The Star Online: World Updates
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- Obama talks Libya and Biden's swimsuit on "Daily Show"
- Obama talks Libya and Biden's swimsuit on "Daily Show"
- Yemen takes tough sell message to U.S. businesses
| Obama talks Libya and Biden's swimsuit on "Daily Show" Posted: 18 Oct 2012 08:21 PM PDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Barack Obama joked that his vice president looked good in a swimsuit and said screw-ups can happen in government as he discussed the Libya controversy, mixing comedy and serious issues in an appearance on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart."
In a appeal to young voters, Obama largely played it straight in his sixth appearance on the liberal-leaning comedy show, which enjoys a broad following among younger viewers. He touted the steps he had taken to lower college costs and expand rights for gays and lesbians and warned that Republican rival Mitt Romney would bring back economic policies that would favour the very wealthy over everyone else if he won the November 6 election. "Here's what I will say to everybody who's watching: The stakes on this could not be bigger," Obama said. "There's no excuse not to vote." Voters under age 30 made up a crucial part of Obama's winning coalition in 2008, and Reuters/Ipsos polling data indicates they back him again this year by wide margins. Younger Americans voted in near-record levels in the 2008, but it is unclear whether they will turn out again in such numbers this year. Obama's campaign has harnessed social media and set up an extensive network of on-campus volunteers to help ensure young supporters vote this year, and an appearance on "The Daily Show" is likely to help. With an average audience of 1.1 million, the Comedy Central cable network show reaches roughly one-third of the viewership of the most popular late-night talk show, NBC's "Tonight Show with Jay Leno," according to Nielsen data provided by Horizon Media. But it ranks first among viewers under the age of 50, according to figures provided by the show. Obama promised viewers he would keep working to help the economy recover from the deepest recession since the 1930s, but he also emphasized issues like student loans and civil liberties that are normally not a central part of his stump speech. He said he still wanted to close the Guantanamo Bay military prison for terrorism suspects, which he has been unable to do so far. Asked about the administration's shifting assessment of last month's deadly attacks on a U.S. diplomatic mission in Libya, Obama said his administration was still piecing together the evidence. "The government is a big operation. At any given time, something screws up and you make sure you find out what's broken and you fix it," he said. The edgy humour that Stewart is known for surfaced occasionally. "How many times a week does Biden show up in a wet bathing suit to a meeting?" Stewart asked in an unprompted reference to Vice President Joe Biden. "I had to put out a presidential directive on that. We had to stop that," Obama said. "I gotta say, though, he looks pretty good." SEXY REFORMS? At another point, when Obama said some of his proposed legal reforms were not "sexy," Stewart stopped him. "You don't know what I find sexy," Stewart said. Obama nearly took the bait, mentioning that the erotic bestseller "Fifty Shades of Grey" had come up in an earlier segment of the show. Then he appeared to catch himself. "We're not going to go there, Jon. I'm still the president," he said. The Democratic incumbent has rebounded since a sharp debate performance on Tuesday night in which he was widely judged to have gotten the better of Romney. A Reuters/Ipsos daily tracking poll showed Obama holding a slight but steady lead, with 47 percent of likely voters saying they planned to vote for Obama, compared with 44 percent for Romney. Other polls show a tighter race, and the focus is on swing states like Ohio and Florida that will likely decide the election. The Romney campaign said it was moving resources out of North Carolina, where it sees an increasing chance of winning, to allocate them to other battleground states. The campaign said its communications director for the state was redeploying to Ohio. Romney's economic plans have "resonated strongly" in the Southern state and polls are increasingly widening, spokeswoman Sarah Pompei said. The two men face off in their last debate on Monday in Florida, where the topic will be foreign policy. They will meet before then in New York on Thursday night, where they are expected to deliver humorous remarks at a political dinner. Romney spent the day at a Manhattan hotel preparing for the debate and his evening speech. For a graphic of the Reuters/Ipsos poll please click here: http://link.reuters.com/new23t (Additional reporting by Steve Holland in New York, Jeff Mason and Lisa Richwine Editing by Alistair Bell)
Locked in tight race, Obama and Romney trade jokes at dinner Mormon feminists? Yes they exist, and they're for Obama Copyright © 2012 Reuters | ||
| Obama talks Libya and Biden's swimsuit on "Daily Show" Posted: 18 Oct 2012 08:06 PM PDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Barack Obama joked that his vice president looked good in a swimsuit and said screw-ups can happen in government as he discussed the Libya controversy, mixing comedy and serious issues in an appearance on "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart."
