As senators gather for a late-night cloture vote on the health-care reform bill Monday morning, lawmakers are already concerned about the gap between the Senate bill and the one the House drafted earlier. Sen. Ben Nelson, who recently agreed to sign onto the bill, has said that he would not vote for a bill with a public option or taxes for richer Americans, both parts of the former House bill that many liberals are attached to. “This can’t be the final version of the bill,” Howard Dean said on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday. “It simply sets us on a track in this country which is expensive and where we’re going to have lots more political fights.” The abortion language in the bill has already angered lawmakers on both sides of the issue, with Rep. Stupak threatening to vote against the bill. On the other hand, if House liberals defect from the more conservative bill, moderates attracted by the absence of the public option might replace them as "yes" votes.

Businesses are hiring more and more temporary workers, suggesting that they might soon take the next step and hire permanent employees if they believe the economy will keep improving. Temp hiring has been on the rise for four months, whereas in the period after the last two recessions, in the early 1990s and in 2001, employers added temps for only two or three months before bringing on more permanent workers. Unemployment fell in 36 states in November, in part because of the growing ranks of temp workers, who are easier for cautious employers to shed if business goes bad.

The courtship period is over. Sen. Olympia Snowe, a key Republican moderate Democrats have been courting for months, has announced she will oppose and filibuster health-care reform. Snowe was the only Republican to vote for the reform in the Finance Committee, but cited the new “artificial and arbitrary deadline of completing the bill before Christmas” as a dealbreaker. “That is shortchanging the process on this monumental and trans-generational effort," Snowe said in a statement. With Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) now signed on as the 60th vote for the measure, Snowe’s decision isn’t catastrophic for Democrats. If the bill passes, it looks like it will be without a single Republican vote.

Actress Brittany Murphy died Sunday morning after going into full cardiac arrest, TMZ reports, and the coroner's officer has said her death appears to be from natural causes, though a toxicology report won't be available for some time. Murphy's mother reportedly found her unconscious in the shower of her Los Angeles home, and told paramedics that she had a history of diabetes. The paramedics tried to resuscitate her, but she was declared dead on arrival at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. Murphy's husband, Simon Monjack, does not want an autopsy performed on his wife, TMZ reports, although The Los Angeles County Coroner will reportedly perform an autopsy on Monday. Murphy was known for her roles in Clueless, 8 Mile, and Don’t Say a Word. Earlier this month, there were rumors she was fired from the set of a film shooting in Puerto Rico.

The infamous “Arbeit Macht Frei” sign that was stolen Friday from former death camp Auschwitz has been located in northern Poland, authorities say. Five men between the ages 25 and 39 have been detained for questioning, and the sign has reportedly been chopped up into three pieces, one for each word. Polish police say that the alleged thieves are not neo-Nazis.

At least 166 former congressional staffers now working as health-industry lobbyists got their old bosses to give their new bosses big breaks in the pending health-care reform legislation, according to a new report. For example, David Nexon, a former aide to the late Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA), amassed 14 lobbyists with similar résumés to attack a tax in the bill aimed at one of his clients, a medical-device trade association. They succeeded in cutting the $40 billion tax in half in the current legislation, according to a report by Northwestern University’s Medill News Service, the Center for Responsive Politics, and the Tribune Newspapers' Washington Bureau. In addition to the former aides, at least 13 former lawmakers are registered to represent a total of 338 health-care clients since the beginning of last year. Since then, those clients spent $635 million lobbying.

Politicians aren’t known for getting along, but in the heart of the holiday season, Senate members are accusing each other of bribery and double-crosses, routinely cutting each other off while speaking on the floor, and engaging in a legislative arms fight that could drag out to a Christmas Eve vote. This divided Senate, which is gathering for a Monday 1 a.m. test vote on health-care legislation, is stewing in a “toxic atmosphere,” according to The New York Times. Republicans say they intend to stage a series of procedural showdowns that will delay the final vote until Christmas Eve, and infighting Democrats can’t afford for a single member to be absent for any vote. “What the American people should pray for is that somebody can’t make the vote,” Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) said on the floor, which Democrats took to mean he was wishing misfortune on them. Other senators have accused Democrats of using a “pay-to-play” approach to votes. “This body prides itself on being the world’s greatest deliberative body,” said Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA). “That designation has been destroyed with what has occurred here the past few days.”

