In another bizaare story, a US soldier claims he will not deploy due to the fact that he believes that President Barack Obama is infact  not a US citizen.

Here’s the full story:

Obama birth certificate deniers won a small victory in court on Monday. Meanwhile, one such conspiracy theorist refused to deploy to Afghanistan on the grounds that Barack Obama isn’t a legitimate president.

A judge said he would listen to “the merits” of Alan Keyes’ case challenging Obama’s presidency. While a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office said the move was merely procedural, birth conspiracy proponents are encouraged:

Supporters of a case that disputes the legitimacy of Barack Obama’s presidency claimed a small victory today when U.S. District Judge David O. Carter told them to fix their paperwork and that he would listen to “the merits” of their case. But others present for the hearing Monday at the federal courthouse in Santa Ana stressed that the case remains a long way from ever getting a full airing in court and may never get to that point. [...]
Perhaps because of that history, Orly Taitz, the lawyer who filed the current suit, was greatly cheered by Monday’s hearing. “He’s very determined to hear the case on the merits,” Taitz said, referring to the judge. “He stated, the country needs to know if Mr. Obama is legitimate, if he can legitimately stay in the White House.”

Orly Taitz, the lawyer in Keyes’ case, is also representing a soldier who refuses to acknowledge Obama as his president. U.S. Army Maj. Stefan Frederick Cook has argued that he shouldn’t have to go to Afghanistan because the man sending him there isn’t really president.

In the 20-page document — filed July 8 with the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Georgia — the California-based Taitz asks the court to consider granting his client’s request based upon Cook’s belief that Obama is not a natural-born citizen of the United States and is therefore ineligible to serve as commander-in-chief of the U.S. Armed Forces.
Cook further states he “would be acting in violation of international law by engaging in military actions outside the United States under this President’s command. … simultaneously subjecting himself to possible prosecution as a war criminal by the faithful execution of these duties.”

A hearing to discuss Cook’s requests will take place in federal court this week.

This is  just ridiculous. I understand that you don’t have to be pleased with the way an election turns out. That’s fine, one side always loses but to take it this far is just absurd. Why was there no questions about any other President? I do not seem to recall anyone even checking to see if Pres. G.W. Bush even had a birth certificate.  The fact that a select few people cannot come to grips with a President who was elected, in a landslide victory might I add, and who has endured almost more scrutiny than any other elected President, impart because of his race, is just sad. We must learn to look beyond our own wants so that we can see the needs of a country. Now we may not agree with everything Pres. Obama does but we do believe him to be our President and will follow suit as we have done for so many previous President’s whether we voted for them or not.

President Barack Obama, left, congratulates Dr. Regina Benjamin, center, as Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius applauds, following Obama's announcement of his nomination of Benjamin to the post of Surgeon General, Monday, July 13, 2009, in the White House Rose Garden in Washington. (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari)

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama turned to the Deep South for the next surgeon general, choosing a rural Alabama family physician who made headlines with fierce determination to rebuild her nonprofit medical clinic in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

Dr. Regina Benjamin is known along Alabama’s impoverished Gulf Coast as a country doctor who makes house calls and doesn’t turn away patients who can’t pay _ even as she’s had to find the money to rebuild a clinic repeatedly destroyed by hurricanes and once even fire.

“For all the tremendous obstacles that she has overcome, Regina Benjamin also represents what’s best about health care in America, doctors and nurses who give and care and sacrifice for the sake of their patients,” Obama said Monday in introducing his choice for a job known as America’s doctor.

He said Benjamin will bring insight as his administration struggles to revamp the health care system:

Saying she “has seen in a very personal way what is broken about our health care system,” Obama said Benjamin will bring important insight as his administration tries to revamp that system.

Benjamin called the job “a physician’s dream,” and pledged to be a voice for patients in need _ and to fight the preventable diseases that claim too many lives each year, including nearly her entire family.

Her father died with diabetes and high blood pressure, her only brother of HIV, her mother of lung cancer “because as a young girl, she wanted to smoke just like her twin brother could” _ an uncle now on oxygen as a result, she noted.

“I cannot change my family’s past. I can be a voice in the movement to improve our nation’s health care and our nation’s health,” Benjamin said. “I want to be sure that no one falls through the cracks as we improve our health care system.”

The surgeon general is the people’s health advocate, a bully pulpit position that can be tremendously effective with a forceful personality. Benjamin has that reputation.

