The scandal plaguing Sen. Robert Menendez just got more complicated, but this time that’s good news for the senator. Police in the Dominican Republic say that three women who had claimed the New Jersey pol had paid them for sex were actually being paid by a Dominican attorney to make those claims. While the sex scandal may have imploded, Menendez is fighting a more credible threat in the form of a Miami grand jury that’s reportedly investigating whether the senator pressured the Dominican government into honoring a port security contract with his friend Salomon Melgen.

Colorado is about to get a new set of gun control regulations. According to an A.P. source, the gun-friendly state's governor, John Hickenlooper, is slated to sign a new measure Wednesday that will expand background checks for gun purchases and impose limits on the capacity of ammunition magazines. The new laws, a win for Democrats pushing gun reform in the wake of recent mass shootings—including one this past summer in Aurora, Colorado—will be the first significant measures passed so far this year outside the East Coast. 

Is Nate Silver handicapping who will come out in favor of gay marriage next? Hillary Clinton released a video online Monday saying she supports gay marriage. Clinton says “LGBT Americans” are “full and equal citizens and deserve the rights of citizenship, and that includes marriage.” The move comes just days after Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman declared his support for gay marriage, saying his position had changed due to his gay son. It also comes shortly after former president Bill Clinton called for the repeal of the controversial legislation he signed, the Defense Against Marriage Act, which he said is unconstitutional. Several key Democratic contenders for 2016 have thrown their support behind gay marriage as well.

Moving forward, the GOP needs to change, well, everything. That’s the gist of the Grow and Opportunity Project, a 100-page report outlining the Republican National Committee’s recommendations on how to revitalize the party by 2016. RNC chairman Reince Priebus said the report makes it clear that “there’s no one reason we lost” the election. “Our message was weak; our ground game was insufficient; we weren’t inclusive; we were behind in both data and digital; our primary and debate process needed improvement.” Specifically, the party needs to make inroads with women, young voters, and minorities, especially Hispanics.

Out of sight, out of mind? That’s what New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is hoping with his proposed new legislation that would make stores keep tobacco products out of public sight. That means the rows of cigarettes that wallpaper many bodegas would have to be relocated, likely angering shop owners who rely on tobacco products for much of their sales. Monday’s proposal comes after a judge struck down Bloomberg’s ban on the sale of large sugary drinks. On to the next battle.

This sounds like the opposite of the desired effect. International markets in Asia and Europe opened down on Monday on the news of an unprecedented proposed bailout by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund for Cyprus that would put a tax on bank savings to finance the bailout. Cyprus’s Parliament will hold an emergency session on Monday to discuss the bailout, which has angered the public and caused a bank run as people rushed to remove their savings before being hit with a tax. Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades pleaded to the angry public to accept the deal, saying the country is facing its worst crisis since the Turkish invasion in 1974. Cyprus is the fifth European nation to appeal to the EU for bailout, and the country had apparently invested heavily in Greek debt.

The investigation into the rape of a teen in Steubenville could net more charges for those who failed to come forward, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine announced on Sunday shortly after two football players were found guilty of raping the girl. A grand jury will meet in mid-April to consider the evidence, which includes text messages from the football coach that indicate he knew what was going on, and students’ postings on social media that suggest they knew, too. The girl, meanwhile, testified she could not remember what happened at the August party. Meanwhile, CNN was under attack Sunday for its coverage of the rape case, which included reports on the “promising futures” and “good grades” of the “star football players” convicted of rape.

Who are you going to believe: your eyes or the History Channel? The History Channel and the executive producers issued a statement about that resemblance between the actor playing Satan and President Obama, saying it was “utter nonsense” and a “false connection.” “The actor who played Satan, Mehdi Ouzaani, is a highly acclaimed Moroccan actor. He has previously played parts in several Biblical epics—including Satanic characters long before Barack Obama was elected our president,” the executive producers said in a statement. Well that's a great line for the resume, but the History Channel insisted the connection was “unfortunate.” Sunday night’s airing of The Bible exploded on the Internet as viewers noticed a resemblance between the actor playing Satan and Obama—first noticed by Glenn Beck earlier in the week.

