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There was a 5.9 percent rise in sales of previously owned homes in November from October, the National Association of Realtors says.

At their 5.04 million annual rate, sales were the highest since November 2009.

"Momentum continues to build," NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun says in the organization's report.

As Reuters notes, "the U.S. housing market tanked on the eve of the 2007-09 recession and has yet to fully recover, but steady job creation has helped the housing sector this year, when it is expected to add to economic growth for the first time since 2005."

Earlier today, there was word that third-quarter economic growth has been revised upward again.

House Speaker John Boehner was dealt a major defeat Thursday night. After spending most of the week trying to round up votes for his "Plan B" to extend tax cuts for virtually everyone, he pulled the measure without a vote and sent the House home for Christmas. The clock keeps ticking toward the end of the year, when automatic tax increases and spending cuts are set to hit.

Early Thursday, Boehner expressed confidence not only that his bill would pass but that the Democratic-controlled Senate would feel so much pressure, it would be forced to consider it, too.

"I am not convinced at all that when the bill passes the House today that it will die in the Senate," Boehner said early Thursday.

It turns out he was wrong — very wrong. And the problem was his fellow Republicans. Boehner's bill would have extended tax cuts for income up to a million dollars. But it also would have raised taxes on those who make more than that.

That made some conservatives, like Rep. Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina, uncomfortable.

"I want to protect everybody," Mulvaney said. "I think everybody pays too much in taxes so I am looking for some way to protect everybody."

Around the time the bill should have been up for a vote, Boehner gathered his conference in the basement of the Capitol and told them he wouldn't bring it up. His whip team had counted the votes, and they didn't have enough.

"He couldn't get the votes for this proposal," said Steve LaTourette, a retiring representative from Ohio. "At the end of the day, you can't make people vote."

Many of the unconvinced were freshmen elected in the Tea Party wave of 2010.

Rep. Tim Huelskamp of Kansas, the most vocal of the bunch, said the speaker was asking his members to take a vote that violated conservative principles. The conservatives rebelled.

"This is not Republican material," said Huelskamp. "I think that's probably why they wisely pulled the plug and said, 'OK, let's regroup.' But regroup and reassess — you know, what exactly do Republicans stand for? — and pushing things that we can pull together on instead of divide ourselves on."

The speaker is stuck, said LaTourette. "He can only play with the cards he's dealt. The voters have populated our conference with this set of representatives, and he does his best to work with them. But sometimes your best isn't good enough in the face of some people that just don't want to find common ground."

Jack Pitney, a professor of politics at California's Claremont McKenna College, feels for Boehner.

"To quote the great philosopher John Belushi in Animal House, my advice to the speaker: 'start drinking heavily,' " he said.

Pitney can't figure out why the speaker would make such a public push if he didn't have the votes lined up to begin with.

"If he brings a proposal to the president, the president's going to say, 'Look John, how do I know you're going to get the support of the members of your conference?' That's an extremely weak hand to be presenting when you're dealing with the president. Where this ends up, I don't know," Pitney said.

To those on the inside, the end game isn't any clearer.

California Rep. Buck McKeon, a Boehner ally, walked out of the conference meeting discouraged, saying, "I don't know how we can get out of this mess."

McKeon added that the speaker might not get any credit for it, but Boehner wants to do what is right. "And he thinks with divided government we should be able to do big things, and we can't do anything, and this is really, really sad," McKeon said.

The White House issued a statement late Thursday night saying the president will work with Congress and hopes to find a bipartisan solution quickly.

There's not much time left. Congress doesn't plan to return to Washington until two days after Christmas.

Russian lawmakers have approved a measure that would bar Americans from adopting Russian children, a move that comes in retaliation for a U.S. law that seeks to "name and shame" Russian officials who violate human rights.

President Vladimir Putin has voiced support for the adoption ban, but it's not clear whether he'll actually sign the measure, which has potential pitfalls.

As the Duma, the lower house of Russia's parliament, prepared for the final vote on the adoption ban, opponents of the measure stood in the subzero cold outside holding picket signs. Milana Minayeva's sign read: "Don't deprive children of their lives."

"I think [the] upcoming law is outrageous," Minayeva says. She says it's not right to make it impossible for children who have neither help nor parents to have any future at all.

Minayeva is a television producer, not an adoption activist, but she echoes the stance of many critics who say that orphans and adoptive parents should not be used as pawns in a political game.

A Deeper Resentment

The process of retaliation in the Duma taps into some deep and long-standing resentments on the part of Russian officials. Putin let some of that anger show in his yearly press conference this week.

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In a news conference Friday, President Obama said there were still things the parties could agree on about the automatic tax-rate increases and spending cuts at the end of the year. But he said parties would have to work together to get a plan approved in the next 10 days.

"Call me a hopeless optimist, but I actually still think we can get it done," he said, after meeting with Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid and speaking to Republican House Speaker John Boehner.

"In the next few days, I've asked leaders of Congress to work toward a package that prevents a tax hike on middle-class Americans, protects unemployment insurance for 2 million Americans and lays the groundwork for further work on both growth and deficit reduction. That's an achievable goal. That can get done in 10 days."