Worst Facebook Poll Ever: "Should Obama be Assassinated?"

U.S. officials have stated that they are investigating an online survey posted on Facebook on Saturday that asked whether people thought President Barack Obama should be assassinated.

There were four answer choices: "Yes," "no," "maybe" and "yes, if he cuts my health care".

Darrin Blackford, a Secret Service spokesman said, "We are aware of it and we will take the appropriate investigative steps... We take of these things seriously." Facebook had suspended its "Polls" applications when we tried to look at the survey last night.

A bit of reassurance: before the poll was halted, 90 percent of respondents had voted "No">

Afghanistan: Obama v. Petraeus (Part 379)

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At the start of the year we closely tracked the political battle between the White House and military commanders, notably General David Petraeus, over the deployment of additional US troops to Afghanistan. This was nominally resolved at the end of March by a "compromise" agreement (even though the military got almost all of the troop request) in which Obama announced a new strategy of military measures supporting non-military measures to build up the country.

The situation was not resolved, either inside Washington or in Afghanistan, and we are back in another cycle of reports, spin, and power moves over another escalation in the US military commitment. One curious absentee, however, is Petraeus, who has not been far from media-shy in the past. Tom Englehardt digs beneath the surface for the story:

How Top Generals May Trap Obama in a Losing War

Front and center in the debate over the Afghan War these days are General Stanley "Stan" McChrystal, Afghan war commander, whose "classified, pre-decisional" and devastating report -- almost eight years and at least $220 billion later, the war is a complete disaster -- was conveniently, not to say suspiciously, leaked to Bob Woodward of the Washington Post by we-know-not-who at a particularly embarrassing moment for Barack Obama; Admiral Michael "Mike" Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who has been increasingly vocal about a "deteriorating" war and the need for more American boots on the ground; and the president himself, who blitzed every TV show in sight last Sunday and Monday for his health reform program, but spent significant time expressing doubts about sending more American troops to Afghanistan. ("I'm not interested in just being in Afghanistan for the sake of being in Afghanistan... or sending a message that America is here for the duration.")

On the other hand, here's someone you haven't seen front and center for a while: General David Petraeus.

He was, of course, George W. Bush's pick to lead the president's last-ditch effort in Iraq. He was the poster boy for Bush's military policies in his last two years. He was the highly praised architect and symbol of "the surge." He appeared repeatedly, his chest a mass of medals and ribbons, for heavily publicized, widely televised congressional testimony, complete with charts and graphs, that was meant, at least in part, for the American public. He was the man who, to use an image from that period which has recently resurfaced, managed to synchronize the American and Baghdad "clocks," pacifying for a time both the home and war fronts.

He never met a journalist, as far as we can tell, he didn't want to woo. (And he clearly won over the influential Tom Ricks, then of the Washington Post, who wrote The Gamble, a bestselling paean to him and his sub-commanders.) From the look of it, he's the most political general to come down the pike since, in 1951 in the midst of the Korean War, General Douglas MacArthur said his goodbyes to Congress after being cashiered by President Truman for insubordination -- for, in effect, wanting to run his own war and the foreign policy that went with it. It was Petraeus who brought Vietnam-era counterinsurgency doctrine (COIN) back from the crypt, overseeing the writing of a new Army counterinsurgency manual that would make it central to both the ongoing wars and what are already being referred to as the "next" ones.

Before he left office, Bush advanced his favorite general to the head of U.S. Central Command, which oversees the former president's Global War on Terror across the energy heartlands of the planet from Egypt to Pakistan. The command is, of course, especially focused on Bush's two full-scale wars: the Iraq War, now being pursued under Petraeus's former subordinate, General Ray Odierno, and the Afghan War, for which Petraeus seems to have personally handpicked a new commanding general, Stan McChrystal. From the military's dark side world of special ops and targeted assassinations, McChrystal had operated in Iraq and was also part of an Army promotion board headed by Petraeus that advanced the careers of officers committed to counterinsurgency. To install McChrystal in May, Obama abruptly sacked the then-Afghan war commander, General David McKiernan, in what was then considered, with some exaggeration, a new MacArthur moment.

On taking over, McChrystal, who had previously been a counterterrorism guy (and isn't about to give that up, either), swore fealty to counterinsurgency doctrine (that is, to Petraeus) by proclaiming that the American goal in Afghanistan must not be primarily to hunt down and kill Taliban insurgents, but to "protect the population." He also turned to a "team" of civilian experts, largely gathered from Washington think-tanks, a number of whom had been involved in planning out Petraeus's Iraq surge of 2007, to make an assessment of the state of the war and what needed to be done. Think of them as the Surgettes.

As in many official reassessments, the cast of characters essentially guaranteed the results before a single meeting was held. Based on past history and opinions, this team could only provide one Petraeus-approved answer to the war: more -- more troops, up to 40,000-45,000 of them, and other resources for an American counterinsurgency operation without end.

Hence, even if McChrystal's name is on it, the report slipped to Bob Woodward which just sandbagged the president has a distinctly Petraeusian shape to it. In a piece linked to Woodward's bombshell in the Washington Post, Rajiv Chandrasekaran and Karen DeYoung wrote of unnamed officials in Washington who claimed "the military has been trying to push Obama into a corner." The language in the coverage elsewhere has been similar.

There is, wrote DeYoung a day later, now a "rupture" between the military "pushing for an early decision to send more troops" and civilian policymakers "increasingly doubtful of an escalating nation-building effort." Nancy Youssef of McClatchy News wrote about how "mixed signals" from Washington were causing "increasing ire from U.S. commanders in Afghanistan"; a group of McClatchy reporters talked of military advocates of escalation feeling "frustration" over "White House dithering." David Sanger of the New York Times described "a split between an American military that says it needs more troops now and an American president clearly reluctant to leap into that abyss." "Impatient" is about the calmest word you'll see for the attitude of the military top command right now.

Buyer's Remorse, the Afghan War, and the President

In the midst of all this, between Admiral Mullen and General McChrystal is, it seems, a missing man. The most photogenic general in our recent history, the man who created the doctrine and oversees the war, the man who is now shaping the U.S. Army (and its future plans and career patterns), is somehow, at this crucial moment, out of the Washington spotlight. This last week General Petraeus was, in fact, in England, giving a speech and writing an article for the (London) Times laying out his basic "protect the population" version of counterinsurgency and praising our British allies by quoting one of their great imperial plunderers. ("If Cecil Rhodes was correct in his wonderful observation that 'being an Englishman is the greatest prize in the lottery of life,' and I'm inclined to think that he was, then the second greatest prize in the lottery of life must be to be a friend of an Englishman, and based on that, the more than 230,000 men and women in uniform who work with your country's finest day by day are very lucky indeed, as am I.")

Only at mid-week, with Washington aboil, did he arrive in the capital for a counterinsurgency conference at the National Press Club and quietly "endorse" "General McChrystal's assessment." Whatever the look of things, however, it's unlikely that Petraeus is actually on the sidelines at this moment of heightened tension. He is undoubtedly still The Man.

So much is, of course, happening just beyond the sightlines of those of us who are mere citizens of this country, which is why inference and guesswork are, unfortunately, the order of the day. Read any account in a major newspaper right now and it's guaranteed to be chock-a-block full of senior officials and top military officers who are never "authorized to speak," but nonetheless yak away from behind a scrim of anonymity. Petraeus may or may not be one of them, but the odds are reasonable that this is still a Petraeus Moment.

If so, Obama has only himself to blame. He took up Afghanistan ("the right war") in the presidential campaign as proof that, despite wanting to end the war in Iraq, he was tough. (Why is it that a Democratic candidate needs a war or threat of war to trash-talk about in order to prove his "strength," when doing so is obviously a sign of weakness?)