Pushed by the need in her own shrimping community of Bayou La Batre, Ala., and its diverse patient mix _ white, black and, increasingly immigrants from Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos _ Benjamin, 51, has emerged as a national leader in the call to improve health disparities. She became the first black woman and the first doctor under age 40 elected to the American Medical Association’s board of trustees, and in 2002 became the first black woman to head a state medical society.

“She’s always been very ambitious from a political standpoint. She has always, always been motivated by that ambition,” said Dr. James Holland, CEO of Mostellar Medical Center in nearby Irvington, Ala., where Benjamin spent about three years in the early 1980s as a National Health Service Corps scholar.

Holland said Benjamin’s selection as surgeon general “doesn’t surprise me at all. The only thing that surprises me is that it hasn’t happened before now.”

Medical groups welcomed her ability for straight-talk, whether to patients or politicians, about the dire health needs of much of the country.

“We want to emphasize prevention, primary care and early intervention, and we have somebody now who does that for a living,” said Dr. Georges Benjamin, no relation, of the American Public Health Association.

Added AMA President Dr. James Rohack, who has known Benjamin for more than two decades. With “her recognition that if you don’t have health insurance, you live sicker and you die younger, she can bring the real-world perspective as surgeon general of the things as a nation we need to do to keep ourselves healthy.”

Benjamin made headlines in the wake of Katrina, as photographs showed her laying patient charts out to bake in the sun and lamenting the lack of pricey but more hurricane-resistant electronic records. Her nonprofit clinic was rebuilt by volunteers only to burn down just as it was about to reopen. Benjamin later told of her patients’ desperation that she rebuild again, recalling on woman who handed her an envelope with a $7 donation to help.

“If she can find $7, I can figure out the rest,” Benjamin said last fall as she received a $500,000 MacArthur Foundation “genius award,” money she said she’d use to help finish that job.

Her nomination for surgeon general requires Senate confirmation.

WASHINGTON (AP) — With joblessness rising, President Barack Obama said Thursday he was “deeply concerned” about unemployment and conceded that too many families are worried about “whether they will be next” to suffer economically.

In a White House interview with The Associated Press, Obama said that since he took office, “we have successfully stabilized the financial markets,” and “started to see some stabilization on housing.”

“But what we are still seeing is too many jobs lost,” said Obama, commenting after new government figures showed the unemployment rate had risen to 9.5 percent last month.

On an important international subject, Obama is scheduled to travel to Russia next week, and he said the agenda includes talks on a new treaty to curtail long-range nuclear missiles. Asked why he intends to meet with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, the former president, Obama said he “still has a lot of sway.” Putin now is nominally the second-in-command in the Kremlin.

Obama also is to meet with the Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev.

It is important that both Medvedev and Putin hear the same message from the U.S., said Obama, who added that he believes Putin “has one foot in the old ways of doing business and one foot in the new.”

Obama praised Russia for its cooperation in attempting to persuade North Korea and Iran to abandon their nuclear development programs. The United Nations recently approved “the most robust sanction regime that we’ve ever seen with respect to North Korea,” he said.

Asked if he was resigned to Iran’s possession of nuclear weapons, he said, “I’m not reconciled with that, and I don’t think the international community is reconciled with that.”

Obama spoke sympathetically of white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., who won a Supreme Court case this week after claiming they had been unfairly denied promotions because of their race. But he added, “Keep in mind the Supreme Court didn’t close the door to affirmative action” to help minorities.

At the same time, he conceded the justices were “moving the ball” on the issue with a 5-4 ruling in the case.

Obama, a former teacher of constitutional law, said, “I’ve always believed that affirmative action was less of an issue or should be less of an issue than it has been made out to be in news reports. It hasn’t been as potent a force for racial progress as advocates will claim and it hasn’t been as bad on white students seeking admissions or seeking a job as its critics say.”

Asked about his plans for detainees currently held at the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the president said the idea of indefinite detention being part of his legacy as president “gives me huge pause.”

But he also said there are some detainees who don’t fall neatly into existing categories for criminal prosecution in the United States or under international law. He said dealing with them is going to be one of the biggest challenges of his administration. He said he’s not comfortable with mandating indefinite detentions on his own through executive orders, but he didn’t explicitly rule that out.

And his view of Michael Jackson, whose death has dominated news coverage for nearly a week: The president said Jackson was “one of our greatest entertainers” and “I still have all his stuff on my iPod.” But he said Jackson’s life had been tragic and in many ways sad.