In a appeal to young voters, Obama largely played it straight in his sixth appearance on the liberal-leaning comedy show, which enjoys a broad following among younger viewers. He touted the steps he had taken to lower college costs and expand rights for gays and lesbians and warned that Republican rival Mitt Romney would bring back economic policies that would favour the very wealthy over everyone else if he won the November 6 election. "Here's what I will say to everybody who's watching: The stakes on this could not be bigger," Obama said. "There's no excuse not to vote." Voters under age 30 made up a crucial part of Obama's winning coalition in 2008, and Reuters/Ipsos polling data indicates they back him again this year by wide margins. Younger Americans voted in near-record levels in the 2008, but it is unclear whether they will turn out again in such numbers this year. Obama's campaign has harnessed social media and set up an extensive network of on-campus volunteers to help ensure young supporters vote this year, and an appearance on "The Daily Show" is likely to help. With an average audience of 1.1 million, the Comedy Central cable network show reaches roughly one-third of the viewership of the most popular late-night talk show, NBC's "Tonight Show with Jay Leno," according to Nielsen data provided by Horizon Media. But it ranks first among viewers under the age of 50, according to figures provided by the show. Obama promised viewers he would keep working to help the economy recover from the deepest recession since the 1930s, but he also emphasized issues like student loans and civil liberties that are normally not a central part of his stump speech. He said he still wanted to close the Guantanamo Bay military prison for terrorism suspects, which he has been unable to do so far. Asked about the administration's shifting assessment of last month's deadly attacks on a U.S. diplomatic mission in Libya, Obama said his administration was still piecing together the evidence. "The government is a big operation. At any given time, something screws up and you make sure you find out what's broken and you fix it," he said. The edgy humour that Stewart is known for surfaced occasionally. "How many times a week does Biden show up in a wet bathing suit to a meeting?" Stewart asked in an unprompted reference to Vice President Joe Biden. "I had to put out a presidential directive on that. We had to stop that," Obama said. "I gotta say, though, he looks pretty good." SEXY REFORMS? At another point, when Obama said some of his proposed legal reforms were not "sexy," Stewart stopped him. "You don't know what I find sexy," Stewart said. Obama nearly took the bait, mentioning that the erotic bestseller "Fifty Shades of Grey" had come up in an earlier segment of the show. Then he appeared to catch himself. "We're not going to go there, Jon. I'm still the president," he said. The Democratic incumbent has rebounded since a sharp debate performance on Tuesday night in which he was widely judged to have gotten the better of Romney. A Reuters/Ipsos daily tracking poll showed Obama holding a slight but steady lead, with 47 percent of likely voters saying they planned to vote for Obama, compared with 44 percent for Romney. Other polls show a tighter race, and the focus is on swing states like Ohio and Florida that will likely decide the election. The Romney campaign said it was moving resources out of North Carolina, where it sees an increasing chance of winning, to allocate them to other battleground states. The campaign said its communications director for the state was redeploying to Ohio. Romney's economic plans have "resonated strongly" in the Southern state and polls are increasingly widening, spokeswoman Sarah Pompei said. The two men face off in their last debate on Monday in Florida, where the topic will be foreign policy. They will meet before then in New York on Thursday night, where they are expected to deliver humorous remarks at a political dinner. Romney spent the day at a Manhattan hotel preparing for the debate and his evening speech. For a graphic of the Reuters/Ipsos poll please click here: http://link.reuters.com/new23t (Additional reporting by Steve Holland in New York, Jeff Mason and Lisa Richwine Editing by Alistair Bell)
Locked in tight race, Obama and Romney trade jokes at dinner Mormon feminists? Yes they exist, and they're for Obama Copyright © 2012 Reuters | ||