Once in office, Obama compounded the damage by doubling down his bet on the war. In March, he introduced a "comprehensive new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan" in his first significant public statement on the subject, which had expansion written all over it. He also agreed to send in 21,000 more troops (which, by the way, Petraeus reportedly convinced him to do). In August, in another sign of weakness masquerading as strength, before an unenthusiastic audience at a Veterans of Foreign Wars convention, he unnecessarily declared: "This is not a war of choice. This is a war of necessity." All of this he will now pay for at the hands of Petraeus, or if not him, then a coterie of military men behind the latest push for a new kind of Afghan War.

As it happens, this was never Obama's "war of necessity." It was always Petraeus's. And the new report from McChrystal and the Surgettes is undoubtedly Petraeus's progeny as well. It seems, in fact, cleverly put together to catch a cautious president, who wasn't cautious enough about his war of choice, in a potentially devastating trap. The military insistence on quick action on a troop decision sets up a devastating choice for the president: "Failure to provide adequate resources also risks a longer conflict, greater casualties, higher overall costs, and ultimately, a critical loss of political support. Any of these risks, in turn, are likely to result in mission failure." Go against your chosen general and the failure that follows is yours alone. (Unnamed figures supposedly close to McChrystal are already launching test balloons, passed on by others, suggesting that the general might resign in protest if the president doesn't deliver -- a possibility he has denied even considering.) On the other hand, offer him somewhere between 15,000 and 45,000 more American troops as well as other resources, and the failure that follows will still be yours.

It's a basic lose-lose proposition and, as journalist Eric Schmitt wrote in a New York Times assessment of the situation, "it will be very hard to say no to General McChrystal." No wonder the president and some of his men are dragging their feet and looking elsewhere. As one typically anonymous "defense analyst" quoted in the Los Angeles Times said, the administration is suffering "buyer's remorse for this war... They never really thought about what was required, and now they have sticker shock."

Admittedly, according to the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, 51% of Americans are against sending in more troops. (Who knows how they would react to a president who went on TV to announce that he had genuinely reconsidered?) Official Washington is another matter. For General Petraeus, who claims to have no political ambitions but is periodically mentioned as the Eisenhower of 2012, how potentially peachy to launch your campaign against the president who lost you the war.

A Petraeus Moment?

In the present context, the media language being used to describe this military-civilian conflict of wills -- frustration, impatience, split, rupture, ire -- may fall short of capturing the import of a moment which has been brewing, institutionally speaking, for a long time. There have been increasing numbers of generals' "revolts" of various sorts in our recent past. Of course, George W. Bush was insistent on turning planning over to his generals (though only when he liked them), something Barack Obama criticized him for during the election campaign. ("The job of the commander in chief is to listen to the best counsel available and to listen even to people you don't agree with and then ultimately you make the final decision and you take responsibility for those actions.")

Now, it looks as if we are about to have a civilian-military encounter of the first order in which Obama will indeed need to take responsibility for difficult actions (or the lack thereof). If a genuine clash heats up, expect more discussion of "MacArthur moments," but this will not be Truman versus MacArthur redux, and not just because Petraeus seems to be a subtler political player than MacArthur ever was.

Over the nearly six decades that separate us from Truman's great moment, the Pentagon has become a far more overwhelming institution. In Afghanistan, as in Washington, it has swallowed up much of what once was intelligence, as it is swallowing up much of what once was diplomacy. It is linked to one of the two businesses, the Pentagon-subsidized weapons industry, which has proven an American success story even in the worst of economic times (the other remains Hollywood). It now holds a far different position in a society that seems to feed on war.

It's one thing for the leaders of a country to say that war should be left to the generals when suddenly embroiled in conflict, quite another when that country is eternally in a state of war. In such a case, if you turn crucial war decisions over to the military, you functionally turn foreign policy over to them as well. All of this is made more complicated, because the cast of "civilians" theoretically pitted against the military right now includes Karl W. Eikenberry, a retired lieutenant general who is the U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, Douglas Lute, a lieutenant general who is the president's special advisor on Afghanistan and Pakistan (dubbed the "war czar" when he held the same position in the Bush administration), and James Jones, a retired Marine Corps general, who is national security advisor, not to speak of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

The question is: will an already heavily militarized foreign policy geared to endless global war be surrendered to the generals? Depending on what Obama does, the answer to that question may not be fully, or even largely, clarified this time around. He may quietly give way, or they may, or compromises may be reached behind the scenes. After all, careers and political futures are at stake.

But consider us warned. This is a question that is not likely to go away and that may determine what this country becomes.

We know what a MacArthur moment was; we may find out soon enough what a Petraeus moment is.

Transcript: Obama's address to UN General Assembly

Below is the full transcript of President Obama's address to the UN General Assembly, delivered today. We'll try to post a video as soon as possible.

Mr. President, Mr. Secretary-General, fellow delegates, ladies and gentleman: it is my honor to address you for the first time as the forty-fourth President of the United States. I come before you humbled by the responsibility that the American people have placed upon me; mindful of the enormous challenges of our moment in history; and determined to act boldly and collectively on behalf of justice and prosperity at home and abroad.

I have been in office for just nine months, though some days it seems a lot longer. I am well aware of the expectations that accompany my presidency around the world. These expectations are not about me. Rather, they are rooted - I believe - in a discontent with a status quo that has allowed us to be increasingly defined by our differences, and outpaced by our problems. But they are also rooted in hope - the hope that real change is possible, and the hope that America will be a leader in bringing about such change.

I took office at a time when many around the world had come to view America with skepticism and distrust. Part of this was due to misperceptions and misinformation about my country. Part of this was due to opposition to specific policies, and a belief that on certain critical issues, America has acted unilaterally, without regard for the interests of others. This has fed an almost reflexive anti-Americanism, which too often has served as an excuse for our collective inaction.



Like all of you, my responsibility is to act in the interest of my nation and my people, and I will never apologize for defending those interests. But it is my deeply held belief that in the year 2009 - more than at any point in human history - the interests of nations and peoples are shared.

The religious convictions that we hold in our hearts can forge new bonds among people, or tear us apart. The technology we harness can light the path to peace, or forever darken it. The energy we use can sustain our planet, or destroy it. What happens to the hope of a single child - anywhere - can enrich our world, or impoverish it.

In this hall, we come from many places, but we share a common future. No longer do we have the luxury of indulging our differences to the exclusion of the work that we must do together. I have carried this message from London to Ankara; from Port of Spain to Moscow; from Accra to Cairo; and it's what I will speak about today. Because the time has come for the world to move in a new direction. We must embrace a new era of engagement based on mutual interests and mutual respect, and our work must begin now.

We know the future will be forged by deeds and not simply words. Speeches alone will not solve our problems - it will take persistent action. So for those who question the character and cause of my nation, I ask you to look at the concrete actions that we have taken in just nine months.

On my first day in office, I prohibited - without exception or equivocation - the use of torture by the United States of America. I ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed, and we are doing the hard work of forging a framework to combat extremism within the rule of law. Every nation must know: America will live its values, and we will lead by example.

We have set a clear and focused goal: to work with all members of this body to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda and its extremist allies - a network that has killed thousands of people of many faiths and nations, and that plotted to blow up this very building. In Afghanistan and Pakistan, we - and many nations here - are helping those governments develop the capacity to take the lead in this effort, while working to advance opportunity and security for their people.

In Iraq, we are responsibly ending a war. We have removed American combat brigades from Iraqi cities, and set a deadline of next August to remove all of our combat brigades from Iraqi territory. And I have made clear that we will help Iraqis transition to full responsibility for their future, and keep our commitment to remove all American troops by the end of 2011.