Who doesn’t like being greeted with glitter? Probably not Lindsay Lohan, who was glitterbombed when she arrived at a Los Angeles courthouse Monday morning (over 45 minutes late). Still, the actress was likely celebrating after striking a plea deal and walking away with a 90-day sentence in lockdown rehab. Lohan was charged with lying to police after she crashed her Porsche last June. There's a mandatory five-day jail sentence for reckless driving, but Lohan will serve it in rehab and will never see the inside of a jail cell. Her 180-day jail sentence for violating probation was also stayed, so she won't have to serve it as long as she obeys all laws.

After being hospitalized for six days for what was an apparently a drug overdose, rapper Lil Wayne has been released from Cedars Sinai Medical Center in West Hollywood, TMZ reports. Wayne spent several days of his stay in the ICU after drinking 'sizzurp,' a cocktail of cough syrup laced with painkillers. He suffered seizures and was at one point reported to be close to death. Sources said Wayne was feeling weak, and plans to lay low until he makes a full recovery.

Tell Thomas Crowne about this one. The $25 admission fee at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art is really a suggested donation, but a former security guard tells the New York Post that staff shames visitors into paying the full price and even threatened to forcibly remove those who didn’t pay. The former employee, who requested anonymity, said he plans to provide evidence in a multimillion-dollar lawsuit brought against the museum by visitors who claim they were tricked into paying the voluntary $25 entrance fee. The former employee, who worked at the Met from 2007 to 2011, insists he does not have an ax to grind with the museum but rather because the management feels “the public is a cash cow.”

Pope Francis: peacemaker? In his first meeting with a head of state, the new pope met with Argentine President Cristina Fernandez, who asked Francis to intervene in Argentina’s dispute with the U.K. over the Falkland Islands. In the past Francis has said the islands belong to Argentina, but he has yet to respond to Fernandez’s request. A week ago Falkland Islanders voted overwhelmingly to remain a U.K. territory. Fernandez and Francis have clashed in the past, with the president calling the then-cardinal’s opposition to gay adoptions reminiscent of “medieval times and the Inquisition.”

Two inmates at a Quebec prison escaped Sunday night by climbing up a rope to a waiting helicopter—but they were both caught within hours. Police said Monday that four people had been arrested for taking part in the escape, including the inmates, Benjamin Hudon-Barbeau, 33, and Danny Provencal, 36. Hudon-Barbeau was arrested Sunday evening, and police later located Provencal, who at first holed himself up in a building, but then surrendered peacefully. Hudon-Barbeau allegedly called a radio station Sunday, saying he was “ready to die” because of his treatment in jail. The jail’s warden said the pair had grabbed a rope from a helicopter to break out—something a correctional-services manager said was the most dramatic escape he had seen in 30 years working at the facility.

Orlando Police found explosives in a University of Central Florida dorm room after a fire alarm went off in the building. Inside the room was a man who appears to have died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Aside from the homemade bombs, the man reportedly had an assault weapon. Hundreds were evacuated from the building and classes have been cancelled through Monday.

Tiger Woods and Lindsey Vonn just announced their relationship on Facebook and Twitter with a series of professionally-shot photographs and now they would like their privacy, thank you. The 37-year-old golfer confirmed rumors that he was dating the 28-year-old Olympic skier in a message on his Facebook page, saying, “We want to continue our relationship, privately, as an ordinary couple to compete as athletes.” In her own statement, Vonn said, “I guess it wasn’t a well-kept secret but yes, I am dating Tiger Woods.” Woods apparently sent his private plane to Austria to pick up Vonn last month after her knee injury.

