Mitt Romney is mostly ignoring his GOP rivals, concentrating instead on challenging Barack Obama. It's part of his general election strategy, designed to show Republicans in Iowa and elsewhere that he'd be most 'electable' next November.

In this special section, we look at the year’s biggest stories, and seven staff correspondents reflect on events in hot spots from Latin America to the Libyan front. 

As tea party support splinters along more traditional political lines, polls show that hopes for nominating a conservative outsider who embodies constitutional ideals have withered. The question now is whether tea partiers will embrace a more conventional presidential nominee.

AP - Fireworks glittered and boomed Sunday as revelers in Australia and Asia welcomed 2012 and others around the world looked forward to bidding adieu to a year marred by natural disasters and economic turmoil.

AP - A confident Mitt Romney called President Barack Obama "a footnote in history" Saturday morning, ignoring his Republican rivals altogether during a campaign stop in New Hampshire three days before the Iowa caucuses.

AP - Times Square was awash in hopeful sentiments as it began to welcome hordes of New Year's Eve revelers looking to cast off a rough year and cheer their way to something better in 2012.