacks on administration lawyers are 'unjust.'

AP - The U.N.-African Union mission in Darfur says two of its peacekeepers who went missing after an ambush on their patrol earlier this week have safely returned to base.

AP - NATO is suspending the training of Kosovo's security troops after a military-style parade that broke the force's agreement to focus only on civil emergencies, it said Sunday.

Rasmussen Reports - As President Obama and his congressional allies search for a way to pass their proposed health care plan, most voters remain opposed to the legislative effort.

AP - The Obama administration said Monday that Israel and the Palestinians have agreed to indirect peace talks brokered by U.S. special Mideast envoy George Mitchell.

Politico - For $2,500, donors can attend a reception with former Alaska governor and take a picture with her.

AP - The Supreme Court is getting involved in the legal fight over the anti-gay protesters who show up at military funerals with inflammatory messages like 'Thank God for dead soldiers.'

AP - The Supreme Court says it will decide whether drug makers can be sued by parents who claim their children suffered serious health problems from vaccines.

Reuters - The Supreme Court said on Monday that it would decide whether a federal law protects vaccine manufacturers from lawsuits in state court seeking damages for alleged design defects.

AP - President Barack Obama is marking the 45th anniversary of 'Bloody Sunday' by praising 'these heroes' who marched into history and endured beatings by Alabama state troopers at the start of their landmark voting rights trek.

AP - A leading Catholic bishop in the Netherlands has called for an independent investigation into the sexual abuse of children by priests after 200 alleged victims contacted help services last week.

AFP - The United Nations estimated Monday that India and China are 'missing' about 85 million women who died from discriminatory health care and neglect or who were never born at all.

Reuters - President Barack Obama on Monday criticized U.S. health insurance companies for raising premiums and denying coverage to the sick, as he sought to rally Democratic support for his healthcare bill.

CQPolitics.com - Rep. Eric Massa (D-N.Y.) told a New York radio station on Sunday that an ethics investigation into his behavior focused on sexually-charged comments he made to an aide at a New Year's Eve celebration, but charged he was unaware of an ethics committee investigation into the incident until after he had announced his retirement last week.

AP - Greece's Prime Minister George Papandreou is urging the United States and Europe to help as it seeks to address its financial crisis and reform its economy.

CQPolitics.com - National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Cornyn (Texas) on Monday all but expressed his regret for getting behind Florida Gov. Charlie Crist (R) last May in the Sunshine State's open-seat Senate race.

Reuters - The Supreme Court said on Monday it would decide whether constitutional free-speech rights protected anti-gay protests by members of a Kansas church at funerals for U.S. military members killed in Iraq.

AP - Germany's justice minister says a Vatican secrecy rule is complicating prosecutors' probes of sexual abuse of children by Catholic clergy in the pope's homeland.

AP - Lawyers for six former Guantanamo detainees on Monday appealed a ruling that the British government can use secret evidence to fight a claim that it was complicit in their abuse.

AFP - A fired-up President Barack Obama launched a populist assault Monday on price-gouging American insurance firms, escalating his last-ditch bid to pass a historic health reform bill.

CQPolitics.com - It's only a small lifeboat in a nation with 14.9 million unemployed people, but the COBRA subsidy program, created by Congress early last year to provide health benefits to laid-off workers, is a lifesaver to those able to climb aboard.

AP - Several police officers responded to a 911 report of a naked woman tied to a tree in Point Defiance Park in Tacoma. Spokesman Mark Fulghum told The News Tribune officers talked with the woman and a man Tuesday in the Owen Beach area and determined it was a 'consensual rendezvous.'

AP - A dilemma as old as baseball is facing the offensively starved, defensively challenged Kansas City Royals.

Politico - He instead accuses a professor from Bob Jones University of being behind the whisper campaign.

Politico - The Minnesota governor's low approval rating may hurt this chances for a 2012 run.

AP - The Supreme Court is getting involved in the legal fight over the anti-gay protesters who show up at military funerals with inflammatory messages like 'Thank God for dead soldiers.'

AP - Republican state Sen. Roy Ashburn of Bakersfield says he is gay.

AP - Numerous people have complained of being forced from their homes or priced out of the housing market as a result of large events such as the World Cup and the Olympic Games, a U.N. human rights investigator said Monday.

AP - The South African president's office announced the nomination of its tourism minister for the United Nations' top climate post on Monday.

AP - Israel and the Palestinians agreed to begin indirect, American-brokered talks, the U.S. Mideast envoy announced Monday — ending a 14-month deadlock in peacemaking and representing the Obama administration's first substantive diplomatic achievement here.

AP - Northrop Grumman Corp. announced Monday that it won't compete against Boeing Co. for a $35 billion contract to build refueling tankers for the Air Force because Northrop doesn't think it can win.

AP - White House aides are increasingly convinced that accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will never face trial in a civilian court and are trying to cut a deal that would still transfer Guantanamo Bay terrorism suspects to the U.S., where many would faces charges, a senior administration official said Monday.

Politico - Granddaughter of Hewlett-Packard founder trashes California GOP Senate candidate.

Politico - Boeing is now in line to win a $35 billion contract to build aerial refueling tankers – all by itself.

AP - For a guy who professes to have no interest in running for president, Gen. David Petraeus can come off as surprisingly eager to talk about it — sometimes without even being asked.

AP - A Democratic aide says a new provision in the health care bill will require businesses to count part-time workers when calculating penalties for failing to provide coverage.

Reuters - Canada's parliamentary restaurant will be serving seal meat on Wednesday in a gesture of defiance aimed at a European Union ban on imports of seal products.

AFP - A senior US Homeland Security officer was travelling to Strasbourg Monday to urge the European parliament not to scupper an air passenger data deal which Washington says is vital in the fight against terror.

Reuters - President Barack Obama said on Monday he will nominate a retired Army officer with intelligence community experience to lead aviation security efforts amid concerns about passenger planes being bombed or hijacked.

McClatchy Newspapers - GLENSIDE, Pa. — President Barack Obama took his pitch for health care legislation on the road Monday, urging voters in suburban Philadelphia to make their voices heard above the political echo chamber in Washington and demand an up-or-down vote now in Congress.

CQPolitics.com - Republican strategists are thrilled that Ohio car dealer Tom Ganley (R) has shifted his focus from taking on former Rep. Rob Portman in the GOP Senate primary to unseating Rep. Betty Sutton (D) in the 13th district.

Politico - Mark Critz, the district director for the late Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.), won the Democratic nomination in the special election to fill his former boss’ vacant seat through the end of this year.

AFP - The US Supreme Court has agreed to consider whether vitriolic anti-gay protestors who picket the funerals of US soldiers are protected by free speech laws.

AFP - A fired-up President Barack Obama has turned his populist ire from Wall Street to the insurance sector as he sought to rally support for a last-ditch bid to pass a historic health care overhaul bill.