I have outlined a comprehensive agenda to seek the goal of a world without nuclear weapons. In Moscow, the United States and Russia announced that we would pursue substantial reductions in our strategic warheads and launchers. At the Conference on Disarmament, we agreed on a work plan to negotiate an end to the production of fissile materials for nuclear weapons. And this week, my Secretary of State will become the first senior American representative to the annual Members Conference of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

Upon taking office, I appointed a Special Envoy for Middle East Peace, and America has worked steadily and aggressively to advance the cause of two states - Israel and Palestine - in which peace and security take root, and the rights of both Israelis and Palestinians are respected.

To confront climate change, we have invested 80 billion dollars in clean energy. We have substantially increased our fuel-efficiency standards. We have provided new incentives for conservation, launched an energy partnership across the Americas, and moved from a bystander to a leader in international climate negotiations.

To overcome an economic crisis that touches every corner of the world, we worked with the G-20 nations to forge a coordinated international response of over two trillion dollars in stimulus to bring the global economy back from the brink. We mobilized resources that helped prevent the crisis from spreading further to developing countries. And we joined with others to launch a $20 billion global food security initiative that will lend a hand to those who need it most, and help them build their own capacity.

We have also re-engaged the United Nations. We have paid our bills. We have joined the Human Rights Council. We have signed the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. We have fully embraced the Millennium Development Goals. And we address our priorities here, in this institution - for instance, through the Security Council meeting that I will chair tomorrow on nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, and through the issues that I will discuss today.

This is what we have done. But this is just a beginning. Some of our actions have yielded progress. Some have laid the groundwork for progress in the future. But make no mistake: this cannot be solely America's endeavor. Those who used to chastise America for acting alone in the world cannot now stand by and wait for America to solve the world's problems alone. We have sought - in word and deed - a new era of engagement with the world. Now is the time for all of us to take our share of responsibility for a global response to global challenges.

If we are honest with ourselves, we need to admit that we are not living up to that responsibility. Consider the course that we are on if we fail to confront the status quo. Extremists sowing terror in pockets of the world. Protracted conflicts that grind on and on. Genocide and mass atrocities. More and more nations with nuclear weapons. Melting ice caps and ravaged populations. Persistent poverty and pandemic disease. I say this not to sow fear, but to state a fact: the magnitude of our challenges has yet to be met by the measure of our action.

This body was founded on the belief that the nations of the world could solve their problems together. Franklin Roosevelt, who died before he could see his vision for this institution become a reality, put it this way - and I quote: "The structure of world peace cannot be the work of one man, or one party, or one Nation.... It cannot be a peace of large nations - or of small nations. It must be a peace which rests on the cooperative effort of the whole world."

The cooperative effort of the whole world. Those words ring even more true today, when it is not simply peace - but our very health and prosperity that we hold in common. Yet I also know that this body is made up of sovereign states. And sadly, but not surprisingly, this body has often become a forum for sowing discord instead of forging common ground; a venue for playing politics and exploiting grievances rather than solving problems. After all, it is easy to walk up to this podium and to point fingers and stoke division. Nothing is easier than blaming others for our troubles, and absolving ourselves of responsibility for our choices and our actions. Anyone can do that.

Responsibility and leadership in the 21st century demand more. In an era when our destiny is shared, power is no longer a zero sum game. No one nation can or should try to dominate another nation. No world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will succeed. No balance of power among nations will hold. The traditional division between nations of the south and north makes no sense in an interconnected world. Nor do alignments of nations rooted in the cleavages of a long gone Cold War.

The time has come to realize that the old habits and arguments are irrelevant to the challenges faced by our people. They lead nations to act in opposition to the very goals that they claim to pursue, and to vote - often in this body - against the interests of their own people. They build up walls between us and the future that our people seek, and the time has come for those walls to come down. Together, we must build new coalitions that bridge old divides - coalitions of different faiths and creeds; of north and south, east and west; black, white, and brown.

The choice is ours. We can be remembered as a generation that chose to drag the arguments of the 20th century into the 21st; that put off hard choices, refused to look ahead, and failed to keep pace because we defined ourselves by what we were against instead of what we were for. Or, we can be a generation that chooses to see the shoreline beyond the rough waters ahead; that comes together to serve the common interests of human beings, and finally gives meaning to the promise embedded in the name given to this institution: the United Nations.

That is the future America wants - a future of peace and prosperity that we can only reach if we recognize that all nations have rights, but all nations have responsibilities as well. That is the bargain that makes this work. That must be the guiding principle of international cooperation.

Today, I put forward four pillars that are fundamental to the future that we want for our children: non-proliferation and disarmament; the promotion of peace and security; the preservation of our planet; and a global economy that advances opportunity for all people.

First, we must stop the spread of nuclear weapons, and seek the goal of a world without them.

This institution was founded at the dawn of the atomic age, in part because man's capacity to kill had to be contained. For decades, we averted disaster, even under the shadow of a super-power stand-off. But today, the threat of proliferation is growing in scope and complexity. If we fail to act, we will invite nuclear arms races in every region, and the prospect of wars and acts of terror on a scale that we can hardly imagine.

A fragile consensus stands in the way of this frightening outcome - the basic bargain that shapes the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty. It says that all nations have the right to peaceful nuclear energy; that nations with nuclear weapons have the responsibility to move toward disarmament; and those without them have the responsibility to forsake them. The next twelve months could be pivotal in determining whether this compact will be strengthened or will slowly dissolve.

America will keep our end of the bargain. We will pursue a new agreement with Russia to substantially reduce our strategic warheads and launchers. We will move forward with ratification of the Test Ban Treaty, and work with others to bring the Treaty into force so that nuclear testing is permanently prohibited. We will complete a Nuclear Posture Review that opens the door to deeper cuts, and reduces the role of nuclear weapons. And we will call upon countries to begin negotiations in January on a treaty to end the production of fissile material for weapons.

I will also host a Summit next April that reaffirms each nation's responsibility to secure nuclear material on its territory, and to help those who can't - because we must never allow a single nuclear device to fall into the hands of a violent extremist. And we will work to strengthen the institutions and initiatives that combat nuclear smuggling and theft.

All of this must support efforts to strengthen the NPT. Those nations that refuse to live up to their obligations must face consequences. This is not about singling out individual nations - it is about standing up for the rights of all nations that do live up to their responsibilities. Because a world in which IAEA inspections are avoided and the United Nation's demands are ignored will leave all people less safe, and all nations less secure.

In their actions to date, the governments of North Korea and Iran threaten to take us down this dangerous slope. We respect their rights as members of the community of nations. I am committed to diplomacy that opens a path to greater prosperity and a more secure peace for both nations if they live up to their obligations.

But if the governments of Iran and North Korea choose to ignore international standards; if they put the pursuit of nuclear weapons ahead of regional stability and the security and opportunity of their own people; if they are oblivious to the dangers of escalating nuclear arms races in both East Asia and the Middle East - then they must be held accountable. The world must stand together to demonstrate that international law is not an empty promise, and that Treaties will be enforced. We must insist that the future not belong to fear.

That brings me to the second pillar for our future: the pursuit of peace.

The United Nations was born of the belief that the people of the world can live their lives, raise their families, and resolve their differences peacefully. And yet we know that in too many parts of the world, this ideal remains an abstraction. We can either accept that outcome as inevitable, and tolerate constant and crippling conflict. Or we can recognize that the yearning for peace is universal, and reassert our resolve to end conflicts around the world.

That effort must begin with an unshakeable determination that the murder of innocent men, women and children will never be tolerated. On this, there can be no dispute. The violent extremists who promote conflict by distorting faith have discredited and isolated themselves. They offer nothing but hatred and destruction. In confronting them, America will forge lasting partnerships to target terrorists, share intelligence, coordinate law enforcement, and protect our people. We will permit no safe-haven for al Qaeda to launch attacks from Afghanistan or any other nation. We will stand by our friends on the front lines, as we and many nations will do in pledging support for the Pakistani people tomorrow. And we will pursue positive engagement that builds bridges among faiths, and new partnerships for opportunity.

