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At a time of tension between their organizations, White House senior adviser David Axelrod met with Fox News chairman and chief executive officer Roger Ailes two weeks ago, sources tell POLITICO. The two met privately in Manhattan during the president’s visit to the United Nations. The two discussed news coverage and the relationship between the organizations. Ailes is the founder of Fox News. A key part of Axelrod’s portfolio is the president’s image and broad message. POLITICO has asked Fox for comment, and will update with reaction. White House officials have expressed pique with what they consider heavy coverage of...

Reporting from Washington - Chicago has been eliminated from the contest to host the 2016 Summer Olympics, a surprise development in the decision-making process by international Olympic officials. The city was a heavy favorite at least to make it through the first round of voting, and to be a serious contender in the final round of voting for the coveted Games. The decision dashes the hopes of U.S. boosters -- President Obama chief among them -- who had put their reputations on the line to help win the games for Chicago. The announcement came as the president and first lady...

A meeting of the Palestinian and Israeli leaders, hosted by President Barack Obama, ended in a frosty handshake in New York on Tuesday after the two sides had failed in advance to reach a compromise over the issue of Israeli settlements. The meeting between Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli prime minister, and Mahmoud Abbas, Palestinian Authority president, almost failed to take place after the failure of last week’s mission to the region by George Mitchell, US peace envoy. Little was expected from the New York session. Mr Abbas reluctantly agreed to the trilateral meeting, having said he would not go in the...

Never has an administration who had more firepower at their disposal, been set to so totally fail in the next six to eight weeks. It is nearly a foregone conclusion. It is nearly unavoidable. And it defies all logic given the sizable majority the administration has in both houses of Congress. Since I was the first pundit to predict Obama's presidency (Dec 2006) it behooves me to tell you the course I believe the next few weeks will take and effectively halt the radical transformation that the left appeared unstoppable with only months ago. 1. Health Care's long and painful...

President Obama's $787 billion stimulus plan is having little effect on job creation within the general-construction industry, the trade association for the sector said Thursday.

The Pentagon's top lawyer says the Obama administration hasn't given up the possibility of transferring some prisoners from Guantanamo Bay Naval Base to a detention facility in the United States, despite congressional opposition. Defense Department General Counsel Jeh Charles Johnson told the House Armed Services Committee Friday that it's possible some terror suspects may be transferred to the U.S. for prosecution and others may be held within the U.S. He said no prisoners would be released from custody inside the country. Congress has prohibited the government from spending federal funds to transfer Guantanamo prisoners to the U.S. Johnson also said...

"The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Thursday shows that 30% of the nation's voters now Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Thirty-eight percent (38%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of –8. The President’s Approval Index rating has fallen six points since release of a disappointing jobs report last week."

Quinnipiac's poll in Ohio out this morning has some eyebrow-raising numbers: "President Barack Obama gets a lackluster 49 – 44 percent approval rating in Ohio, considered by many to be the most important swing state in a presidential election, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today. This is President Obama’s lowest approval rating in any national or statewide Quinnipiac University poll since he was inaugurated and is down from 62 – 31 percent in a May 6 survey."

President Obama has staked his reputation on being a human rights guru to people around the world. But his remarks at Tuesday’s news conference and behavior since taking office have instead exposed a different persona–that of human rights charlatan. On June 15, three days after the phony Iranian elections and the same day that seven Iranian demonstrators were murdered, Obama’s UN Ambassador, Susan Rice, made a speech in Vienna promoting the Saint Obama vision: “The responsibility to protect is a duty that I feel deeply. … We must prepare for the likelihood that we will again face the worst impulses...

Chuck Todd: "Then why won't you spell out the consequences that the Iranian people..." President Obama: "Because I think that we don't know yet how this thing is going to play out. I know everybody here is on a 24-hour news cycle. I'm not. OK?"

WASHINGTON – The White House says President Barack Obama has been "moved" by the television images of people in Iran taking to the street in protest.

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday shows that 32% of the nation's voters now Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Thirty-four percent (34%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -2. That’s the President’s lowest rating to date and the first time the Presidential Approval Index has fallen below zero for Obama (see trends).

