Broker Regulation

Here's the assignment President Barack Obama has won with his re-election: Improve an economy burdened by high unemployment, stagnant pay, a European financial crisis, slowing global growth and U.S. companies still too anxious to expand much.

Despite an economy we're all still waiting to bounce back, Barack Obama snagged a second term.

The election laid bare a dual and dueling nation, politically speaking, jaggedly split down the middle on the presidency and torn over much else. It seems you can please only half of the people nearly all of the time.

Republicans drove toward renewed control of the House on Tuesday as Democrats failed to make any significant inroads into the GOP's delegations from the East, South and Midwest.

President Barack Obama faces a new urgent task now that he has a second term, working with a status-quo Congress to address an impending financial crisis that economists say could plunge the country into further recession if not resolved.

Preliminary results from a national exit poll in Tuesday's elections for The Associated Press and the television networks