But our efforts to promote peace cannot be limited to defeating violent extremists. For the most powerful weapon in our arsenal is the hope of human beings - the belief that the future belongs to those who build, not destroy; the confidence that conflicts can end, and a new day begin.

That is why we will strengthen our support for effective peacekeeping, while energizing our efforts to prevent conflicts before they take hold. We will pursue a lasting peace in Sudan through support for the people of Darfur, and the implementation of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, so that we secure the peace that the Sudanese people deserve. And in countries ravaged by violence - from Haiti to Congo to East Timor - we will work with the UN and other partners to support an enduring peace.

I will also continue to seek a just and lasting peace between Israel, Palestine, and the Arab world. Yesterday, I had a constructive meeting with Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Abbas. We have made some progress. Palestinians have strengthened their efforts on security. Israelis have facilitated greater freedom of movement for the Palestinians. As a result of these efforts by both sides, the economy in the West Bank has begun to grow. But more progress is needed. We continue to call on Palestinians to end incitement against Israel, and we continue to emphasize that America does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements.

The time has come to re-launch negotiations - without preconditions - that address the permanent-status issues: security for Israelis and Palestinians; borders, refugees and Jerusalem. The goal is clear: two states living side by side in peace and security - a Jewish State of Israel, with true security for all Israelis; and a viable, independent Palestinian state with contiguous territory that ends the occupation that began in 1967, and realizes the potential of the Palestinian people. As we pursue this goal, we will also pursue peace between Israel and Lebanon, Israel and Syria, and a broader peace between Israel and its many neighbors. In pursuit of that goal, we will develop regional initiatives with multilateral participation, alongside bilateral negotiations.

I am not naïve. I know this will be difficult. But all of us must decide whether we are serious about peace, or whether we only lend it lip-service. To break the old patterns - to break the cycle of insecurity and despair - all of us must say publicly what we would acknowledge in private. The United States does Israel no favors when we fail to couple an unwavering commitment to its security with an insistence that Israel respect the legitimate claims and rights of the Palestinians. And nations within this body do the Palestinians no favors when they choose vitriolic attacks over a constructive willingness to recognize Israel's legitimacy, and its right to exist in peace and security.

We must remember that the greatest price of this conflict is not paid by us. It is paid by the Israeli girl in Sderot who closes her eyes in fear that a rocket will take her life in the night. It is paid by the Palestinian boy in Gaza who has no clean water and no country to call his own. These are God's children. And after all of the politics and all of the posturing, this is about the right of every human being to live with dignity and security. That is a lesson embedded in the three great faiths that call one small slice of Earth the Holy Land. And that is why - even though there will be setbacks, and false starts, and tough days - I will not waiver in my pursuit of peace.

Third, we must recognize that in the 21st century, there will be no peace unless we make take responsibility for the preservation of our planet.

The danger posed by climate change cannot be denied, and our responsibility to meet it must not be deferred. If we continue down our current course, every member of this Assembly will see irreversible changes within their borders. Our efforts to end conflicts will be eclipsed by wars over refugees and resources. Development will be devastated by drought and famine. Land that human beings have lived on for millennia will disappear. Future generations will look back and wonder why we refused to act - why we failed to pass on intact the environment that was our inheritance.

That is why the days when America dragged its feet on this issue are over. We will move forward with investments to transform our energy economy, while providing incentives to make clean energy the profitable kind of energy. We will press ahead with deep cuts in emissions to reach the goals that we set for 2020, and eventually 2050. We will continue to promote renewable energy and efficiency - and share new technologies - with countries around the world. And we will seize every opportunity for progress to address this threat in a cooperative effort with the whole world.

Those wealthy nations that did so much to damage the environment in the 20th century must accept our obligation to lead. But responsibility does not end there. While we must acknowledge the need for differentiated responses, any effort to curb carbon emissions must include the fast-growing carbon emitters who can do more to reduce their air pollution without inhibiting growth. And any effort that fails to help the poorest nations both adapt to the problems that climate change has already wrought - and travel a path of clean development - will not work.

It is hard to change something as fundamental as how we use energy. It's even harder to do so in the midst of a global recession. Certainly, it will be tempting to sit back and wait for others to move first. But we cannot make this journey unless we all move forward together. As we head into Copenhagen, let us resolve to focus on what each of us can do for the sake of our common future.

This leads me to the final pillar that must fortify our future: a global economy that advances opportunity for all people.

The world is still recovering from the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. In America, we see the engine of growth beginning to churn, yet many still struggle to find a job or pay their bills. Across the globe, we find promising signs, yet little certainty about what lies ahead. And far too many people in far too many places live through the daily crises that challenge our common humanity - the despair of an empty stomach; the thirst brought on by dwindling water; the injustice of a child dying from a treatable disease, or a mother losing her life as she gives birth.

In Pittsburgh, we will work with the world's largest economies to chart a course for growth that is balanced and sustained. That means vigilance to ensure that we do not let up until our people are back to work. That means taking steps to rekindle demand, so that a global recovery can be sustained. And that means setting new rules of the road and strengthening regulation for all financial centers, so that we put an end to the greed, excess and abuse that led us into disaster, and prevent a crisis like this from ever happening again.

At a time of such interdependence, we have a moral and pragmatic interest in broader questions of development. And so we will continue our historic effort to help people feed themselves. We have set aside $63 billion to carry forward the fight against HIV/AIDS; to end deaths from tuberculosis and malaria; to eradicate polio; and to strengthen public health systems. We are joining with other countries to contribute H1N1 vaccines to the World Health Organization. We will integrate more economies into a system of global trade. We will support the Millennium Development Goals, and approach next year's Summit with a global plan to make them a reality. And we will set our sights on the eradication of extreme poverty in our time.

Now is the time for all of us to do our part. Growth will not be sustained or shared unless all nations embrace their responsibility. Wealthy nations must open their markets to more goods and extend a hand to those with less, while reforming international institutions to give more nations a greater voice. Developing nations must root out the corruption that is an obstacle to progress - for opportunity cannot thrive where individuals are oppressed and business have to pay bribes. That's why we will support honest police and independent judges; civil society and a vibrant private sector. Our goal is simple: a global economy in which growth is sustained, and opportunity is available to all.

The changes that I have spoken about today will not be easy to make. And they will not be realized simply by leaders like us coming together in forums like this. For as in any assembly of members, real change can only come through the people we represent. That is why we must do the hard work to lay the groundwork for progress in our own capitals. That is where we will build the consensus to end conflicts and to harness technology for peaceful purposes; to change the way we use energy, and to promote growth that can be sustained and shared.

I believe that the people of the world want this future for their children. And that is why we must champion those principles which ensure that governments reflect the will of the people. These principles cannot be afterthoughts - democracy and human rights are essential to achieving each of the goals that I have discussed today. Because governments of the people and by the people are more likely to act in the broader interests of their own people, rather than the narrow interest of those in power.

The test of our leadership will not be the degree to which we feed the fears and old hatreds of our people. True leadership will not be measured by the ability to muzzle dissent, or to intimidate and harass political opponents at home. The people of the world want change. They will not long tolerate those who are on the wrong side of history.

This Assembly's Charter commits each of us, and I quote - "to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women." Among those rights is the freedom to speak your mind and worship as you please; the promise of equality of the races, and the opportunity for women and girls to pursue their own potential; the ability of citizens to have a say in how you are governed, and to have confidence in the administration of justice. For just as no nation should be forced to accept the tyranny of another nation, no individual should be forced to accept the tyranny of their own government.

