News you can use
News you can use
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WASHINGTON (AP) — Working with Congress against a midnight deadline, President Barack Obama said Monday that a deal to avert the "fiscal cliff" was in sight but not yet finalized. The emerging deal would raise tax rates on family income over $450,000 a year, increase the estate tax rate and extend unemployment benefits for one year. "There are still issues left to resolve but we're hopeful Congress can get it done," Obama said at a campaign-style event at the White House. "But it's not done." The parties were at an impasse o...
WASHINGTON (AP) — Declaring the American dream under siege, President Barack Obama called Tuesday night for a flurry of help for a hurting middle class and higher taxes on millionaires, delivering a State of the Union address filled with re-election themes. Restoring a fair shot for all, Obama said, is "the defining issue of our time." Obama outlined a vastly different vision for fixing the country than the one pressed by the Republicans challenging him in Congress and fighting to take his job. He pleaded for an active govern... Full story
WASHINGTON (AP) — Declaring the American dream under siege, President Barack Obama called Tuesday night for a flurry of help for a hurting middle class and higher taxes on millionaires, delivering a State of the Union address filled with re-election themes. Restoring a fair shot for all, Obama said, is "the defining issue of our time." Obama outlined a vastly different vision for fixing the country than the one pressed by the Republicans challenging him in Congress and fighting to take his job. He pleaded for an active govern... Full story
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama said Wednesday he has seen no evidence that national security was threatened by the widening sex scandal that ensnared his former CIA director and top military commander in Afghanistan. Facing questions from reporters, Obama also reaffirmed his belief that the U.S. can't afford to continue tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, a key sticking point in negotiations with Republicans over the impending "fiscal cliff." He said, "The American people understood what they were getting" when t... Full story
WASHINGTON (AP) — Susan Rice, the embattled U.N. ambassador, abruptly withdrew from consideration to be the next secretary of state on Thursday after an ugly standoff with Republican senators who declared they would vigorously oppose her nomination. The move elevates Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry as the likely choice to be the nation's next top diplomat when Hillary Rodham Clinton departs soon. AP Photo/ Evan Vucci, File UN Ambassador Susan Rice is seen leaving a meeting on Capitol Hill on Nov. 28. Rice has withdrawn from c... Full story
WASHINGTON (AP) — Under fierce election-year fire, President Barack Obama on Friday abruptly abandoned his stand that religious organizations must pay for free birth control for workers, scrambling to end a furor raging from the Catholic Church to Congress to his re-election foes. He demanded that insurance companies step in to provide the coverage instead. AP Photo/Susan Walsh President Barack Obama, accompanied by Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, announces the revamp of his contraception policy requiri...
WASHINGTON (AP) — In an abrupt jolt to the White House, President Barack Obama announced Monday that chief of staff William Daley was quitting and heading home to Chicago, capping a short and rocky tenure that had been expected to last until Election Day in November. Obama budget chief Jack Lew will take over the job. Daley's run as Obama's chief manager and gatekeeper lasted for all of one consequential year — filled with notable moments like the killing of al-Qaida terrorist leader Osama bin Laden, but also internal gru... Full story
WASHINGTON (AP) — In an abrupt jolt to the White House, President Barack Obama announced Monday that chief of staff William Daley was quitting and heading home to Chicago, capping a short and rocky tenure that had been expected to last until Election Day in November. Obama budget chief Jack Lew will take over the job. Daley's run as Obama's chief manager and gatekeeper lasted for all of one consequential year — filled with notable moments like the killing of al-Qaida terrorist leader Osama bin Laden, but also internal gru...
WASHINGTON — People remember the hope and the history. For him or against him, they picture candidate Barack Obama as the one who stood on stage in a football stadium in Denver and accepted the Democratic presidential nomination by declaring "It's time for us to change America." Forgotten, it seems, is what Obama said when he actually won. AP Photo/Charles Dharapak First Lady Michelle Obama appears at the podium Monday for a camera test as head stage manager David Cove instructs on the stage at the Democratic National Convent...
PATASKALA, Ohio — Down to a fierce finish, President Barack Obama accused Mitt Romney of scaring voters with lies on Friday, while the Republican challenger warned grimly of political paralysis and another recession if Obama reclaims the White House. Heading into the final weekend, the race's last big report on the economy showed hiring picking up but millions still out of work. "Four more days!" Romney supporters bellowed at his rally in Wisconsin. "Four more years!" Obama backers shouted as the president campaigned in Ohio....
KABUL, Afghanistan — President Barack Obama slipped into Afghanistan Tuesday night on an unannounced visit on the anniversary of the killing of 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden. Obama is signing an agreement cementing a U.S. commitment to the nation after the long and unpopular war comes to an end. The partnership spells out the US relationship with Afghanistan beyond 2014, covering security, economics and governance. The deal is limited in scope and essentially gives both sides political cover: Afghanistan gets its s... Full story
BAGRAM AIR FIELD, Afghanistan — On a swift, secretive trip to the war zone, President Barack Obama declared Tuesday night that after years of sacrifice the U.S. combat role in Afghanistan is winding down just as it has already ended in Iraq. "We can see the light of a new day on the horizon," he said on the anniversary of Osama bin Laden's death. AP Photo/Charles Dharapak President Barack Obama addresses troops at Bagram Air Field, Afghanistan, Wednesday. "Our goal is to destroy al-Qaida, and we are on a path to do exactly t...
