Foreign Policy

David Gregory is clearly concerned that if Republicans don't vote in favor of the START treaty with Russia, President Obama's international image, as well as American prestige abroad, will be damaged. On Sunday's "Meet the Press," Gregory asked Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, "Is this going to potentially be a problem with the president not being able to get what he wants on the world…

While we focus our scrutiny on President Obama's domestic agenda nightmare, we'd best not take our eyes off another big ball: Obama's frantic effort to get the New START ratified during the Senate's lame-duck session. As usual, Obama is engaged in a full-court press, pretending that there is some urgency to formalizing this ill-conceived nuclear arms treaty with Russia, when the sole urgency…

I owe Ottmar Edenhofer thanks for two things. First, I am grateful that Edenhofer, a German economist who is "co-chair of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) Working Group III on Mitigation of Climate Change," has a last name on which searching is easy. I quickly determined that his name last name doesn't currently come up in searches at the Associated Press's main web…

While most of the country took a collective gasp over the verdict in the trial of al-Qaeda terrorist Ahmed Ghailani, Cenk Uygur spun the disconcerting outcome as a success story for the Obama administration. Anchoring the 3:00 P.M. EDT hour of MSNBC's live news coverage today, the liberal host of "The Young Turks" boldly and bizarrely proclaimed "our justice system worked." After accusing…

If the definition of insanity is repeating the same mistake over and over again, then U.S. policymakers over several administrations should be institutionalized and relegated to padded cells. The latest, but certainly not the last example of this craziness, is the pressure the Obama administration is exerting on Israel to stop building settlements in the West Bank. A Nov. 14 New York Times…

Don't go overboard with it, but have some pity on Sewell Chan at the New York Times. On Thursday evening online and in Friday's print edition, Chan was among three Times reporters who composed a report ripping President Obama's lack of results at the G-20 summit. The piece's original title -- "Obama's Economic View is Rejected on World Stage" -- originally appeared online and actually made…

Rush mentioned this when he opened his show today, and it deserves a bit of graphic support. Today's New York Times print edition has a headline at the top right which reads: "Obama's Economic View Is Rejected on World Stage" (captured here for future reference). Ouch. But there's also a story about the story, specifically concerning its stinging headline.

Previewing President Obama's upcoming speech in Indonesia during Tuesday's 2PM ET hour on MSNBC, anchor Tamron Hall wondered if the troop surge in Afghanistan had hurt the President's image in the Muslim world: "How much of the skepticism comes from the fact that he's added more troops on the ground in Afghanistan?" Hall asked that question of Time magazine's deputy international editor…

A current headline at an Associated Press story (saved here at my web host in case it's updated) has to be seen to be believed: G20 leaders meet amid strains as US splashes cash "Splashes cash"? If the AP's headline writer was trying to be cute, it didn't work for me. Sadly, replacing "splashes" with "trashes" might have been more appropriate, but of course less "funny."

Well known Hillary Clinton fan Cynthia McFadden on Tuesday pushed Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to agree that the former First Lady could do his job. Talking to both Clinton and Gates for Good Morning America, McFadden noted that the Defense Secretary has pledged to leave within a year. Motioning her head to Clinton, sitting to the left of Gates, the ABC News anchor prompted, "Any…

Anyone critical of President Obama being in India right now is an "idiot," MSNBC's Joe Scarborough bluntly served on his morning show, which prides itself on being a safe haven for different views. India is "exactly where [President Obama] should be" right now, he opined. With Council on Foreign Relations president Richard Haass on as a guest Monday morning, Scarborough clamored that…

They're back, they have their media water-carriers in place, and the Obama administration is smack dab in the middle of it. The United Nations is pushing for countries in the developed world to keep their "promise" to, in the worlds of Charles J. Hanley at the Associated Press,  "raise up to $100 billion a year in new money for poorer countries to cope with climate change and reduce their…

Worked into a tizzy over conservative radio talk show hosts and a Republican congresswoman complaining about the reported cost of President Obama's state visit to India, MSNBC's Chris Matthews today suggested racial animus -- against President Obama and the country of India -- played a role in the criticism. Yet at the same time Matthews put down Indian journalists by suggesting their reporting…

In an attempt to re-litigate the past, MSNBC contributor Cenk Uygur indicted former President George W. Bush for war crimes. Bellowing today from his regular perch on late afternoon Dylan Ratigan Show, Uygur mischaracterized the 43rd President's position on the waterboarding of 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as "go ahead and torture him basically" before demanding that Bush be…