By Michael Isikoff President Obama’s decision to suspend sending any detainees being held in the Guantánamo Bay detention facility back to Yemen was “politically, a no-brainer,” a senior administration official tells NEWSWEEK. But the move will do more than complicate Obama’s commitment to shut down the base: it has raised new questions about whether the facility will be shuttered... 

Greg Craig, the top in-house lawyer for President Barack Obama, is getting the blame for botching the strategy to shut down Guantanamo Bay prison by January — so much so that he’s expected to leave the White House in short order. Share/Save Read More →

After a fairly smooth opening, President Barack Obama faces new concerns among the American public about the budget deficit and government intervention in the economy as he works to enact ambitious health and energy legislation, a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll finds. Share/Save Read More →

By Michael Goodwin It was a tale of two speeches. One was clear, direct and powerful. Barack Obama gave the other speech. It would have been heresy to write those words any other time, so commanding has President Obama been with the spoken word. But the real Mission Impossible was to imagine that wheezy old Dick Cheney would be the speaker to best Obama. Share/Save Read More →

By Toby Harnden Thank goodness for Vice President Joe Biden. In one of the few amusing parts of the Wanda Sykes comedy routine at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, she said: "God forbid that Joe Biden falls into the hands of terrorists….We're done. Oh, they won't even have to torture him. All they have to do is go, 'How's it going, Joe?'" Share/Save Read More →

Here, from the Associated Press, is a partial account of DNI Dennis Blair’s first press conference today (emphasis mine): Share/Save Read More →

By Mario Loyola With its myriad of “desk officers” and “stovepipes,” the hierarchy of the executive branch is well-suited for managing stability. But when new problems arise, it tends to take them piecemeal, often with little consideration of how they are interrelated or of the larger historical questions at stake. At the White House — which in the modern era has become... 

By Evan Perez Attorney General Eric Holder said some detainees being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, may end up being released in the U.S. as the Obama administration works with foreign allies to resettle some of the prisoners. Share/Save Read More →

President Obama is meeting Friday afternoon with the families of victims of the Sept. 11 attacks and the bombing of the USS Cole — but some invited guests say they worry that the gesture is window-dressing, since the administration has suspended trials of detainees at Guantanamo Bay and a military judge on Thursday dropped charges against a suspect in the 2000 Cole bombing. Share/Save Read More →

President Barack Obama is fighting to maintain control of the American political agenda after being rocked by a series of setbacks. He has admitted "screwing up" key White House appointments and now faces possible defeat in the Senate over his economic stimulus bill. Share/Save Read More →

President Barack Obama said in an interview aired on Monday he worried that detainees freed from the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo, Cuba, might resume attacks on the United States. But he told NBC News that closure of the prison was a matter of upholding U.S. values and law, and that a failure to do so would ultimately make Americans less secure. Share/Save Read More →