On light subjects:

– The president spoke enthusiastically of the White House pastry chef. “Whatever kind of pie you want, he will make it,” Obama said, adding ruefully that that was a problem for him and wife Michelle in regard to their weight.

– Asked whether he was a bigger fan of Kobe Bryant or Michael Jordan, one the reigning MVP of the National Basketball Association and the other a retired superstar, the basketball-playing president said without hesitation: “Michael. I haven’t seen anybody match up with Jordan yet.”

Report courtesy Huffington Post

Nico Pitney

pitney@huffingtonpost.com | HuffPost Reporting

Become a Fan Get Email Alerts from this Reporter

I’m liveblogging the latest Iran election fallout. Email me with any news or thoughts. Send me instant messages at nico.pitney@gmail.com or njpitney on AIM. Scroll down for stories that correspond to the front-page headlines. Local Iran time is 8 1/2 hours ahead of Eastern time.

President Obama’s press conference today: looking for questions from Iranians. One of the most rewarding parts of documenting the recent events in Iran has been making contact with the brave people there who are organizing and demonstrating at incredible risk.

Later today, President Obama is holding a news conference at the White House and I’ll be attending. If I get called, I want to ask a question that comes directly from an Iranian. We’ve all spent plenty of time discussing and debating how the President has reacted to the crisis there; it seems only fair that the people on the ground, living right now under great stress and uncertainty, be able to have a question of theirs answered.

The popular Farsi-language social bookmarking site Balatarin has posted our request for questions here, and users there will be able to vote on them. If you’re on Twitter, please retweet this post to help get the word out. Or, if you’re reading this from Iran or you want to relay questions from friends/family in Iran, please feel free to contact me by email on Facebook.

1:16 AM ET — Allahu Akbar! “People in Tehran, in a gesture of defiance first used in the 1979 Islamic revolution and now adopted by pro-reform protesters, again chanted ‘Allahu Akbar’ (God is greatest) from their rooftops at nightfall on Monday.”

Via Iran’s Green Revolution:

12:40 AM ET — A 19-year-old shot in the head and killed during the demonstrations… and Iranian officials asked his parents to “pay an equivalent of $3,000 as a ‘bullet fee’ — a fee for the bullet used by security forces — before taking the body back.” One of the most tragic stories I’ve read in a long time, by the Wall Street Journal’s exceptional Farnaz Fassihi.

12:20 AM — 600+ miles from Tehran. They’re in the streets there too, according to this video apparently filmed in Kerman.

12:15 AM ET — UN chief speaks up. “U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged an immediate stop on Monday to use of force against civilians in Iran and urged authorities to respect civil rights in dealing with protests over presidential election results. A statement issued by Ban’s press office said he was dismayed by the post-election violence, ‘particularly the use of force against civilians.’” Ban urged “an immediate stop to the arrests, threats and use of force.”

7:18 AM ET — Khamenei takes a hard line. A very harsh message. “Iran’s supreme leader said Friday that the country’s disputed presidential vote had not been rigged, sternly warning protesters of a crackdown if they continue massive demonstrations demanding a new election.” Here’s AP:

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei sided with hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and offered no concessions to the opposition. He effectively closed any chance for a new vote by calling the June 12 election an “absolute victory.”
The speech created a stark choice for candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi and his supporters: Drop their demands for a new vote or take to the streets again in blatant defiance of the man endowed with virtually limitless powers under Iran’s constitution.

Khamenei accused foreign media and Western countries of trying to create a political rift and stir up chaos in Iran.

“Some of our enemies in different parts of the world intended to depict this absolute victory, this definitive victory, as a doubtful victory,” he said, according to an official translation on state TV’s English-language channel. “It is your victory. They cannot manipulate it.” [...]

Khamenei’s address was his first since hundreds of thousands of Mousavi supporters flooded the streets in Tehran and elsewhere in the country in rallies evoking the revolution that ended Iran’s U.S.-backed monarchy. On Thursday, supporters dressed in black and green flooded downtown Tehran in a somber, candlelit show of mourning for those who have been killed in clashes since Friday’s vote.

Khamenei said the street protests would not have any impact.

“Some may imagine that street action will create political leverage against the system and force the authorities to give in to threats. No, this is wrong,” he said.

Former President George W. Bush has been remarkably reticent since Barack Obama took office, saying that the new commander in chief “deserves my silence.” Apparently, that’s no longer the case. At a speech in Erie, Pennsylvania Wednesday night, Bush broke his vow in all but word.