The last day filming The Office and a disappointing start for Burt Wonderstone—this was not Steve Carell’s weekend. Oz the Great and Powerful won the weekend box office with $42.2 million, bringing its total up to $142 million, while Spring Breakers earned $270,000 in just three theaters—meaning it had an per-theatre average of $90,000. Rounding out this weekend’s box-office returns, Halle Berry’s The Call took second place with $17.1 million, Burt Wonderstone came in third with $10.3 million, Jack the Giant Slayer fourth with $6.2 million, and Identity Thief came in fifth with $4.5 million.

Without local TV news, how will the next generation know how much to appreciate Ron Burgundy? Local TV news is apparently going the way of the print dinosaur, suffering from “shrinking pains,” according to a study released Monday by the Pew Research Center. “This adds up to a news industry that is more undermanned and unprepared to uncover stories, dig deep into emerging ones or to question information put into its hands,” writes the study’s main author, Amy Mitchell. And apparently nobody is even paying attention to the dire circumstances for media: 60 percent of respondents said they had heard little or nothing about struggles in the industry. One bright spot for aspiring bloggers: 50 percent of respondents said they use digital media daily for news.

The view from Afghanistan is mightily different from the conventional wisdom, writes Afghan national Saad Mohseni in Monday’s Wall Street Journal. Mohseni, the president of the country’s largest media group, MOBY, writes that one of the biggest errors is the Western belief that the democratic process isn’t working in Afghanistan—the country has an opportunity to show how well democracy is working in the 2014 election. Additionally, literacy is up to 33 percent and is expected to reach 90 percent by 2040, life expectancy is past 60, and the country as a whole has been modernizing. But key to keeping the momentum for a changing Afghanistan is not letting the international attitude of failure seep into the borders—now is crucial in the country’s rebirth.

Another day, another Obama nominee for Republicans to attack. President Obama will nominate Thomas Perez, a Justice Department official, to take over at the helm of the Labor Department, White House officials said on Sunday. He will replace Hilda Solis, who stepped down in January. Perez currently heads the DOJ’s civil rights division, and is the first Hispanic-American chosen for Obama’s second-term cabinet. But he’s not a shoo-in to be approved—congressional Republicans are expected to question him over Labor Department policies, which the GOP has called unfair to small businesses.

In the aftermath of the Citizens United ruling, there is no limit to the amount corporate interest groups can raise to defeat President Obama’s policies—or how much Obama can raise to lobby for them. The result? A permanent fundraising campaign, headed by Organizing for Action, the 2012 Obama election committee now being used a de facto fundraising wing of the White House, writes Edward Luce in Monday’s Financial Times. This is the final nail in the coffin of Obama being a Washington outsider, writes Luce—the president has become the ultimate Beltway glad-handler. What that means for Obama’s credibility is unknown—and it could set a dangerous precedent for future presidents.

It’s not quite a mea culpa, but Paul Wolfowitz, the former deputy Pentagon chief who called for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, admits that the U.S. botched parts of the invasion and allowed the country to spiral out of control. There “should have been Iraqi leadership from the beginning,” Wolfowitz told The Sunday Times, and the U.S. shouldn’t have excluded so many former Baath Party members from the reconstruction process. But that’s as far as he’ll go: the war itself, he says, was still a good idea. If we hadn’t ousted Hussein, “We would very likely either have had to go through this whole scenario all over but probably with higher costs for having delayed.”

This has to hurt. A poll by The Hill released Monday found that voters trust the Democratic Party more than the Republican Party on the budget—despite agreeing with the GOP plan. Respondents in the poll were asked to choose which blueprint they preferred without being told which party supported which plan, and 55 percent chose a plan extremely similar to the one Paul Ryan proposed last week. A whopping 65 percent said they supported lowering U.S. budget deficits by cutting spending rather than raising taxes. And to rub salt in the GOP’s wounds, many of the respondents who identified themselves as Democrats supported the Republican proposals. This could be why Jeb Bush told CPAC that Republicans were seen as “anti-everything,” you guys.