Obama's Horrible Weekend

President Obama badly needed a weekend to regroup. He didn't get one.

Obama went to the presidential retreat at Camp David Friday afternoon for some R&R. But the bad news kept piling up. On Friday, the latest federal jobless report showed only a small drop in the unemployment rate to 9.1 per cent. At this point, the president was still digesting the distasteful news of major declines in the stock market all week. On Friday, Standard & Poor's lowered the nation's AAA credit rating. [Check out U.S. News Weekly, now available on iPad.]

On Saturday came the worst news of all—word that 30 American soldiers had been killed in an apparent Taliban attack on their helicopter in Afghanistan. Obama spent much of Sunday being briefed on the incident and calling various military commanders "to express his condolences for those who were lost, and to reaffirm the American people's support for our men and women in uniform and their families," according to a White House spokesman. Obama also took a call from President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, who expressed his condolences.

• Read more about the deficit and national debt.
  
• Check out our editorial cartoons on President Obama.
  
• See a collection of political cartoons on Afghanistan.

Reader Comments Read all comments (5)

Add Your Thoughts

Comment Name State Select One AL AK AZ AR CA CO CT DE DC FL GA HI ID IL IN IA KS KY LA ME MD MA MI MN MS MO MT NE NV NH NJ NM NY NC ND OH OK OR PA RI SC SD TN TX UT VT VA WA WV WI WY International Email

Please enter the two words below into the text field underneath the image.

Incorrect please try again

Enter the words above: Enter the numbers you hear:

Your comment will be posted immediately, unless it is spam or contains profanity. For more information, please see our Comments FAQ.