A substantial majority of Americans say President Obama has not developed a strategy to deal with the budget deficit, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, which also found that support for his plans to overhaul health care, rescue the auto industry and close the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, falls well below his job approval ratings. A distinct gulf exists between Mr. Obama’s overall standing and how some of his key initiatives are viewed, with fewer than half of Americans saying they approve of how he has handled health care and the effort to save General Motors...

Diplomacy:Should the U.S. scrap its special relationship with the U.K. to fulfill an ill-considered campaign vow? That's the trade-off the Obama administration made by secretly foisting terrorists onto Bermuda. It's wrong.The British Foreign Office had a right to be angry at the U.S. transfer of four Uighur terrorists from Guantanamo detention to the U.K. colony of Bermuda without its knowledge. After all, Britain is a sovereign state and, like any nation, has a right to know who's on its territory. Instead, it got treated like some banana republic. It didn't learn of the move until after the four Gitmo detainees...

WASHINGTON – When President Barack Obama increased unemployment benefits as part of his economic stimulus, he also made some Americans ineligible for hundreds of dollars a month in food stamps.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Monday that nuclear and missile tests conducted by North Korea were a "grave concern to all nations" and a legal violation that warranted action by the international community. "North Korea's attempts to develop nuclear weapons, as well as its ballistic missile program, constitute a threat to international peace and security," Obama said in a statement after Pyongyang conducted a nuclear test and reportedly fired a short-range missile. The nuclear test was a major diplomatic challenge to Obama at a time when he is facing a global economic crisis and working to curb...

President Barack Obama Friday warned America risked its security when it compromised its values, seeking support for his bid to sketch a new legal framework for anti-terror policies. Obama used the backdrop of the US Naval Academy graduation ceremony to argue that founding US ideals must guide the future battle against terrorism, a day after trying to quell raging debate over Guantanamo Bay in a major speech. "We uphold our fundamental principles and values not just because we choose to, but because we swear to -- not because they feel good, but because they help keep us safe," Obama told...

Fidel Castro says President Barack Obama "misinterpreted" his brother Raul's remarks regarding the United States and bristled at the suggestion that Cuba should free political prisoners or cut taxes on remittances from abroad as a goodwill gesture to the U.S. Raul Castro touched off a whirlwind of speculation last week that the U.S. and Cuba could be headed toward a thaw in nearly a half-century of chilly relations. The speculation began when the Cuban president said leaders would be willing to sit down with their U.S. counterparts and discuss "everything," including human rights, freedom of the press and expression, and...

Help me out here folks Could he really be this stupid???? Now Obama has insulted French President Sarkozy! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Oh no! Obama sent a letter to Chirac, saying he looks forward to working with him the next four years. Le Figaro, French newspaper is horrified at the faux pas. Doesn't Obama ever consult his staff before acting? Sarkozy is the President there! It's like Sarko writing to George Bush and saying he looks forward to working with him. Chirac is the FORMER president. Here is a translation of the letter in Le Figaro: Vendredi 20 mars 2009 OBAMA PREFERS CHIRAC...

Administration: Changes May be Needed in 90-Percent Tax on AIG Bonuses White House economic advisers said Sunday that President Obama won't "govern out of anger" despite calls for the heads of AIG executives who received bonuses, and acknowledged that using tax law to get back $165 million in government-funded bonuses may be "a dangerous way to go." Those officials said the economy will return to better days soon, but suggested the House-backed plan to tax American International Group Inc. executives' bonuses at a 90-percent rate may have to be modified in the Senate. "I think the president would be concerned...

Who would have thought 55 days into this administration we would be asking the question, what did he know and when did he know it? Word that a provision in the stimulus bill gave the green light for AIG to hand out bonuses using taxpayer money sent the media bloodhounds hot on the trail of whoever is the culprit. For a time, it looked like Senate Banking chairman Chris Dodd would take the fall, but after 24 hours of twisting in the wind, Dodd said the change that exempted past agreements to pay bonuses was made at the request of...

Obama just told the crowd that raising taxes on a couple about 3% was not that big of a deal to him because it could help healthcare reform and he felt it was not socialism.