“I told you I’m not going to criticize my successor,” he said. “I’ll just tell you that there are people at Gitmo that will kill American people at a drop of a hat and I don’t believe that persuasion isn’t going to work. Therapy isn’t going to cause terrorists to change their mind.”

ABC News has pointed out that it was the Bush administration that sent terrorists to therapy — a Saudi jihadi rehabilitation camp — with “decidedly mixed success.”

Bush’s critique extended to Obama’s domestic policy.

“Government does not create wealth,” Bush said. “The major role for the government is to create an environment where people take risks to expand the job rate in the United States.”

To continue reading this story please visit Huff Post here

Mousavi speaks at the mourning rally. A reliable Iranian on Twitter types up some of the highlights on the fly, via reader Ian:

· I have come due to concerns of current political and social conditions – to defend the rights of the nation
· I have come to improve Irans International relations
· I have come to tell the world and return to Iran our pride, our dignity, our future
· I have come to bring to Iran a FUTURE of FREEDOM, of HOPE, of fulfilment
· I have come to represent the poor the helpless the hungry
· I have come to be ACCOUNTABLE to you my people and to this world
· Iran must participate in FAIR elections, it is a matter of national importance
· I have come to you because of the corruption in Iran
· 25% inflation means IGNORANCE – THIEVING – CORRUPTION – where is the wealth of my nation?
· What have you done with $300 BILLION in last 4 years – where is the wealth of the nation?
· The next Gov of Iran will be chosen by the people
· Why do all our young want to leave this country?
· I know of no creation who places HIMSELF ahead of 20 million of the nation
· We are Muslims – what is happening in Iran Government is a sin
· This Gov is not what Imam Khomeini wanted for Iran – #Irane lection I will change all this – This is the SEA of GREEN

Salon.com just posted a very interesting article begging to ask the question  what would be different if John McCain had won. Now We like John McCain as well

Picture, if you will, an America apparently like our own. A country like ours bogged down in war on two fronts and suffering from the greatest economic slump since the Great Depression of the 1930s. An America indistinguishable from ours in every respect except that when you turn on the nightly news you see the face of President John Sidney McCain …

OK, Rod Serling as host of “The Twilight Zone” probably would have said it better. But seriously — where would we be in the summer of 2009, if in last November’s election John McCain rather than Barack Obama had been elected president of the United States?

“No difference!” would be the answer of those alienated populists and leftists for whom Republicans and Democrats are merely different tentacles of the same Bilderberger or Trilateral Commission octopus. Certainly from the perspectives of socialists or libertarians — or fascists or Islamic theocrats — the consensus shared by America’s two parties seems much greater than their differences. But from the vantage point of mainstream American politics, the differences between the Obama administration and a hypothetical McCain administration would have been real and can be vividly illustrated by counterfactual history.

To continue reading this article, please visit Salon.com here

by Rachel Weiner

President Obama is considering sending former Vice President Al Gore to North Korea to negotiate the release of two American journalists from Current TV, Reuters reports.

Aides to Obama have been working behind the scenes to secure the release of the two women, Laura Ling and Euna Lee, who were sentenced on Monday to twelve years of hard labor.

To continue reading this article please visit Huffington Post here

Senate Democratic leader Malcolm Smith, D-Queens, is surrounded by Democratic senators during a news conference at the Capitol in Albany, N.Y., Monday, June 8, 2009. Republicans and two dissident Democrats appeared to have taken control of New York's Senate on Monday after the Democrats voted with the GOP to throw the fledgling Democrat majority out of power in a parliamentary coup. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) Republicans and two dissident Democrats took control of New York’s Senate on Monday after the two New York City renegades voted with the GOP to throw the fledgling Democratic majority out of power.

The decision by senators Pedro Espada Jr. of the Bronx and Hiram Monserrate of Queens to join the coalition gave Republicans a 32-30 voting edge on hastily introduced measures that changed the leadership structure. Neither Espada nor Monserrate changed party affiliation.

Democrats held the Senate for barely five months after being out of power for four decades.

Shortly after the coup, Republicans named Espada temporary president of the Senate and Republican Dean Skelos of Nassau County vice president and majority leader. Skelos was majority leader in 2008.

Those are the most powerful positions in the chamber. With them, the bipartisan coalition can direct legislation and reassign committee and leadership posts.