Spontaneous protests have erupted across university campuses and cities in Iran following the death of dissident cleric Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, who was considered a thorn in the side of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The outpouring of support for the cleric threatens to set the stage for another confrontation between protesters, still angry about last June’s presidential elections, and the government, which has stepped up security in Qom, Montazeri’s hometown. His death comes a day after 12 prison officials were charged in the murder of three jailed protesters. Montazeri gained a following for advocating for more democracy and reform in Iran. Monday has been declared a national day of mourning by opposition leaders, and thousands have already gathered for his funeral.

Though President Obama will likely miss his January deadline for closing the Guantanamo Bay detention center, the U.S. Justice Department said Sunday that it transferred a dozen detainees from the controversial prison over the weekend. Six Yemeni and four Afghans were sent to their home countries, and two more were turned over to regional Somali authorities. The move drew criticism from Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), who called it a "very bad decision" and said it "endangers our national security and endangers our citizens." There are concerns that Yemen and Somalia are training grounds for al Qaeda, and detainees released to those countries could "easily slip back into the lawless part of the country," Wolf said. Of the 198 prisoners who remain at Guantanamo, most will face trial in the U.S. or be sent elsewhere for detention.

Though Afghan President Hamid Karzai was re-elected amid allegations of fraud, he has publicly promised that the 23 people he nominated to ministerial positions will be “accountable” and that his own political activity will stand up to scrutiny as well. “I can assure that all the newly introduced ministers, and those who have been with me in the past, will be held accountable on any issue related to corruption,” he said. “And I will be accountable before the nation of Afghanistan for preventing [corruption] and for solving this problem.” He also pointed to the diversity of his selection and vowed to include more female ministers, though out of the 23 cabinet nominees only one woman was included. Karzai’s comments come at a crucial time: The nominations are his first major political act since the scandal-plagued election, and may be a bid to reassure nations set to commit more troops to Afghanistan in response to an increased Taliban presence.

After having her petition to sail around the world rejected by a court in October, Dutch teen Laura Dekker disappeared from her father’s home Friday, but was discovered Sunday on the Caribbean island of St. Maarten. Prior to disappearing, Dekker mentioned that she may try to go to New Zealand—where she also has citizenship—in order to carry out her planned sailing trip. Her parents disagreed on whether her around-the-world ambitions were safe for the 14-year-old, and when courts ruled against her, she was also placed under supervision by child-care authorities, who barred Dekker from leaving the country without permission. Island police say they have tracked down Dekker, but police and the Child Protection Agency in the Netherlands were not available for comment.

As the headline-grabbing U.N. climate talks wrapped up in Copenhagen, participating nations signed off on an accord with good intentions and vague details, agreeing to “take note” of a pact pledging lower emissions. The accord was signed by nearly all of the 193 nations at the conference, but has left many disappointed by the lack of specific action or emissions goals in the agreement as well as the clunky process required by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Because of problems with the framework, future talks will likely involve a smaller group of delegates from 30 nations responsible for 90 percent of the world’s greenhouse-gas emissions. The talks were also marred by tensions between American and Chinese officials, and U.S. sources privately criticized Chinese emissions goals as insufficient. President Obama summarized the difficulties of the meetings in Copenhagen, saying, “This progress did not come easily, and we know that this progress alone is not enough.”

The United States locks up more people than any other country, but could see a decline in its prison population for the first time since the 1960s, the Associated Press reports. With the economy putting the screws on states, state governments are now rethinking whom they put in the big house and the costs that accompany that decision. This year saw 0.8 percent growth in American prison populations, off from an average of 6.5 percent in the 1990s, and the smallest increase this decade. Two factors adding room to America's prisons: Iraq and Afghanistan. "People who go to war are young men, and young men are the most likely to get arrested or prosecuted," says one industry researcher.