I’ve been searching for the video of Obama accidentally reading Irish PM Brian Cowen’s speech yesterday. He even thanks himself at the end! Apparently his teleprompter went loopy. If this were GWB, the video would be everywhere, yet I can’t find a clip on the Internet of a public press conference that took place yesterday. It will come out, but this is amazing. Thank Sky News for doing its job: Mr Cowen stopped, turned to the president and said: “That’s your speech.” A laughing Mr Obama returned to the podium to take over but it seems the script had finally...

WASHINGTON -- A new poll by the independent Pew Research Center for the People & the Press has found that President Barack Obama's popular support is eroding, with his approval rating dropping below 60 percent. "President Barack Obama's approval rating has slipped, as a growing number of Americans see him listening more to his party's liberals than to its moderates, and many voice opposition to some of his key economic proposals," the Pew Center concluded.

"Never waste a good crisis" has become the semi-official motto of the Obama administration. We first heard it from the Machiavellian Rahm Emmanuel last November, when he said "you never want a serious crisis to go to waste. … It's an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before." The gaffe-prone Hillary Clinton echoed this sentiment in Europe earlier this month. Then President Obama, in his Saturday radio address, urged America to "discover great opportunity in the midst of great crisis." Emergencies call for urgent responses that allow little time for substantive debate. That is why...

THE furor over the huge federal spending under President Oba- ma - a $1.75 trillion deficit, 13 percent - obscures an even more basic question: Does he know what he is doing? That is, does he know how to do anything other than spend? His stimulus package, of course, took no special ability: He left the details to Democrats in Congress. But his two other major initiatives - his banking- and mortgage-relief plans - are both flawed and unlikely to solve their respective problems. Indeed, they're so wide of the mark as to prompt questions not of Obama's ideology but...

In what should be an extremely worrisome sign for the Obama administration, even those who most fervently supported Barack Obama are now beginning to express substantial doubts about his ability to govern. Columns by the Washington Post's David Broder (who proclaims the end of the Obama honeymoon), the NY Daily News' Michael Goodwin, and the always-reliable Michael Barone highlight the point. Mind you, it's not Broder, Goodwin or Barone expressing their own opinions. Rather, they're quoting Obama loyalists. Broder: "[S]ome thoughtful congressional Democrats with whom I have spoken . . .worry that [Obama] has bitten off more than he can...

When predators hunt, they look for signs of weakness in their prey. Big cats carefully observe the herd in search of the straggler, the sick or wounded and the very young because they are the easiest to catch and kill. On the world stage, political predators operate in a very similar manner. National leaders and their staffs watch and test for weakness among adversaries and allies. In fact, a substantial portion of the activities we call "spying" are devoted to information gathering and analysis for those very purposes. It is no secret that any perception of weakness in the president...

Not long ago, after a string of especially bad days for the Obama administration, a veteran Democratic pol approached me with a pained look on his face and asked, "Do you think they know what they're doing?" The question caught me off guard because the man is a well-known Obama supporter. As we talked, I quickly realized his asking suggested his own considerable doubts. Yes, it's early, but an eerily familiar feeling is spreading across party lines and seeping into the national conversation. It's a nagging doubt about the competency of the White House. It was during George W. Bush's...

As carefully as Barack Obama prepared for it, the presidency has held some surprises for him-some foreseeable, some not, and some of his own making. Seeking to avoid the mistakes of the early Clinton era, Obama concluded that, unlike Clinton, he didn't want to hold the numerous meetings that can chew up so much of the president's time. Instead, according to his press secretary, Robert Gibbs, Obama's style is to drop by an aide's office-a restless man, he roams the White House corridors-or stop an aide in a hallway and ask, "How are you coming on that thing we were...

Rio de Janeiro (AP) - His meet-and-greet with the U.S. president was bumped to Saturday, and when the White House announced his official visit, they misspelled his name. But when Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva becomes the first Latin American leader to sit down with President Barack Obama this weekend, he brings undisputed clout. Silva runs the world's fifth-most-populous nation and ninth-largest economy and has close ties with leaders across the political spectrum. He's been asked to lobby Obama for free trade on behalf of conservatives in Colombia and for dropping the U.S. embargo against communist Cuba. Even...