As an African-American, I will never forget that I would not be here today without the steady pursuit of a more perfect union in my country. That guides my belief that no matter how dark the day may seem, transformative change can be forged by those who choose the side of justice. And I pledge that America will always stand with those who stand up for their dignity and their rights - for the student who seeks to learn; the voter who demands to be heard; the innocent who longs to be free; and the oppressed who yearns to be equal.

Democracy cannot be imposed on any nation from the outside. Each society must search for its own path, and no path is perfect. Each country will pursue a path rooted in the culture of its people, and - in the past - America has too often been selective in its promotion of democracy. But that does not weaken our commitment, it only reinforces it. There are basic principles that are universal; there are certain truths which are self evident - and the United States of America will never waiver in our efforts to stand up for the right of people everywhere to determine their own destiny.

Sixty-five years ago, a weary Franklin Roosevelt spoke to the American people in his fourth and final inaugural address. After years of war, he sought to sum up the lessons that could be drawn from the terrible suffering and enormous sacrifice that had taken place. "We have learned," he said, "to be citizens of the world, members of the human community."

The United Nations was built by men and women like Roosevelt from every corner of the world - from Africa and Asia; form Europe to the Americas. These architects of international cooperation had an idealism that was anything but naïve - it was rooted in the hard-earned lessons of war, and the wisdom that nations could advance their interests by acting together instead of splitting apart.

Now it falls to us - for this institution will be what we make of it. The United Nations does extraordinary good around the world in feeding the hungry, caring for the sick, and mending places that have been broken. But it also struggles to enforce its will, and to live up to the ideals of its founding.

I believe that those imperfections are not a reason to walk away from this institution - they are a calling to redouble our efforts. The United Nations can either be a place where we bicker about outdated grievances, or forge common ground; a place where we focus on what drives us apart, or what brings us together; a place where we indulge tyranny, or a source of moral authority. In short, the United Nations can be an institution that is disconnected from what matters in the lives of our citizens, or it can be indispensable in advancing the interests of the people we serve.

We have reached a pivotal moment. The United States stands ready to begin a new chapter of international cooperation - one that recognizes the rights and responsibilities of all nations. With confidence in our cause, and with a commitment to our values, we call on all nations to join us in building the future that our people deserve. Thank you.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/23/obama-un-speech-text_n_296017.htmlTranTr

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Bob Schieffer: Mr. President, thank you very much.

Obama: Thank you.

Schieffer: You have made speeches, you've addressed the joint session of Congress, you've done interviews, but the polling continues to show that people are still skeptical about your health reform plans.

Orrin Hatch, the Republican Senator from Utah, has done a lot of work on health care over the years, summed it up this way - these are his words: "If anyone believes that Washington can do a plan that will cost close to a trillion dollars, cover all Americans, not raise taxes on anyone, not increase the deficit, not reduce benefits or choices for our families and seniors, then I have a bridge to sell you."

Have you promised too much, Mr. President?

Obama: No I don't think I've promised too much at all. Look - first of all, everybody acknowledges this is a problem. Everybody acknowledges that the current path we're on is unsustainable. Not just for people who don't have health insurance, but for those who do.

We just had a study come out this week showing that premiums for families went up 130 percent over the last decade. Those costs probably went up even higher for the average employer and that's part of the reason why you're seeing each successive year fewer Americans having health insurance from their employers than they previously did.

Health care inflation went up 5.5 percent this past year when inflation was actually negative because of this extraordinary recession. So we know that standing still is not an option.

Now what I've said is we can make sure that people who don't have health insurance can buy into an insurance pool that gives them better bargaining power. For people who have health insurance we can provide health insurance reforms that make the insurance they have more secure. And we can do that mostly by using money that every expert agrees is being wasted and is currently in the existing health care system. So -- in fact what we've got right now is about 80 percent consensus on how we would accomplish that.

Now let me be honest: With a piece of legislation this complicated and a sector of the economy that's about one-sixth of our economy there's a reason why for the last 40 years people have been talking about this and it hasn't gotten done; it's hard. And there are a lot of moving parts. And so I appreciate fact that the American people are really cautious about this because it's important to them and the majority of people still have health insurance. What I'm trying to do is to explain the facts, which are if we don't do anything a lot of Americans are gonna be much worse off and over time the federal budget just can't sustain it.

Schieffer: Let me just ask you - the main concern that people seem to have is that this plan is somehow going to mean a tax on middle class Americans. Now you promised during the campaign -

Obama: Right.

Schieffer: … that that was not gonna happen.

Obama: Right.

Schieffer: No tax increase on people who made under 250,000 dollars.

Obama: Right.

Schieffer: No payroll tax, no capital gains …

Obama: Right.

Schieffer: … no tax of any kind on Americans. Can you still make that promise to people today?

Obama: I can still keep that promise because, as I've said, about two-thirds of what we've proposed would be from money that's already in the health care system but just being spent badly. And as I said before, this is not me making wild assertions.

You know, you always hear about waste and abuse in Washington and usually it doesn't mean much because nobody ever finds where that waste and abuse is. This is money that has been directly identified that the Congressional Budget Office, that Republican and Democratic experts agree is there, that is not improving the quality of our health. So the lion's share of money to pay for this will come from money that's already in system.

Now, we are going to have to find some additional sources of revenue for the other third or so of the health care plan. And I've provided a long list of approaches that would not have an impact on middle class Americans. They're not going to be forced to pay for this. Insurance companies, drug companies are gonna have to be ponying up, partly because right now they're receiving huge subsidies from folks.

Schieffer: But aren't they going to then pass it on to consumers? I mean that's what you know the Chamber of Commerce is saying. They're starting a big ad campaign right -

Obama: Right.

Schieffer: - now, they're saying you're gonna put these taxes on these insurance companies on people that make things like X-rays and lab tests and all of that and they're just going to turn right around and pass it right on to the consumer.

Obama: Here's the problem, they're passing on those costs to the consumer anyway. The only difference is …

Schieffer: But this would be more

Obama: No, the difference is that they're making huge profits on it, Bob. I mean, let's take the Medicare HMO programs that are being run by insurance companies. It's estimated by everybody that they're overcharging by about 14 percent. This amounts to about $177 billion over 10 years. About $17 billion a year, $18 billion a year. That's just going to pad their profits, hasn't been shown to make Medicare recipients any healthier. And in fact because those huge subsidies are going to insurance companies, Medicare recipients are not getting a good deal. Now if we are enforcing what should be the rules around Medicare and making sure the people are getting a bang for the buck, it's not going to be possible for insurance companies to simply pass on those costs to Medicare recipients because ultimately it's Uncle Sam that's paying for those services anyway.

Look, bringing about change in this town is always hard. When you've got special interests that are making billions of dollars, absolutely they're gonna want to keep as much of that, the profits that they're making, as possible. And by the way, those insurance companies even during these down years have been making terrific profits. We don't mind them making profits, we just want them to be accountable to their customers.

Schieffer: Let me ask you a little bit about the tenor of this debate. It seems to me that there is a sort of meanness that has settled over our political dialogue. It started this summer at these town hall meetings …

Obama: Right.

Schieffer: We saw this outbreak when you spoke to the joint session. Some people clearly just don't agree with your policy.

Obama: Absolutely.

Schieffer: But there seem to be others that are just, just mad, angry. President Carter is now saying that he thinks it's racial. Nancy Pelosi says it could be dangerous. What do you think it's all about?

Obama: Well look, what I think we have to remember is that at various periods in American history people get pretty rambunctious when it comes to our democratic debate. That's not new. And every president who's tried to bring about big changes I think elicits the most passionate responses. Maybe you hear what people had to say about Abraham Lincoln or what they had to say about FDR, or what they had to say about Ronald Reagan when he first came in and was trying to change our approach to government. That elicited huge responses.

