Oprah Winfrey earned the rare opportunity to convert her media charisma into a monogramed TV channel. Now she's the one tasked with rescuing OWN, the Oprah Winfrey Network, after a disappointing first year.

It's a high-stakes, potentially ego-shattering challenge that could make the strongest woman or man flinch. But win or lose, Winfrey says she relishes the fight to turn OWN's fortunes around.

Forty years ago, Dick Clark's New Year's Eve special was created to give young people an alternative to a seasonal institution, bandleader Guy Lombardo.

Now Clark's annual show is the institution.

Sports towels and fleece blankets. A poker tournament. A $1 million Christmas display. A prom for senior citizens. BP gas card giveaways. A "most deserving mom" contest. And advertising, lots of advertising.

Florida Panhandle officials made the mix of eyebrow-raising purchases with $30 million BP gave them earlier this year to help tourism recover from 2010's disastrous Gulf oil spill.

The final box office weekend of 2011 should be led by Tom Cruise in "Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol," with a not impossible domestic gross near $35 million for the four-day New Year's weekend.

The Paramount film led the Christmas weekend after its limited debut in IMAX gave it a big marketing boost, and this week's midweek numbers indicate audience interest is holding, with a total North American gross of about $130 million expected by Monday night.

Wynonna Judd is celebrating an engagement this holiday season.

Representatives for the 47-year-old country singer say her boyfriend, Cactus Moser, proposed on Christmas Eve.

Large seizures of elephant tusks make this year the worst on record since ivory sales were banned in 1989, with recent estimates suggesting as many as 3,000 elephants were killed by poachers, experts said.

"2011 has truly been a horrible year for elephants," said Tom Milliken, elephant and rhino expert for the wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC, on Thursday.

The Obama administration has hit two men with sanctions for allegedly laundering money on behalf of Mexican and Colombian drug cartels.

The move blocks any assets in the U.S. belonging to Lebanese-Colombian nationals Jorge Fadlallah Cheaitelly and Mohamad Zouheir El Khansa, and blocks Americans from doing business with them.

Ali al-Saadi gave Lebanon a 1-0 lead against South Korea and the sectarian chants echoing across Cite Sportive stadium suddenly gave way to a more hopeful cheer.

The roars of "Minshan Allah, Libnan yallah" — "For God's Sake, Lebanon Come On" — filled the 60,000-seat stadium and grew louder as the team closed in on a historic 2-1 win over their favored Asian opponents.

Rafael Nadal says he plans to take several weeks off after the Australian Open to recover from a nagging shoulder injury.

The second-ranked Nadal said the injury surfaced during the ATP World Tour Finals in London and that he was still "not 100 percent."

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is questioning the rash of cancer cases among Latin American leaders and asking if somehow the U.S. might have a way to induce the illness.

Chavez has long questioned whether the U.S. government could be plotting to oust him, but his latest remarks went far beyond any such theories.