Obama to lay out his case on Libya to nation BEN FELLER, AP White House Correspondent WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is striving to explain why the U.S. is at war again — on a third front — as he resolutely defends the military campaign in Libya. His message in a speech to the nation at 5:30 p.m. MDT Mondayt: U.S. involvement this time is shrinking and isn't a precedent for further action as violence flows across the Middle East. Obama's address was unlikely to specify how long the conflict might last or what the cost...
President Barack Obama speaks about Libya at the National Defense University in Washington, Monday, AP Photo/Charles Dharapak Obama strongly defends US military action in Libya BEN FELLER, AP White House Correspondent WASHINGTON (AP) — Defending the first war launched on his watch, President Barack Obama declared Monday night the United States intervened in Libya to prevent a slaughter of civilians that would have stained the world's conscience and "been a betrayal of who we are." Yet he ruled out targeting Libyan leader M...
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama hailed the beginning of the end of a devastating war Wednesday night, announcing he was pulling home 33,000 troops from Afghanistan by next summer, withdrawing the "surge" of forces he sent in to rescue a flailing effort. Said Obama to a country eager for an exit: "The tide of war is receding." AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, Pool President Barack Obama delivers a televised address from the East Room of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, on his plan to drawdown U.S. troops in A... Full story
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama on Friday declared an end to the Iraq war, one of the longest and most divisive conflicts in U.S. history, announcing that all American troops would be withdrawn from the country by year's end. Obama's statement put an end to months of wrangling over whether the U.S. would maintain a force in Iraq beyond 2011. He never mentioned the tense and ultimately fruitless negotiations with Iraq over whether to keep several thousand U.S. forces there as a training force and a hedge against m...
WASHINGTON — The death of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi expands the growing string of security victories on President Barack Obama's watch and reinforces his own style of dealing with enemies without immersing the United States in war. Even skeptics offered congratulations. For Obama, the outcome allowed him to stand victorious in the Rose Garden on Thursday, taking note also of the death this year of prominent al-Qaida leaders at the hands of the United States. AP Photo/Susan Walsh Pesident Barack Obama speaks in the Rose G...
WASHINGTON (AP) — In a blunt display of differences, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected the idea of using his country's 1967 boundaries as the basis for a neighboring Palestinian state on Friday, declaring his objections face-to-face to President Barack Obama who had raised the idea just 24 hours earlier in an effort to revive stalled Mideast peace talks. Though the two leaders, meeting in the Oval Office, found cordial and predictable agreement on the other central element that Obama outlined in his M... Full story
WASHINGTON — Forcefully stepping into an explosive Middle East debate, President Barack Obama on Thursday endorsed a key Palestinian demand for the borders of its future state and prodded Israel to accept that it can never have a truly peaceful nation based on "permanent occupation." Obama's urging that a Palestinian state be based on 1967 borders — before the Six Day War in which Israel occupied East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza — was a significant shift in the U.S. approach and seemed certain to anger Israel. AP Photo... Full story
WASHINGTON — Seeking to jolt the economy, President Barack Obama will propose new ideas to create jobs and help the struggling poor and middle class in a major speech after Labor Day. And then he will try to seize political advantage by spending the fall pressuring Congress to act on his plan. Obama's plan is likely to contain a mix of tax cuts, jobs-boosting construction projects and steps to help the long-term unemployed, a senior administration official told The Associated Press. The official emphasized that Obama's p...
TUCSON, Ariz. — Summoning the soul of a nation, President Barack Obama on Wednesday implored Americans to honor those slain and injured in the Arizona shootings by becoming better people, telling a polarized citizenry that it is time to talk with each other "in a way that heals, not in a way that wounds." Following a hospital bedside visit with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the target of the assassination, he said: "She knows we're here, and she knows we love her." In a memorably dramatic moment, the president said that G...
WASHINGTON — Confronting an economy in peril, President Barack Obama on Thursday night unveiled a $450 billion plan to boost jobs and put cash in the pockets of dispirited Americans, challenging Republican skeptics to embrace an approach heavy on the tax cuts they traditionally love. With millions of voters watching and ever skeptical of Washington, Obama told Congress, "Let's meet the moment." AP Photo/Charles Dharapak President Barack Obama delivers a speech to a joint session of Congress at the Capitol in Washington, T...
WASHINGTON — Confronting an economy in peril, President Barack Obama unveiled a larger-than-expected $450 billion plan Thursday night to boost jobs and put cash in the pockets of dispirited Americans, urging Republican skeptics to embrace an approach heavy on the tax cuts they traditionally love. With millions of voters watching and skeptical of Washington, Obama repeatedly challenged Congress to act swiftly. The newest and boldest element of Obama's plan would slash the Social Security payroll tax both for tens of m...
President Barack Obama listens as his new White House Chief of Staff William Daley makes a statement in the East Room of the White House, Thursday, Jan. 6, 2011 in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) BC-US--White House Shake-up,9th Ld-Writethru/1215 Eds: New version. With AP Photos. For global distribution. AP Video. Meet the new boss: Daley is Obama chief of staff BEN FELLER,AP White House Correspondent WASHINGTON (AP) — Overhauling his team at the top, President Barack Obama on Thursday named banker and seasoned political...
President Barack Obama listens as his new White House Chief of Staff William Daley makes a statement in the East Room of the White House, Thursday, Jan. 6, 2011 in Washington. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) BC-US--White House Shake-up,9th Ld-Writethru/1215 Eds: New version. With AP Photos. For global distribution. AP Video. Meet the new boss: Daley is Obama chief of staff BEN FELLER,AP White House Correspondent WASHINGTON (AP) — Overhauling his team at the top, President Barack Obama on Thursday named banker and seasoned political...