Now I think that what's driving passions right now is that health care has become a proxy for a broader set of issues about how much government should be involved in our economy, particularly coming off a huge economic crisis. And the only thing that I've been trying to say is - number one, I have no interest in increasing the size of government. I just want to make sure we've got a smart government that is regulating for example the financial institutions smartly so I don't have to engage in any kind of bank bailouts. That's point number one. And point number two, even though we're having a passionate disagreement here, we can be civil to each other. And we can try to express ourselves acknowledging that we're all patriots, we're all Americans and not assume the absolute worst in people's motives.

And I have to, one last point I've got to make, Bob, and that is I do think part of what's different today is that the twenty-four-hour news cycle and cable television and blogs and all this, they focus on the most extreme elements on both sides. They can't get enough of conflict, it's catnip to the media right now. And so the easiest way to get 15 minutes of fame is to be rude to somebody. In that environment I think it makes it more difficult for us to solve the problems that the American people sent us here to solve.

Schieffer: Mr. President, seven former directors of the CIA have sent you a letter today asking you to reverse the decision of the Attorney General to reopen the criminal investigation of CIA interrogations that took place after the attacks on September 11th. Would you consider that?

Obama: Well first of all, I have utmost respect for the CIA. I have said consistently that I want to look forward and not backward when it comes to some of the problems that occurred under the previous administration, or when it came to interrogations. I don't want witch hunts taking place. I've also said though that the Attorney General has a job to uphold the law…

Schieffer: So you intend to let him go forward?

Obama: He's got to make judgment in terms of what has occurred. My understanding is it's not a criminal investigation at this point. They are simply investigating what took place. And I appreciate the former CIA directors wanting to look after an institution that they helped to build. But I continue to believe that nobody's above the law. And I want to make sure that as President of the United States that I'm not asserting in some way that my decisions over rule the decisions of prosecutors who are there to uphold the law.

Schieffer: Afghanistan.

Obama: Yeah.

Schieffer: We keep hearing that General McChrystal is about to ask you for tens of thousands of new American troops to go to Afghanistan, our David Martin has reported that. Are you considering something of that nature? Sending that large a force to Afghanistan?

Obama: I'm not considering it at that point because I haven't received the request. But I just want to remind people how we got here. When I came in Afghanistan was adrift because we frankly hadn't focused on it. I immediately ordered a top-to-bottom review. Part of that review was when General McChrystal got to Afghanistan for him to do his own assessment. In the meantime I sent 21,000 troops to make sure that we could secure election that was going to take place in the early fall.

The election is now complete. General McChrystal has completed his assessment. But my job is to make sure that we get a strategy that focuses on my core goal, which is to dismantle, defeat, destroy al Qaeda and its allies that killed Americans and are still plotting to kill Americans…

Schieffer: Well if he asked you for that many troops, you're going to have a hard time saying no, are you not?

Obama: Let's be clear, my central focus is, what are we doing to protect the American people and the American homeland? Afghanistan and Pakistan are critical elements in that process but the only reason I send a single young man or woman in uniform anywhere in the world is because I think it's necessary to keep us safe. And so whatever decisions I make are going to be based first on a strategy to keep us safe, then we'll figure out how to resource it. We're not gonna put the cart before the horse and just think by sending more troops we're automatically going to make Americans safe.

Schieffer: Didn't you say on March 27th that you had announced a comprehensive new strategy for Afghanistan? I thought you already had a strategy.

Obama: Well we did. But what I also said was that we were gonna review that every six months because this is a very complicated terrain. We had just started getting our troops in. In fact the 21,000 that I already ordered in are just now getting in place. And what I did not want is a situation in which we are just continually sending more and more troops or putting more and more resources without having looked at how the whole thing fits together, making sure that our efforts in terms of building Afghan capacity is in place, that our civilian and diplomatic efforts are in place. So what we're going to do is to continue to reassess, review what's taking place and make sure that our strategy and resources fit together for the aim of making sure that al Qaeda is not able to attack the United States.

Schieffer: You announced yesterday a major change in American strategic strategy when you said that we would not go forward with the missile defense system that would be there on the border of Russia. The Russians saw that as a poke in the eye from the very beginning. But even people who agree that that missile system is out of place are asking questions. Shouldn't you have tried to get something from the Russians in exchange for doing that?

Obama: Well keep in mind that when George Bush announced his strategy for putting missile defense in place, in the Czech Republic and in Poland, I said at the time I think we need missile defense but I want to make sure it works, that it's cost effective, that the technologies are operable, that it's our best possible strategy. And that hadn't been shown. So when I came in I asked the same people who had signed on first one - Bob Gates, my Secretary of Defense, as well as the Joint Chiefs of Staff - tell me given the intelligence you have now and the technology we possess and what we know about the Iranian threat, which always been our main concern, not Russia, tell me if the system that we've designed is the best possible system. And they came back to me and said, you know what, given what we know now we actually think that this is a better way of doing it. So we're not eliminating missile defense - in fact what we're doing is putting a system in that's more timely, more cost effective, and that meets the actual threats that we perceive coming from Iran.

Russia had always been paranoid about this, but George Bush was right, this wasn't a threat to them. And this program will not be a threat to them. So my task here was not to negotiate with the Russians. The Russians don't make determinations about what our defense posture is. We have made a decision about what will be best to protect the American people as well as our troops in Europe and our allies. If the by-product of it is that the Russians feel a little less paranoid and are now willing to work more effectively with us to deal with threats like ballistic missiles from Iran or nuclear development in Iiran, you know, then that's a bonus.

Schieffer: Mr. President our time is up. Thank you so much.

Obama: Thank you so much. Appreciate it, Bob.

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KING: Mr. President, thank you for joining us.

OBAMA: Great to see you.

KING: I want to begin with the economy. I get out of Washington every week for the show, and we’re in Connecticut and Rhode Island this week. And I knew I was going to be seeing you, so I asked 20 people: “What would you ask if you had the privilege that I have at this moment?” Eighteen of the twenty, eighteen, asked a variation of...

OBAMA: Jobs.

KING: ... where are the jobs? When are they coming back?

OBAMA: Yes. Well, look, the -- this is something that I ask every single one of my economic advisers every single day, because I know that ultimately the measure of an economy is, is it producing jobs that help people support families, send their kids to college? That’s the single most important thing we can do. What we’ve done, I think, in the first eight months is to stop the bleeding. We’ve...

KING: Is the recession over?

OBAMA: Well, you know, I’ll leave that up to the Fed chairman to pronounce whether it’s officially over or not. I think what’s absolutely clear is that -- that the financial markets are working again, that we even saw manufacturing tick up, in terms of production, last month. So all of the signs are that the economy is going to start growing again.

But here’s -- here’s the challenge, that not only are usually jobs figures the last to catch up, they’re the lagging indicator, but the other problem is, we lost so many jobs that making up for those that have already been lost is going to require really high growth rates.

And so what we’re focused right now on is, how can we make sure that businesses are investing again? How can we make sure that certain industries that were really important, like housing, are stabilized? How can we expand our export markets? And that’s part of what the G-20 meeting in Pittsburgh is going to be about, making sure that there’s a more balanced economy.

We can’t go back to the era where the Chinese or the Germans or other countries just are selling everything to us, we’re taking out a bunch of credit card debt or home equity loans, but we’re not selling anything to them.

So that’s how all this is going to fit together. But I want to be clear that probably the jobs picture is not going to improve considerably -- and it could even get a little bit worse -- over the next couple of months. And we’re probably not going to start seeing enough job creation to deal with the -- a rising population until some time next year.

