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"In January of 2009, Obama nominated Dawn Johnsen to head the Office of Legal Counsel in the Justice Department. This was seen as a tremendous move, as Johnsen had the experience, the expertise and an apparent eagerness to take on the job of unraveling a series of horrible legal opinions that had been issued to support the torture program put into place during the Bush administration. Sadly, though, even with 60 votes for Johnsen clearly within reach for an extended time, Obama chose not to fight for Johnsen's confirmation. As a result, once it became clear that another Supreme Court nomination was going to be necessary, Johnsen withdrew from consideration, knowing that Obama had abandoned her."

he apparent victory by Republicans in the debt ceiling debate will now give the GOP "ownership" of the economy. That's another victory for Obama because the economic outlook right now looks very, very bleak. In short, this was a great victory for the electoral prospects of Obama - even if it was a loss for the prospects of progressive political achievements.

"The Responses to 'Why I Refuse to Vote for Barack Obama'"

"You don't have to wait to use plain language in your dealings with consumers. You don't have to wait to put the 2009 bonuses of your senior executives up for a shareholder vote," Obama said. "You don't have to wait for a law to overhaul your pay system so that folks are rewarded for long-term performance instead of short-term gains."

Anti-Entitlement Juggernaut Gets Fueled Up by Obama

"President Obama isn't completely innocent of blame in the current [Gulf oil] spill."

Critique of Goldberg's preposterous assertion that Obama is a socialist.

Jamie Dimon is on the board of the NY Fed. He knows what they're up to. No matter what excuse Obama offers for opposing the Sanders amendment, there is no reasonable argument to be made for allowing the Chair of JP Morgan Chase to know what members of Congress cannot.

Speaking at the Twitter Town Hall at the White House today, the president said Congress "shouldn't be toying" with the debt ceiling and cautioned against risking the financial health of the country in order to protect the interests of the super wealthy.   "Never in our history has the United States defaulted on its debt. The debt ceiling should not be something that is used as a gun against the heads of the American people to extract tax breaks for corporate jet owners, for oil and gas companies that are making billions of dollars because the price of gasoline has gone up so high.  I mean, I'm happy to have those debates.  I think the American people are on my side on this," Obama said. The president was adamant that when it comes to fixing the economy and solving the deficit problem "we should go with what works," and that's a tax increase on the wealthy. "If the wealthiest among us -- and I include myself in this category -- are willing to give up a little bit more, then we can solve this problem.  It does not take a lot… when people say, you know, "job-killing tax increases, that's what Obama's proposing," we're not going to," he said. "You're entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts.  And the facts are that a modest increase for wealthy individuals is not shown to have an adverse impact on job growth." "We can test the two theories.  You had what happened during the '90s.  Right?  Taxes for wealthy individuals were somewhat higher, businesses boomed, the economy boomed, great job growth;  and then the 2000s, when taxes were cut on wealthy individuals, jobs didn't grow as fast, businesses didn't grow as fast. I mean, it's not like we haven't tried what these other folks are pitching.  It didn't work.  And we should go with what works," he said.

The Obama administration said Thursday it would require lenders to allow unemployed homeowners to delay their monthly payments for up to a year without threat of foreclosure.

Obama had 2 imperatives during this fight: prevent a default + get this issue off the table till after 2012. Period.

Obama the realist. Not the pragmatist. Certainly not the idealist. Realism as a doctrine: The principal purpose of U.S. foreign policy SHOULD be to manage relations between states, rather than to alter the nature of states. U.S. foreign policy shouldn't be in the business of nation-building.

Michael Moore addresses press on Barack Obama and Blue Dog Democrats' approach to health care reform at Public Citizen headquarters in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday, September 29th, 2009.

President Obama is taking a sharp, populist tone with Wall Street and scolding the ways of Washington

Why Did Obama Reveal That We Have 5,113 Nuclear Warheads?

Dave Weigel, now of The Washington Post, becomes the latest to observe the core similarity between the Obama and Bush/Cheney approaches to civil liberties, Terrorism and national security.

Obama: Those affected by spill should be employed in cleanup