“The White House is considering canceling a fall summit between President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, a move that would further aggravate the already tense relationship between the two leaders,” the AP writes. “The White House is dangling that option over the Russians as Moscow considers a temporary asylum petition from Edward Snowden, the American accused of leaking information about classified U.S. intelligence programs. But officials have privately signaled that scrapping the bilateral talks would also be retaliation for other areas of disagreement with Russia, including its continued support for Syrian President Bashar Assad’s attacks against civilians.”
“President Barack Obama has encouraged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stick with efforts to restart peace talks with Palestinians and is asking Netanyahu to continue working with Secretary of State John Kerry on that effort,” the AP adds. “The White House says Obama and Netanyahu spoke by phone Thursday. In addition to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, they also discussed the crisis in Egypt, Syria’s civil war and Iran’s nuclear program.”
USA Today: “In the days and weeks ahead, a critical deadline looms for implementation of the law, and the battle for public opinion is heating to a boil. As the Obama administration nears the Oct. 1 deadline to establish health care exchanges in all 50 states, the White House and Republicans are exchanging barbs and revving up outreach efforts to make their case to the public in the most highly partisan policy battle in the president's 4½ years in office.”
A Treasury official told Congress Thursday that there are no further Obamacare delays coming.
Everything’s America’s fault… USA Today: “More than two weeks after Egypt's military unseated the country's first freely elected president, Washington refused to call the power grab a military coup, sparking criticism from supporters of Mohammed Morsi who believe they were robbed of their democratic right after voting for the now-ousted leader.”
Obama’s pick to head the EPA was confirmed Thursday.
Hey, what’s a DUI, anyway when you raise $700,000? “President Obama nominated campaign fundraiser Timothy Broas on Thursday to be his next ambassador to the Netherlands, one year after the Washington lawyer withdrew himself from consideration for the same post following a DUI arrest,” USA Today writes. “Broas, a defense attorney specializing in white-collar crime cases, raised at least $700,000 for the president's two presidential campaigns. He was nominated for the post last year and went through a confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.”
The Hill: “President Obama on Thursday launched a new effort to appoint a key campaign donor to a plum diplomatic post, a year after a drunk driving arrest forced the fundraiser to withdrew his name.”
Jimmy Carter told the NBC Atlanta affiliate that the jury in the Zimmerman case made the “right decision.”
National Journal: “More Top Obama Officials Have Graduate Degrees From Oxford Than Any Public University in the United States.”
Michael Hirsh profiles Samantha Power: “The Taming of Samantha Power:
How a former icon of humanitarian intervention changed from a buzz saw into a bureaucrat.” Power’s tough statements on Syria at a hearing Wednesday “only served to remind people how quiet she's really been these last few years, a former firebrand who once passionately championed humanitarian intervention--and Obama as its savior--but who in reality hitched her wagon to perhaps the most conservative president on foreign policy since Dwight Eisenhower.”