KING: Do you think jobs will not grow, you will not be adding jobs until some time next year, or maybe...

(CROSSTALK)

OBAMA: No, I think -- I think we’ll be adding jobs, but you need 150,000 additional jobs each month just to keep pace with a growing population. So if we’re only adding 50,000 jobs, that’s a great reversal from losing 700,000 jobs early this year, but, you know, it means that we’ve still got a ways to go.

KING: Let’s talk health care. The Senate Finance Committee finally has a proposal before it by the chairman, Max Baucus . It’s getting some criticism from the left, some criticism from the right. I want to get to the details of it in a minute. It’s also getting some important praise from the middle. I want to break down some of the details in a minute. But if the Baucus bill made it to your desk as is, would you sign it? Does it meet your goals?

OBAMA: Well, that’s such a hypothetical, since it won’t get there as is, that I’m not going to answer that question. But can I say that it does meet some broad goals that all the bills that have been introduced meet.

KING: Is it better than the others?

OBAMA: It provides health insurance to people who don’t have it at affordable prices. I’d like to make sure that we’ve got that affordability really buttoned down, because I think that’s one of the most important things, is that if we’re offering people health insurance and we’re saying that people have to get health insurance if it’s affordable, we’ve got to make sure it’s affordable.

We’re helping people who have health insurance with the -- with knowing that, if they’re paying their premiums, they’re actually getting what they pay for, and that has been a huge problem, the people not able to get insurance because of pre-existing conditions, being surprised because some fine print says that they’ve got to pay huge out-of-pocket expenses or they hit a lifetime cap. All of those reforms are in there, and that’s really important.

Deficit neutrality, very important. Bending the cost curve, reducing health care inflation over time, part of the reason that’s so important, there was just a report that came out last week. Kaiser Family Foundation said, if you’ve got health insurance, last year, your premiums went up 5.5 percent, 5.5 percent. This is despite the fact that inflation was negative on everything else.

And that has been true almost every year. Premiums have doubled, gone up over 130 percent over the last 10 years. That’s the direction we’re heading. More and more people are finding that their employers are dropping their coverage, because it’s getting too expensive, so making sure that we’re controlling the long-term costs by improving the delivery systems, all of that’s in the bill.

Now, there are a whole bunch of details that still have to get worked out. I suspect you’ll have one or two questions about them. But what I’ll say is, is that right now I’m pleased that, basically, we’ve got 80 percent agreement, we’ve got to really work on that next 20 percent over the last few weeks.

KING: One of the issues is how to pay for it. And one of the things Chairman Baucus does -- and you have endorsed, at least in concept -- is putting a fee, slapping a fee on these so-called “Cadillac” insurance plans. And the fee would go on the insurance company, not on the individual.

OBAMA: That’s right.

KING: But as you know, many of your allies, Senator Rockefeller, other Democrats, and many union presidents who have helped you in this fight, say, you know what? That insurance company will pass that on to the consumer, and they think it’s a backdoor way potentially of violating your promise during the campaign to not raise taxes, not hurt middle-class Americans, because that will be passed back on through the back door.

OBAMA: Keep in mind that the average insurance plan, I think, is about $13,000, a little -- maybe a little more than that, because of health care inflation. Even the health care plan that members of Congress get is, you know, in that range of the teens. And so people would be, for the most part, completely unaffected by this.

You do have some Cadillac plans -- I mean, you know, the CEOs of Goldman, I think, published what their plans were worth. They were worth $40,000 or something like that. That’s probably leading to...

KING: Would you make sure...

OBAMA: ... some waste...

KING: I hate to interrupt, but would you make sure that -- some of these unions have negotiated pretty good plans, too. Would you...

OBAMA: Oh, absolutely.

KING: ... make sure theirs are carved out, or should some of them be subject to that?

OBAMA: This is a very important issue. I’ve been talking to the unions about it. I’ve been honest with them about it. What I’ve said is, is that the -- we want to make sure that guys are protected, guys and gals who have got a good benefit, that they are protected, but we also want to make sure that we’re using our health dollars wisely.

And I -- I do think that giving a disincentive to insurance companies to offer Cadillac plans that don’t make people healthier is part of the way that we’re going to bring down health care costs for everybody over the long term.

KING: It is not one of the central issues, but it has become one of the emotional flashpoints, and that is coverage of illegal immigrants. The Finance Committee plan is the only one in Congress right now that has specific language that says an illegal immigrant cannot go to one of these new health insurance exchanges. It requires documentation. Would you sign a bill without that documentation? Or is that an adamant red line for you?

OBAMA: Let me be clear. I think that, if I’m not mistaken, almost all of the plans had specific language saying that illegal immigrants would not be covered. The question really was, was the enforcement mechanism strong enough?

Here’s what I’ve said, and I will repeat: I don’t think that illegal immigrants should be covered under this health care plan. There should be a verification mechanism in place. We do that for a whole range of existing social programs. And I think that’s a pretty straightforward principle that will be met.

KING: Mitch McConnell told a conservative group: “We’re winning the health care debate.” What do you think of that?

OBAMA: Well, you know, they -- they were saying they were winning during the election, too.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: Up next, we turn to global challenges, wrestling with sending more U.S. troops to Afghanistan, and a headline from former President Bill Clinton’s trip to North Korea. Much more with President Obama, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Afghanistan is now often referred to as Obama’s war and the strategy and decisions he faces in the coming weeks could well define his presidency. The American people have deep doubts about the mission and some of the president’s fellow Democrats see eerily parallels to Iraq in Afghanistan’s failure to build a more capable army and its government corruption and dysfunction. Defining the mission is perhaps the president’s biggest challenge.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KING: Let me move on to the world stage. You face a very tough decision in the weeks ahead about Afghanistan. Our Pentagon correspondent, Barbara Starr, says she has been told that General McChrystal has finished his report and his recommendation to you, but he has been told, “Don’t call us; we’ll call you. Hold it.”

Are you or someone working for you asking him to sit on that at the moment because of the dicey politics of this?

OBAMA: No, no, no, no. Let -- let me describe the process from start to where we are now. When we came in, I think everybody understood that our Afghanistan strategy was somewhat adrift, despite the extraordinary valor of the young women -- men and women who are -- who are fighting there.

So what we said was, let’s do a soup-to-nuts re-evaluation, focusing on what our original goal was, which was to get Al Qaida, the people who killed 3,000 Americans.

To the extent that our strategy in Afghanistan is serving that goal, then we’re on the right track. If it starts drifting away from that goal, then we may have a problem.

What I also said was, we’ve got an election coming up. I ordered 21,000 troops in to secure that election. But I said, after the election’s over, we’ve got to review it, because we’ve got to figure out, what kind of partner do we have in Afghanistan? Are they willing to make the commitment to build their capacity to secure their own country?

We are in the process of working through that strategy. The only thing I’ve said to my folks is, A, I want an unvarnished assessment, but, B, I don’t want to put the resource question before the strategy question. You know, the -- because there is a natural inclination to say, if I get more, then I can do more. But right now, the question is, the first question is, are we doing the right thing? Are we pursuing the right strategy?

And -- and once I have that clarity from the commanders on the ground, Secretary Gates, my national security adviser, Jim Jones, and others, when we have clarity on that, then the question is, OK, how do we resource it? And that’s -- what I will say to the American public is not going to be driven by the politics of the moment. It’s going to be driven by the fact that, A, my most important job is to keep us safe -- and Al Qaida’s still trying to do us harm -- but, B, every time I sign an order, you know, I’m answerable to the parents of those young men and women who I’m sending over there, and I want to make sure that it’s for the right reason.

KING: On that point, about a month before the election, you promised a re-focused national security strategy. And you said, quote, “We will kill bin Laden. We will crush Al Qaida.” As president, commander-in-chief, are you finding it’s harder to find him than you thought it might have been as a candidate?