Transatlantic rift?: Downing Street finding it 'unbelievably difficult' to get in touch with White House, says Gus O'Donnell By IAN DRURY Last updated at 8:39 PM on 10th March 2009 Sparking a transatlantic rift?: Sir Gus O'Donnell is usually very guarded about his comments He has a reputation for being the archetypal senior civil servant professional, unflappable, and, above all, discreet. But Sir Gus O'Donnell risked sparking a transatlantic tiff today with an imprudent remark about Downing Street's relations with the White House. The head of the civil service, Sir Gus said the handover to President Barack Obama's administration was...

Afghanistan's Taliban on Tuesday turned down as illogical U.S. President Barack Obama's bid to reach out to moderate elements of the insurgents, saying the exit of foreign troops was the only solution for ending the war.snip"The Taliban are united, have one leader, one aim, one policy...I do not know why they are talking about moderate Taliban and what it means?," "If it means those who are not fighting and are sitting in their homes, then talking to them is meaningless. This really is surprising the Taliban."

It was embarrassing enough that President Barack Obama insulted British Prime Minister Gordon Brown last week by handing him 25 movie videos as the chief executive’s diplomatic gift to the visiting representative of America’s most important ally. Compared to Brown’s gifts, which included a pen holder made of wood from a British warship that helped stamp out the slave trade, Obama’s gift, in the words of The Telegraph, looked like the kind of thing the White House might hand out to the visiting head of a minor African state. Even worse is the context in which this huge diplomatic gaffe...

Pass the popcorn, please. This is getting good. Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi went after each other in a closed meeting with the Democratic leadership over what to do about the Senate's failure to pass the Omnibus spending bill that would keep the government running through the year. The problem is that the GOP is balking over the 8,000 earmarks as well as some other wasteful spending that they wish to see removed. And Reid can't get the Republicans to budge which has angered Pelosi who feels rather exposed after the House passed the bill easily: After an angry, swearing...

The White House's top budget official declared on Sunday that "fundamentally, the economy is weak" while saying the administration's own financial predictions could need a revision by midyear. Peter Orszag, President Barack Obama's Office of Management and Budget director, said in television interviews that the economic downturn has been years in the making but cautioned that the new administration wasn't yet looking at a second economic stimulus package. Orszag said the already-in-place $787 billion stimulus should have a chance to work before officials ask Congress to consider a sequel.

The U.S. will press world leaders to boost emergency government spending to lift the global economy, risking a rift with European nations more concerned with revamping financial regulation. In President Barack Obama's first foray into economic diplomacy, Washington will urge the shift at a summit next month in London, U.S. officials say, as markets look for a unified plan of action from the world's most economically powerful nations. Washington's focus is at odds with France, Germany and other European nations that want the Group of 20 summit on April 2 to focus on rewriting rules governing financial markets. These nations...

National Journal's Stuart Taylor becomes the latest sophisticated analyst to notice the moderate bipartisan centrist in the White House is behaving very oddly. Or as Mr Taylor's headline puts it: Obama's Left Turn What left turn? He's chugging in the same direction he has since he decided to become a "community organizer". His budget is entirely consistent with his voting record as a US Senator, his state politics back in Illinois, his friends and political mentors - and even, as the late Dean Barnett noticed in February last year*, his non-teleprompter campaign rhetoric: Virtually every time Obama deviated from the...

Barack Obama's offhand approach to Gordon Brown's Washington visit last week came about because the president was facing exhaustion over America's economic crisis and is unable to focus on foreign affairs, the Sunday Telegraph has been toldSources close to the White House say Mr Obama and his staff have been "overwhelmed" by the economic meltdown and have voiced concerns that the new president is not getting enough rest. British officials, meanwhile, admit that the White House and US State Department staff were utterly bemused by complaints that the Prime Minister should have been granted full-blown press conference and a formal...

Barack Obama's offhand approach to Gordon Brown's Washington visit last week came about because the president has facing exhaustion over America's economic crisis and is unable to focus on foreign affairs, the Sunday Telegraph has been told. Sources close to the White House say Mr Obama and his staff have been "overwhelmed" by the economic meltdown and have voiced concerns that the new president is not getting enough rest. British officials, meanwhile, admit that the White House and US State Department staff were utterly bemused by complaints that the Prime Minister should have been granted full-blown press conference and a...