Democrats tried to leave the chamber, even turning off the lights briefly, and are expected to challenge Monday’s action in court.

The coup throws into doubt the movement to legalize same-sex marriage, one of the major policy issues still pending for the last two weeks of the regular session. Although passed in the Democrat-led Assembly, it is stalled in the Senate. Several Republicans and Sen. Ruben Diaz, a Bronx Democrat oppose the measure.

“This is historic,” Libous said in an interview on the floor. “There is going to be reform. You are going to see things that you’ve never seen in Albany.”

Democratic leader Malcolm Smith of Queens, who was elected majority leader in January, referred to the drama as “scurrilous action” by Republicans.

“There was an illegal vote taken,” Smith said. “Let me be very clear _ very clear _ the Senate majority is in Democratic hands.” He said he won’t reconvene the session until the coalition drops its challenge to the leadership.

The coalition immediately approved a thick new list of rules for governing the chamber. It adjourned until Wednesday, when it plans to return to run the Senate.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hit the Sunday morning talk show circuit and she had some pretty interesting stuff to say to ABC’s George Stephanopoulos about her former rival. Here’s how George puts it:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said President Barack Obama has “absolutely” answered questions she posed during the Democratic campaign about his lack of experience and ability to handle an international crisis.

In her first Sunday show interview since her presidential bid ended a year ago, I asked Clinton if Obama answered the questions she raised in her campaign’s “3a.m.” ad.

“Absolutely,” Clinton told me in an exclusive “This Week” Sunday show interview– her first as secretary of state.

“And, you know, the president in his public actions  and demeanor, and certainly in private with me and with the national security team, has been strong, thoughtful, decisive, I think he is doing a terrific job,” she said, “And it’s an honor to serve with him.”

Obama told Richard Wolffe that he had decided to offer State to Clinton during their primary battle.
That came as a surprise to her.

“I never had any — any dream, let alone inkling that I would end up in President Obama’s cabinet,” she told me.

“I was looking forward to going back to the Senate and, frankly, going back to my life and representing New York, which I love. And I had no idea that he had a different plan in mind.”

Clinton also deflected Obama’s first pass.

“When he called and asked me to come see him, and we had our first conversation I said, ‘you know, I really don’t think I’m the person to do this, I want to go back to my life. I really feel like I owe it to the people of New York,’” Clinton said.

“And I gave him a bunch of other names of people who I thought would be great secretaries of state. But he was quite persistent and very  persuasive. And, you know, ultimately it came down to my feeling that, number one, when your president asks you to do something for your country, you really need a good reason not to do it.”

“Number two, if I had won and I had asked him to please help me serve our country, I would have hoped he would say yes,” Clinton said, “And finally, I looked  around our world and I thought, you know, we are in just so many deep  holes that everybody had better grab a shovel and start digging out.”

–George Stephanopoulos

CAIRO – Quoting from the Quran for emphasis, President Barack Obama called for a “new beginning between the United States and Muslims” Thursday and said together, they could confront violent extremism across the globe and advance the timeless search for peace in the Middle East.

“This cycle of suspicion and discord must end,” Obama said in a widely anticipated speech in one of the world’s largest Muslim countries, an address designed to re frame relations after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the U.S.-led war in Iraq.

The White House said Obama’s speech contained no new policy proposals on the Middle East. He said American ties with Israel are unbreakable, yet issued a firm, evenhanded call to the Jewish state and Palestinians alike to live up to their international obligations.

In a gesture to the Islamic world, Obama conceded at the beginning of his remarks that tension “has been fed by colonialism that denied rights and opportunities to many Muslims, and a Cold War in which Muslim-majority countries were often treated as proxies without regard to their own aspirations.”

“And I consider it part of my responsibility as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear,” said the president, who recalled hearing prayer calls of “azaan” at dawn and dusk while living in Indonesia as a boy.

At the same time, he said the same principle must apply in reverse. “Just as Muslims do not fit a crude stereotype, America is not the crude stereotype of a self-interested empire.”

Notably, Obama made an emotional plea for the right of Palestinians to live in dignity in an independent state of their own. He even used the term “Palestine,” in a break from standard references to a future Palestinian state.

Watch Obama’s remarks below:

YEONPYEONG, South Korea – North Korea warned Friday it would act in “self-defense” if provoked by the U.N. Security Council, which is considering tough sanctions over the communist country’s nuclear test, and followed the threat with the test launch of another short-range missile.