OBAMA: Oh, I think as a candidate I knew I was -- it was going to be hard. I don’t doubt the interest and the desire of the previous administration to find him and kill him. But I do think that, if we have a overarching strategy that reminds us every day that that’s our focus, that we have a better chance of capturing and killing him and certainly keeping Al Qaida on the run than if we start drifting into a whole bunch of other missions that really aren’t related to what is our essential strategic problem and rationale for being there.

KING: It is a small number, but a growing number of Democrats in the Congress who say they want a timeline, they want a time limit on U.S. troop commitments in Afghanistan. You thought that was a good idea when it came to Iraq. Is it a good idea for Afghanistan?

OBAMA: You know, I think that what we have to do is get the right strategy, and then I think we’ve got to have some clear benchmarks, matrix of progress. That’s part of the reason why I said, even after six months, I wanted us to re-evaluate. You know...

(CROSSTALK)

KING: What would you say to the American who says you’ve been president for eight months, why are you still looking for a strategy?

OBAMA: Well, no, no, no. Keep in mind that we have a -- we put a strategy in place, clarified our goals, but what the election has shown, as well as changing circumstances in Pakistan, is that, you know, this is going to be a very difficult operation, and we’ve got to make sure that we’re constantly refining it to keep our focus on what our primary goals are.

KING: Do you think President Karzai stole the election?

OBAMA: You know, I don’t think that, you know, I’m going to make comments on the election until after everything has been certified. I think there is no doubt that there were reports of fraud out there that at first glance look pretty serious. They’re being investigated. They’re going through the -- the normal processes.

How much fraud took place and whether that had a substantial effect on the results of the election, I think that is something that we’re going to have to wait and see in the next few weeks.

KING: A couple other quick security questions, and then I want to bring it back home. You recently had lunch with President Clinton. He went to North Korea to help facilitate the release of those American journalists. What is the most interesting thing he told you about Kim Jong-il?

OBAMA: You know, I think President Clinton’s assessment was that he’s -- he’s pretty healthy and in control. And that’s important to know, because we don’t have a lot of interaction with the North Koreans. And, you know, President Clinton had a chance to see him close up and have conversations with him.

I won’t go into any more details than that. But there’s no doubt that this is somebody who, you know, I think for a while people thought was slipping away. He’s reasserted himself. It does appear that he’s concerned about -- he was more concerned about succession when he was -- succession when he was sick, maybe less so now that he’s well.

But our -- but our main focus on North Korea -- and I’m very -- actually, this is a success story so far, and that is that we have been able to hold together a coalition that includes the Chinese and the Russians to really apply some of the toughest sanctions we’ve seen, and it’s having an impact.

OBAMA: And I think that North Korea is saying to itself, you know, we can’t just bang our spoon on the table and somehow think that the world is going to react positively. We’ve got to start behaving responsibly. So hopefully, we’ll start seeing some progress on that front.

KING: Seven former directors of central intelligence have sent you a letter saying, please invoke your authority to stop the attorney general’s investigation of the Bush-era interrogation tactics. Will you do that?

OBAMA: You know, first of all, I respect all seven of them. And as importantly or more importantly, I have absolute respect and have reliance upon a robust CIA.

And I’ve said before, I want to look forward and not backwards on this issue. On the other hand, I’ve also said nobody is above the law. And I don’t want to start getting into the business of squelching, you know, investigations that are being conducted.

Now, it’s not a criminal investigation as yet, my understanding. I trust career prosecutors to be judicious. I’ve made clear both publicly and privately that I have no interest in witch hunts. But, ultimately, the law is the law, and we don’t go around sort of picking and choosing how we approach it.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KING: Ahead, angry outbursts and disturbing images in recent weeks have some on the left suggesting racism motivates some Obama critics. Does the president see race as the issue? I’ll ask him next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: How much, if at all, does our first African-American president believe race motivates his critics? Back to our conversation in the Roosevelt Room.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

KING: It’s a tough business, as you know. But in recent weeks, people have raised some pretty serious questions, the big rally in town, signs talking about Afro-socialism (ph), swastikas with your name and your picture on them, “you lie” shouted at you during a nationally televised addressed, and former President Carter says he sees racism in some of this. Do you?

OBAMA: You know, as I’ve said in the past, you know, are there people out there who don’t like me because of race? I’m sure there are. That’s not the overriding issue here. I think there are people who are anti-government.

I think that there are -- there has been a longstanding debate in this country that is usually that much more fierce during times of transition or when presidents are trying to bring about big changes.

I mean, the things that were said about FDR are pretty similar to the things that were said about me, that he was a communist, he was a socialist. Things that were said about Ronald Reagan when he was trying to reverse some of the New Deal programs, you know, were -- were pretty vicious, as well.

The only thing I’d just hope is, is that people -- you know, I think we can have a strong disagreement, passionate disagreements about issues without -- without resorting to name-calling. We can maintain civility. We can give other people the benefit of the doubt that -- that they want what is best for this country.

KING: But the speaker says it reminds her of the hateful anti- gay language in San Francisco that led to deadly violence. Jim Clyburn, who’s the highest-ranking African-American in Congress, says he thinks people are trying to de-legitimize you. Did you see it as that worrisome?

OBAMA: You know, I’ve got to tell you that, as I said before, you know, yelling at politicians is as American as apple pie. I mean, that’s -- that’s in our DNA. We -- I said this in the speech to the joint session, that we have a long tradition of being skeptical of government.

I do think that it’s important for us, again, to remind ourselves that all of us are Americans who love this country. I think it’s important not to exaggerate or provide just rank misinformation about each other.

You know, I’m amused. I can’t tell you how many foreign leaders who are heads of center-right governments say to me, I don’t understand why people would call you socialist, in my country, you’d be considered a conservative.

You know, and the other thing I’ve got to say is, is that I think it’s important for the media -- you know, not to do any media-bashing here -- to recognize that right now, in this 24-hour news cycle, the easiest way to get on CNN or FOX or any of the other stations -- MSNBC -- is to just say something rude and outrageous.

If you’re civil, and polite, and you’re sensible, and you don’t exaggerate the -- the bad things about your opponent, and, you know, you might maybe get on one of the Sunday morning shows, but -- but you’re not going to -- you’re not going to be on the loop.

And, you know, part of what I’d like to see is -- is all of us reward decency and civility in our political discourse. That doesn’t mean you can’t be passionate, and that doesn’t mean that you can’t speak your mind. But I think we can all sort of take a step back here and remind ourselves who we are as a people.

KING: I’m over my time. If I can, I want to ask you one question as a parent, not as a president. I was on a college campus this week and at a lab where they’re trying to make an H1N1 vaccine. As a parent with two daughters in school, how are you dealing with this? And does the Obama family plan include a vaccine for you?

OBAMA: Well, the -- here’s the Obama family plan, is to call up my HHS secretary, Kathleen Sebelius , and my CDC director and just ask them, what’s your recommendation? And whatever they tell me to do, I will do.

My understanding at this point is that the high-risk populations are going to be first with the vaccine, and that means not only health care workers, but particularly children with underlying neurological vulnerabilities. And so we’ve got to make sure that those vaccines go to them first.

OBAMA: I’m assuming -- and pregnant women, by the way -- after that, I think you’re looking at kids, and so Malia and Sasha would fall into that category. I suspect that I may come fairly far down the line, so we’re not going to -- here’s what I guarantee you. We want to get vaccinated. We think it’s the right thing to do. We will stand in line like everybody else. And when folks say it’s our turn, that’s when we’ll get it.

KING: Mr. President, thank you for your time.

OBAMA: Thank you so much.

KING: Thank you.

OBAMA: Appreciated it.