(Reuters) - U.S. forces will cede the lead role in combat operations in Afghanistan next year, but will keep fighting alongside Afghan troops, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Thursday, as the Obama administration struggled to clear up confusion over its Afghan exit strategy.

(Fox News) The Republican presidential candidates fanned out across the country Wednesday, as they prepared for a new round of elections which will require a greater human touch than the debate- and ad-driven campaigns of delegate-rich Florida.

(Fox News) Mitt Romney crushed Newt Gingrich in the Florida Republican presidential primary Tuesday night, surging from a second-place finish in South Carolina to sweep the winner-take-all contest and reassert his frontrunner status.

(Reuters) - Florida's Republican voters go to the polls on Tuesday in a high-stakes presidential primary election, with former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney holding a commanding double-digit lead in polls over rival Newt Gingrich.

(Fox News) What happens in Iran over the next few months may be one of the biggest wild cards in the 2012 election, and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta was characteristically blunt about the stakes.

(Fox News) As President Obama prepares to raise the debt ceiling -- after the Senate waived its opposition last week -- $5 trillion hikes evidently are no longer "unpatriotic" as Obama said they were in 2008 while describing former President George W. Bush's $4 trillion increase over eight years.

(Reuters) - Consumer spending was flat in December as households took advantage of the largest rise in income in nine months to boost their savings, setting the tone for a slowdown in demand early in 2012.

(Bloomberg) Valuations for U.S. equities have been stuck below the five-decade average for the longest period since Richard Nixon’s presidency, a sign investors don’t trust earnings even after a three-year bull market.

(Reuters) - Republican White House hopeful Mitt Romney's lead over rival Newt Gingrich edged up to 12 percentage points in Florida, according to Reuters/Ipsos online poll results on Sunday, as Romney's front-runner status stabilized and Gingrich continued to slip.

(Bloomberg) The European financial crisis and the ineffective effort to stop Iran’s nuclear-weapons program are crashing into each other. As the European Union adopts new restrictions on importing Iranian oil, the most-troubled EU economies will continue to seek delays and exceptions.