The North fired the missile from its Musudan-ni launch site on the east coast, a South Korean government official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the sensitivity of the matter. It is the sixth short-range missile North Korea has test-fired since Monday’s nuclear test.

The official did not provide further details. But the Yonhap news agency cited an unidentified South Korean government official as saying the missile is a new type of ground-to-air missile estimated to have a range of up to 160 miles (260 kilometers).

Yonhap said the missile is believed to be an improved version of the SA-5, which North Korea introduced in 1963 and deployed in eastern and western parts of the country. The SA-5 was originally produced by the Soviet Union.

North Korea is also showing signs of firing a short-range missile from its west coast, Yonhap said, without elaborating.

With tensions high on the Korean peninsula, Chinese fishing boats left the region, possibly to avoid any maritime skirmishes between the two Koreas. But U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said the situation was not a crisis and no additional U.S. troops would be sent to the region.

North Korea, meanwhile, warned it would retaliate if provoked.

“If the U.N. Security Council makes a further provocation, it will be inevitable for us to take further self-defense measures,” the North’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.

North Korea also accused the Security Council of hypocrisy.

“There is a limit to our patience,” the statement said. “The nuclear test conducted in our nation this time is the Earth’s 2,054th nuclear test. The five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council have conducted 99.99 percent of the total nuclear tests.”

The North has been strident since its test — which it has also called a self-defensive measure. It did not specify what further action it was considering in response to U.N. resolutions, or what it would consider a provocation.

Fears have increased of military skirmishes, particularly in disputed waters off the western coast, after North Korea conducted the nuclear test on Monday and then renounced the truce that has kept peace between the Koreas since the Korean War ended in 1953.

The waters were the site of two deadly clashes in 1999 and 2002.

Article courtesy of  the Huffingon Post (JAMES PRICHARD)

BENTON TOWNSHIP, Mich. — Flying on Air Force One, eating meals prepared by the White House kitchen staff and drawing inspiration from his encounters with U.S. military personnel were among things former President George W. Bush missed since leaving office, he said Thursday.

The often-tearful meetings he had with relatives of fallen soldiers were “in some ways… very hard and in some ways, it was very uplifting,” the Texas Republican said in a speech to The Economic Club of Southwestern Michigan at Lake Michigan College.

About eight people protested Bush’s appearance outside the venue, carrying signs that called him a murderer and a traitor. The speech Thursday was one of the first made by the former president since leaving office in January.

Bush, the nation’s 43rd president, spoke to 2,500 people about “the fog of war” that followed the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the economic downturn and his return to life as a regular citizen.

“It was a roller coaster of emotions, it really was,” Bush said of the terror attacks. “I think about it now at times but I definitely thought about it every day as president.”

Bush spoke broadly about his decision-making after the capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in March 2003.

“I vowed to take whatever steps that were necessary to protect you,” Bush said.

‘”The first thing you do is ask, what’s legal?” he said. “What do the lawyers say is possible? I made the decision, within the law, to get information so I can say to myself, ‘I’ve done what it takes to do my duty to protect the American people.’ I can tell you that the information we got saved lives.”

He talked about the economy, blaming “a lack of responsible regulation” in the lending industry for the recession and said that the Federal National Mortgage Association, known as Fannie Mae, and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp., or Freddie Mac, shouldn’t have engaged in certain financial practices.

“I don’t want to sound like a self-serving guy, but we did try to rein them in,” Bush said.

He also said he believes he was right to depose Iraq president Saddam Hussein and that it may lead to the spread of democracy throughout the Middle East.

The audience, which gave Bush a warm welcome at his arrival, cheered when he said he wanted to be remembered as a president who “showed up in office with a set of principles and he was unwilling to sacrifice his soul for the sake of popularity.”

President Barack Obama announces federal appeals court judge Sonia Sotomayor, right, as his nominee for the Supreme Court, Tuesday, May 26, 2009, in an East Room ceremony at the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais )

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama named federal appeals judge Sonia Sotomayor as the nation’s first Hispanic Supreme Court justice on Tuesday, praising her as “an inspiring woman” with both the intellect and compassion to interpret the Constitution wisely.

Obama said Sotomayor has more experience as a judge than any current member of the high court had when nominated, adding she has earned the “respect of colleagues on the bench,” the admiration of lawyers who appear in her court and “the adoration of her clerks.”

