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House Speaker John Boehner says congressional leaders and President Barack Obama did not reach a budget agreement following a White House meeting. Boehner says Republicans are rallying behind a short-term cure. Obama met with Boehner, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and the top House and Senate appropriators Tuesday in hopes of breaking an impasse in talks to set spending levels through the end of September. Without an agreement by Friday, the government would be forced to shut down. Boehner said he told Obama that House Republicans are preparing a short-term measure that would keep the government running for another week...

BANGKOK – The United States was heavily criticized Friday at the U.N. climate talks in Bangkok for failing to offer emission cuts or financing for developing countries — both considered crucial to reaching a global warming pact this year. The Bangkok talks ended just as it was announced that President Barack Obama had won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize, for among other things strengthening the U.S. role in combatting climate change. U.N. climate chief Yvo de Boer said he hoped the award would spur progress when the U.S. delegation arrives in Copenhagen in December for crucial climate negotiations. Obama is...

WASHINGTON – An internal review prepared for Barack Obama found his incoming chief of staff had multiple conversations with the Illinois governor's office, but said the talks did not involve any deal concerning whom the governor would appoint to replace Obama in the Senate. The report was released Tuesday as a transition official disclosed that Obama and two of his top aides, Rahm Emanuel and Valerie Jarrett, have been interviewed in connection with the federal investigation into Gov. Rod Blagojevich. The transition official, speaking on a condition of anonymity before the report's public release, also confirmed that Emanuel had been...

Russia will stop developing some strategic weapons if the United States drops plans for a missile shield in Europe, Interfax news agency quoted the commander of Russia's strategic missile forces as saying on Friday. "If Americans give up plans to deploy the third positioning region and other elements of the strategic missile defense system then certainly we will adequately respond to it," Colonel-General Nikolai Solovtsov said.

President George Bush's emergency meeting to solve the economic crisis in America failed to reach an agreement, a top senator involved has said. Senator Richard Shelby told reporters outside the White House that he did not believe there was an agreement and that the proposals by US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson constituted a "bad plan". Both presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama were taking part in the meeting after being invited by Mr Bush on Wednesday. The president has said a 700 billion dollar (£380bn) rescue plan needs to be agreed "immediately" if the United States is to avoid...

Senator Graham said on Greta that ACORN was going to get funds in the original deal. It will be a cold day in hell if those leftist crooks get my tax dollars.

Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign rejected suggestions Sunday that Sen. Hillary Clinton is staying in the race in hopes of brokering some kind of agreement with the likely Democratic nominee. "I don't believe that Sen. Clinton is looking for a deal," Obama's chief campaign strategist, David Axelrod, told "Fox News Sunday," when asked about suggestions she may want the Obama campaign's help retiring her campaign debt. "I don't think that's what this is about," he said. Last week, Obama sparked rumors that his campaign would pay off Clinton's campaign debts once he secured the nomination. "I'd want to have a...

VIENNA (Reuters) - Iran could stop enriching uranium "in the best case" only as a result of negotiations with major world powers, but not as a precondition for such talks, a senior Iranian official said on Thursday. It appeared to be the first time Tehran had hinted at the possibility of suspending nuclear fuel enrichment the West sees as an atomic bomb risk. But the insistence that suspension could only happen after talks was likely to be rejected. Javad Vaeedi, deputy head of Iran's national security council and of its nuclear negotiating team, said Tehran was taking its time to...

DeLay Offered Deal Before Indictment 17 minutes ago A Texas prosecutor tried to persuade Rep. Tom DeLay to plead guilty to a misdemeanor and save his job as majority leader but DeLay refused, the congressman's attorney said Monday. Dick DeGuerin described such an effort in a letter to the prosecutor in the case, Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle. DeLay has been indicted on conspiracy and money laundering charges in a Texas campaign finance investigation, both felonies. He was obligated to step aside under House Republican rules. "Before the first indictment you tried to coerce a guilty plea from Tom...

The Answer Is in the Works The real negotiations haven’t taken place yet. Today begins the fifth year of waiting for confirmation for some of President Bush's nominees to the federal courts of appeals. With the Senate reconvening on Capitol Hill, and Majority Leader Bill Frist preparing to use the "nuclear option" — or the "constitutional option" or "Byrd option," as it is also known — to end the standoff over Democratic filibusters, the outlines of a possible compromise solution are beginning to take shape. It's not the quick-and-dirty fix, recently floated in the press, in which both sides would...

Yasser Arafat wants to reach a mutual truce with Israel, his national security adviser said Tuesday, but Israeli officials said the government would reject the offer outright. Brig. Gen. Jibril Rajoub, Arafat's national security adviser, said under a ceasefire, the Palestinians would halt all acts of violence in return for an Israeli agreement to end its military operations, including lifting blockades on Palestinian towns and villages. "We are ready to sit and we are ready to declare a general ceasefire, but there needs to be something mutual because without mutuality nothing will be achieved," Rajoub told Israel Radio. Rajoub did...