With snow blanketing the Eastern seaboard, the final weekend of Christmas shopping has met a fierce opponent, putting into doubt a period that retailers say is crucial to winter sales. The last Saturday before Christmas—dubbed "Super Saturday"—is usually one of the biggest shopping days of the year, with $15 billion changing hands. One analyst told The Wall Street Journal that not even the snow could stop America's procrastinators: "A lot of these people don't have gifts, so they're going to have to go back to the stores and buy something, whether it's snowing or not."

James Cameron’s much-anticipated new film Avatar exceeded expectations and broke records at the box office this weekend, taking in an estimated $73 million. With a budget of $300 million, the science-fiction film is one of the most expensive ever made, and had the second-largest December weekend ever, falling behind I Am Legend, which earned $77 million in 2007. Disney’s latest, The Princess and the Frog, came in second place with $12.2 million just ahead of The Blind Side, still drawing crowds after leading lady Sandra Bullock scored a Golden Globe nomination. Did You Hear About the Morgans?, starring romantic-comedy staples Sarah Jessica Parker and Hugh Grant, had a disappointing debut, bringing in only $7 million despite its big-name stars.

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) tore into President Obama for abandoning his campaign pledge to cut down on the bitter partisanship in Washington on Fox News Sunday. McCain said the environment in the capital is more toxic than under the Clinton administration. "At least under Hillarycare, they tried to seriously negotiate with Republicans," McCain said. "There has been no effort that I know of—of serious across-the-table negotiations—such as I have engaged in with other administrations. And that was the commitment that the president made." The senator did not say blame should be split between Obama and the GOP. McCain was also asked about Sarah Palin wearing a campaign visor while on vacation. Palin said she blacked out McCain’s name on the hat so she could travel incognito, and he didn’t seem to take it as a snub, brushing off the “cap flap” by saying, “She is going to be a force in the Republican Party for a long time.”

Legislators who have spent months haggling over the health-care bill have lost sight of an equally important health-care issue: the need for more funding for research and prevention, Mike Milken argues. In the 1950s, experts worried that treating polio would cost the government $100 billion a year by the year 2000 (it now costs 1,000 times less than that). The former Wall Street financier writes that we risk losing ground in medical research if we don’t pump more money into curing diseases, and with big goals, like making cancer a manageable chronic disease instead of a killer. And costs will only increase as American waistlines expand, so more money should go toward wellness programs. “Legislation will address health-insurance coverage and payments—perhaps, as the president put it, ‘without adding a dime to our deficit,’” Milken writes. “But that’s no more important than whether we add inches to our waistlines. ‘Reform’ will be largely irrelevant if we don’t increase prevention and research.”

The hearts of tween girls across America broke this weekend as Kevin Jonas married his girlfriend Danielle Deleasa Saturday night, swapping his famous chastity ring for a custom-designed wedding band. The young couple was married in a castle on New York's Long Island, in a wedding attended by 400 guests despite attempted interference from the weekend’s Northeast blizzard. “The snow only made it look more like a winter wonderland,” said Michael Russo, who planned the event. “Danielle looked like a princess.” The 22-year-old singer’s best men were, naturally, his brothers Joe and Nick. Kevin Jonas met Deleasa, a former hairdresser, in the Bahamas.

Yet another woman is unhappy with Tiger Woods right now—his mother. Sources say that Kutilda Woods, who was repeatedly cheated on by the late Earl Woods, is “furious with her son for his recently revealed string of infidelities.” According to a friend, she is “hurt, angry, and disappointed” with Tiger and “wants to know how he could do this to his family.” She is reportedly friendly with Woods’ wife Elin Nordegren, and concerned about the future of his marriage and her grandchildren. As a result, the golfer may not be home for Christmas, and is said to have plans to spend the holidays on his yacht, aptly named Privacy. “It’s going to be a lonely Christmas for him,” said a source.