Barack Obama won the presidency in large measure because he presented himself as a demarcation point. The old politics, he said, was based on "spin," misleading arguments, and an absence of candor. He'd "turn the page" on that style of politics. Last week's presentation of his budget shows that hope was a mirage. For example, Mr. Obama didn't run promising larger deficits -- but now is offering record-setting ones. He'll add $4.9 trillion before his term ends and $7.4 trillion if given a second, doubling the national debt in five years and tripling it in 10. Mr. Obama's deficits will...

NBC's Tom Costello, on duty at the White House today, asked press secretary Robert Gibbs about some comments made by his CNBC colleague Jim Cramer. On the Today show this morning, Cramer called Pres. Obama's budget a "radical agenda," adding, "This is the greatest wealth destruction I've seen by a President." "I'm not entirely sure what he's pointing to to make some of the statements," said Gibbs. "And you can go back and look at any number of statements he's made in the past about the economy and wonder where some of the back-up for those are too." When pressed...

Dear Mr. Attorney General: Your speech commemorating Black History Month by calling America "a nation of cowards" because we "do not talk enough with each other about race" -- a topic about which we talk incessantly -- was unworthy of the admirable public servant I believe you to be. The speech was, as others have pointed out, embarrassingly misinformed, hackneyed, and devoid of thoughtful contributions to racial dialogue. You can do much better. Please use your bully pulpit in the future to cut through the usual cant and state some politically incorrect truths about race in America that would carry...

WASHINGTON -- Energy Secretary Steven Chu -- whose agency has long taken the lead on global oil-market policy -- said Thursday he doesn't know what the Obama administration would urge the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to do at its meeting next month. "I'm not the administration," Mr. Chu said during a meeting with reporters Thursday. OPEC members are scheduled to meet March 15 to discuss the possibility of production cuts to respond to slumping prices. "I will be speaking and learning more about this in order to figure out what the U.S. position should be and what the president's...

Jennifer Rubin, a mainstay of Commentary’s “Contentions” blog, does a fine job deconstructing the Washington Post’s editorial on Pres. Obama’s first three weeks in office. Rubin’s bottom line: “The Washington Post editors can’t quite bring themselves to condemn the president outright, but they sure do give some hints that they aren’t pleased.”

Elections have consequences. That is what democracy is about after all. Barack Obama is correct when he states that his victory last November gives him the right, or more specifically the power, to have things his way when it comes to handling the nation's economic challenges. The country, moreover, could use some decisive economic action. The financial system is a mess, unemployment is rising and will keep increasing. The government will likely run a deficit of 10 percent or more of GDP both this year and next--roughly twice the share of the Reagan deficits and roughly three times the size...

Few pieces of political "wisdom" are more tediously recycled than a well-retailed bon mot of British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan. Asked what he feared most in the months ahead, he gave an amused Edwardian response: "Events, dear boy, events." In other words, you can plan all you want, but next month, next year some guy off the radar screen will launch a war, or there'll be an earthquake, or … something. Governments get thrown off course by "events." It requires a perverse kind of genius for the 44th president not to have waited for a single "event" to throw him...

Emanuel: White House not 'amateur hour' Jon Ward (Contact) Defending the White House in the wake of Sen. Judd Gregg's withdrawal as Commerce Secretary, Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said it is not "amateur hour" and that the Obama administration is still doing better than President Clinton was at this point. "Some may call it amateur hour. Having been in two separate White Houses, I'm more than — and within our third week given this set of accomplishments — measure them up," said Mr. Emanuel, who served as a senior adviser in the Clinton White House from 1993 to 1998....

Aides Say Team Interviewed Palin Late in the Process By Dan Balz Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, September 3, 2008; A01 ST. PAUL, Minn., Sept. 2 -- Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin was not subjected to a lengthy in-person background interview with the head of Sen. John McCain's vice presidential vetting team until last Wednesday in Arizona, the day before McCain asked her to be his running mate, and she did not disclose the fact that her 17-year-old daughter was pregnant until that meeting, two knowledgeable McCain officials acknowledged Tuesday. Palin was one of two finalists in the vice presidential sweepstakes...