| Yemen takes tough sell message to U.S. businesses Posted: 18 Oct 2012 07:32 PM PDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - It has to be one of the toughest jobs around - trying to sell U.S. businesses on the investment potential of one of the poorest nations on Earth, a country battered by Islamist militants who bomb, assassinate and kidnap. Yet it is a job U.S. Ambassador to Yemen Gerald Feierstein is taking on by leading a delegation of 10 Yemeni businessmen on a 10-day, five-city tour of the United States. "We think there are great opportunities. There's money to be made investing in Yemen," Feierstein, a career diplomat, said on Thursday. This is the first time the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa has organized a Yemeni business delegation to visit U.S. companies. Just last week masked gunmen fatally shot a Yemeni who worked in the security office of the U.S. Embassy, leaving behind a wife and seven children. A month ago the embassy was stormed by protesters angry about an anti-Islam film made in California. The task of promoting Yemen seems daunting and could draw a parallel to the 2011 film "Salmon Fishing in the Yemen," starring Ewan McGregor as a fisheries expert hired by an eccentric sheik to bring fly-fishing to the parched land. Still, the Yemeni business executives, who arrived in New York on Wednesday, presented an upbeat image of their nation. "The overall situation in Yemen is improving," said Fathi Abdulwasa Hayel Saeed, chairman of the Yemeni Businessmen Club. "Yes, there are challenges. Yes, there are security issues but Yemen is such a virgin country where there are a lot of opportunities to do business. "I think a lot of American companies have been shy from coming to Yemen, while other nationalities like from Europe and Southeast Asia have been coming to Yemen even in the difficult times," Saeed said. Their itinerary also takes them to Kansas City, Houston, Washington, D.C., and San Francisco. 'YEMEN NEEDS POWER' The executives come from the construction, pharmaceuticals, medical and technology industries. However, much of the discussion focused on developing clean water, a precious commodity in the dry Arabian peninsula landscape, as well as renewable energy such as wind and solar power. "Yemen needs power to grow the economy," said Wael Zokari, chief executive officer of Griffin International, the technology arm of conglomerate Griffin Group. "The technology we need comes from the United States," he said. Yemen produces less than half the electricity it needs now, let alone for the infrastructure it wants to build to grow an economy that contracted 10.5 percent in 2011 to under $29 billion. The International Monetary Fund estimates 40 percent of the population lives on less than $2 a day and earlier this month forecast economic contraction of 1.9 percent for this year. However, in September nearly $8 billion in international donor pledges were collected to help support the government's budget, which is under severe strains because of frequent attacks on its oil pipelines. According to Feierstein, there is a misperception that Yemen's oil and gas production is "going to run dry over the next few years." He said oil companies, including major U.S. producers, are interested in taking another look at the country because much of it has never been explored. A survey by Houston-based oil and gas consultant Knowledge Reservoir is under way to calculate more accurately its gas reserves, a U.S. State Department official travelling with the delegation said. POLITICAL TRANSFORMATION The storming of the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa occurred in conjunction with the violence on September 11 in Libya in which the U.S. ambassador to Libya, another diplomat and two U.S. security men were killed in an attack on the consulate in Benghazi. Asked if he has enough support on security in Yemen, Feierstein responded: "Yes. Absolutely. I would say specifically that the support we have gotten from Washington, the State Department, from (U.S.) Central Command, the White House, which oversees or certainly watches these things, has been outstanding. "There's never been a time where we came and asked for support where the support wasn't forthcoming." Yemen still is rattled by violence, often claimed by al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), and U.S.-led drone attacks on militants. But the executives highlighted a political transition that is holding despite militancy, while international donors have pledged billions of dollars to help rebuild the country. In February, Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, the sole candidate to replaced Ali Abdullah Saleh, was sworn into office. Saleh ruled Yemen for three decades with an iron fist but was pushed out by months of street protests sparked by the Arab Spring. The hope among the executives, the U.S.-backed government, and Washington is that much like McGregor's fictional movie character, who saw his project blown up by local militants, they, like the salmon, will survive. (Editing by Bill Trott) Copyright © 2012 Reuters |
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