After months of infighting, compromising, and Sunday-show grandstanding among his caucus colleagues, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid cheerily told reporters Saturaday he's confident he'll have the 60 votes he needs to pass health-care reform legislation. Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), once skeptical of the bill, has signed on after winning a nice chunk of pork for his state and after the Congressional Budget Office released its cost estimate of the effort. (Nelson managed to get the federal government to pay the entire cost of expanding Medicaid in Nebraska.) The Senate version of the bill will reduce the deficit by $132 billion over the next decade and cost $871 billion. President Obama hailed the bill as "the largest deficit-reduction plan in a decade."

The government should force AIG to release emails and other important communications, allowing for an "open-source" investigation, former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer writes in The New York Times Sunday. Spitzer, along with two other former prosecutors, says that such a move would help answer how exactly the insurance giant became so desperate that it required a $180 billion bailout. "Once the documents are available for everyone to inspect, a thousand journalistic flowers can bloom, as reporters, victims, and angry citizens have a chance to piece together the story," they write. They hope such a document dump would help prevent a future repeat of the financial disaster.

"Hasn't Tony been through enough?" That's what Whoopi Goldberg wants to know about Anthony Marshall, the 85-year-old heir to the Astor fortune, who has been convicted of robbing his philanthropist mother and will be sentenced Monday. Lately, the once-private Astor has been laying his personal life bare and gaining support from celebrities in the hopes of receiving a lenient sentence—or avoiding jail time entirely. More than 70 letters of support have been sent to the court. Prosecutors are rebuffing his eleventh-hour attempts, saying that Astor's health problems shouldn't prevent him from serving time. Recently, in court papers, prosecutors called Astor "nothing more than a 'thief in a three-piece suit.’"

James Cameron's juggernaut Avatar sold $27 million in movie tickets Friday, the first full day the 3-D science fiction adventure film was in theaters. One analyst predicted the movie might rake in $80 million by the end of the weekend. Will Smith's I Am Legend holds the record for the biggest December weekend release with $77.2 million. Entertainment Weekly reports that Avatar was pretty much the only movie people watched Friday: No other film made more than $3.4 million. Costing Twentieth Century Fox $230 million, Avatar was one the most expensive films of all time.

Well, that's over: The New Orleans Saints, who racked up 13 straight wins and caught the attention of everyone in the NFL along the way, are no longer undefeated, falling to the Dallas Cowboys Saturday. The Cowboys won 24-17 and held off a last-minute charge from football's most explosive offense. The loss leaves one undefeated team left in professional football: Peyton Manning's Indianapolis Colts.

Three Iranian prison officials were charged with premeditated murder in the deaths of three protesters Saturday. The Iranian military court announced indictments for a dozen officials from Tehran's Kahrizak Prison. Kahrizak officials initially said Mohsen Rouhol-Amini, Amir Javadifar, and Mohammad Kamrani, who had been protesting Iran's disputed June elections, died of meningitis, but a coroner found they had been beaten to death. The prison's sub-par conditions played a role in the men's deaths, the court found. About 4,000 people were arrested during the mass demonstrations earlier this year. Reports of prisoner mistreatment led Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to shut down Kahrizak two weeks before the men's deaths were reported.

Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) said he would support health-care reform legislation Saturday after months of negotiating and compromises, which resulted in some pretty sizable concessions for his home state. Yet his job could still be at risk. Although Nelson may have succeeded in inserting abortion-restricting measures into the health-care bill (and thereby infuriating some more liberal members of his party), he did not win a total ban on any government money going to insurance plans that cover abortion. Nelson's long record of strongly opposing abortion won him support among many independent and Republican voters; if he softens his pro-life position, those folks could be up for grabs. (In one voter's words, "He'd be toast.") Nebraska Right to Life, which gave Nelson its lone endorsement in 2006, said the senator had betrayed abortion opponents. And the head of the Nebraska GOP predicted that supporting health-care legislation would kill Nelson's career.