Reuters - France spearheaded an international peace mission on Tuesday to try to halt Russia and Georgia's five-day-old Caucasus war, which has rattled world oil markets and unnerved the West.

Reuters - U.S. swimmer Michael Phelps carved his name among Olympic greats on Tuesday, winning a record-equaling ninth gold on a dominant morning for Americans in the pool.

AP - Aaron Rodgers shrugged off a shaky beginning as Brett Favre's replacement.

AP - Ed McMahon is being sued by another creditor. Westmoore Lending of Huntington Beach, Calif., sued McMahon for more than $275,000 it says the pitchman and former "Tonight Show" sidekick owes from a 2006 loan.

AP - Just months before President Bush leaves office, his administration is antagonizing environmentalists by proposing changes that would allow federal agencies to decide for themselves whether subdivisions, dams, highways and other projects have the potential to harm endangered animals and plants.

AP - A roadside bomb hit a Pakistan air force truck in a northwestern city Tuesday, killing 14 people as the military pounded insurgent positions in a nearby tribal region.

AP - Michael Phelps climbed out of the pool, unzipped his skin-tight suit and ambled over to chat with his coach.

AP - If you're a senior citizen and make less than $50,000 a year, Barack Obama has a deal for you: the rest of your life free of federal income tax.

AP - President Bush on Monday demanded that Russia end a "dramatic and brutal escalation" of violence in Georgia, agree to an immediate cease-fire and accept international mediation to end the crisis in the former Soviet republic.

AP - Russia's foreign minister says that Georgia's president must leave office and Georgian troops should stay out of the breakaway South Ossetia region for good.

AFP - Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe said Monday that difficult issues in power-sharing talks to resolve the country's protracted crisis had been "overcome".

AFP - Russian troops on Monday moved further into Georgian territory and the Tbilisi government said its soldiers had been forced to retrench closer to the capital.

Reuters - Toyota Motor Corp (7203.T) is considering exporting U.S.-made vehicles as it sees potential demand for its large pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles overseas, the automaker's U.S. manufacturing chief said on Monday.