“My heart today is bursting with gratitude,” Sotomayor said from the White House podium moments after being introduced by Obama.

HOUSTON — The nation’s turbulent space program will be run by one of its own, a calming well-liked former space shuttle commander.

President Barack Obama on Saturday chose retired astronaut Gen. Charles Bolden to lead NASA. He also named former NASA associate administrator Lori Garver as the agency’s No. 2. If confirmed, Bolden, who has flown in space four times and was an assistant deputy administrator at one point, would be the agency’s first black administrator.

Bolden would also be only the second astronaut to run NASA in its 50-year history. Adm. Richard Truly was the first. In 2002, then-President George W. Bush unsuccessfully tried to appoint Bolden as the space agency’s deputy administrator. The Pentagon said it needed to keep Bolden, who was a Marine general at the time and a pilot who flew more than 100 sorties in Vietnam.

“Charlie knows NASA and the people know Charlie; there’s a level of comfort,” especially given the uncertainty the space agency faces, said retired astronaut Steve Hawley, who flew twice in space with Bolden.

Bolden likely will bring “more balance” to NASA, increasing spending on aeronautics and environment missions, working more with other nations in space, and emphasizing education, which the president often talks about when it comes to space, said former Johnson Space Center Director George Abbey, a longtime friend.

“He’s a real leader,” Abbey said Saturday. “NASA has been looking for a leader like this that they could have confidence in.”

Bolden’s appointment came during the tail end of the space shuttle Atlantis’ mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope one final time. He was the pilot on the flight that sent Hubble into orbit in 1990.

Bolden, 62, would inherit a NASA that doesn’t look much like the still-somewhat-fresh-from-the-moon agency he joined as an astronaut in 1980. NASA now “is faced with a lot of uncertainty,” Abbey said.

This morning the battle of anti-terror policy took center stage as the President addressed his decisions regarding anti-terrorism.

President Barack Obama vigorously defended his plans to close the Guantanamo prison camp on Thursday and promised to work with Congress to develop a system for imprisoning detainees who can’t be tried and can’t be turned loose.

Obama conceded that some would end up in U.S. prisons and insisted those facilities were tough enough to house even the most dangerous inmates.

Moments after President Barack Obama concluded a sober and wide-ranging address at the National Archives on Thursday, news networks cut to a shot of Dick Cheney stepping up to a podium, set to issue what was hyped as a substantive rebuttal from the former vice president.

Instead, Cheney began by cracking jokes at the length of Obama’s speech. “Good morning — or perhaps, good afternoon,” he said to some chuckles. “It’s pretty clear the president served in the Senate and not in the House of Representatives because, of course, in the House, we have the five-minute [speaking] rule.”

Here are highlights from President Obama’s speech courtesy of Politico:

Here are highlights from former Vice-President Dick Cheney’s speech courtesy of Politico:

On Thursday when the Superbowl Champion Pittsburgh Steelers are scheduled to meet the President of the United States, a gesture of congratulations usually shown to all of the major sports winners, they will do so without star linebacker James Harrison. It’s not because he’s hurt or that he had a prior obligation. No not at all. Harrison’s reasoning…”I don’t feel the need to actually go,” he said of the visit with President Obama. “I don’t feel like it’s that big a deal to me. If you want to see the Pittsburgh Steelers, invite us when we don’t win the Super Bowl,” he told Pittsburgh’s WTAE-TV. “So as far as I’m concerned he would have invited Arizona if they had won.”

WHAT! Is this guy insane?  It doesn’t matter if you voted for him or not (not that we know who he voted for), but this is a neutral gesture honoring a tremendous Super bowl victory by the Pittsburgh Steelers and for him to act as if meeting the President is something he should take for granted, make me question whether he is really serious? He must really think very highly of himself if he thinks he gains by skipping out on the President.

MY OPINION: I wouldn’t care if George Bush was still President, if the Commander-In-Chief extends you an invitation to the White House to honor your achievement….YOU GO! No if ands or buts about it. But I guess Mr. Harrison feels the same way the officials at Arizona State felt when deciding not to honor Obama with a degree for speaking that their commencement…that the President of the United States and leader of the free world has an insufficient body of work.

Showing that he is in touch with the burdens of mainstream America, President Barack Obama in his weekly address instructed congress to deliver to his desk by Memorial day, legislation that would crack down on the credit card industry’s “sudden rate hikes, unfair penalties and hidden fees that have become all-too common.”

Watch the full address below: