The power of women hit the State Department on Wednesday when first lady Michelle Obama joined Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to celebrate champions of women's rights around the world. The event was to celebrate the State Department Women of Courage Awards, but highlighted how both the current and former first ladies have made women's rights a signature issue. Since calling women's rights a human rights issue at a women's conference in Beijing in 1995, Clinton has made it a ...

President Obama says the United States is open to reaching out to some moderate voices in the Taliban, but critics say that's not the right approach. In an interview published in the New York Times this weekend, Obama said some military leaders believe that part of the success in Iraq has come from reaching out to Sunni militants there. The president said while the situation in Afghanistan is much more complex, there may be some comparable opportunities in Afghanistan ...

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN's chief medical correspondent, has withdrawn his name from consideration as surgeon general of the United States, an administration official said Thursday. (CNN) -- Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN's chief medical correspondent, has withdrawn his name from consideration as surgeon general of the United States, an administration official said Thursday. "Sanjay Gupta was under serious consideration for the job of surgeon general," the official said in an e-mail. "He has removed himself from consideration to focus more on ...

Europeans were among the loudest cheerleaders for Barack Obama during his presidential campaign. Soon after he won the Democratic candidacy 200,000 people turned out in Berlin to hear him speak. But now that he is settled in the White House, many Europeans feel snubbed. Just six weeks into his presidency, Europeans are already fretting that Obama has yet to visit Europe. His Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, flew west for her first foreign trip, spending a week in ...

During the most contentious stretch of the Democratic presidential primary campaign last winter, then-candidate Hillary Clinton mocked Barack Obama for his pledge to transcend Washington's entrenched partisanship. "The sky will open. The lights will come down. Celestial choirs will be singing and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect!" Clinton bellowed. Obama dismissed Clinton's sarcasm as overly cynical and further evidence she was a creature of Washington. But as President Obama prepares ...

During the most contentious stretch of the Democratic presidential primary campaign last winter, then-candidate Hillary Clinton mocked Barack Obama for his pledge to transcend Washington's entrenched partisanship. "The sky will open. The lights will come down. Celestial choirs will be singing and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect!" Clinton bellowed. Obama dismissed Clinton's sarcasm as overly cynical and further evidence she was a creature of Washington. But as President Obama prepares ...

Ahead of her first trip abroad as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton said she planned to renew U.S. focus on Asia, which she suggested the Bush administration had ignored. In China, that new attitude of engagement has been cautiously welcomed. "For many years the U.S. has been accustomed to delivering its demands to China, and this situation should change," the popular nationalist tabloid Global Times put it on the morning of Clinton's arrival. "The U.S. can no longer ...

Barack Obama's economic team likes to say that crisis breeds opportunity. His foreign policy team is unlikely to feel that way about the political turmoil in Israel and the Palestinian territories right now. The ascension of Benjamin Netanyahu in the wake of the fragmented Israeli parliamentary elections puts a hawk in control in Jerusalem and sets up a period of political uncertainty that blunts any early moves the U.S. had planned to make in pursuit of peace. But the Obama ...

When Hillary Clinton visits Beijing this week, her Chinese hosts will closely watch her body movement and parse her every word. Her first trip here as the U.S. secretary of state comes in the shadow of the global financial crisis, the pressing North Korea nuclear issue and a warming planet. The U.S. Congress has passed a massive stimulus bill that will plunge America even deeper into debt. Will China help out About $700 billion of China's $1.9 trillion of ...

Five drug-trafficking suspects were killed and seven federal police officers were wounded Tuesday in clashes in the Mexican border town of Reynosa, police said. She's expected to huddle with Foreign Minister Hassan Wirayuda Wednesday evening before meeting with President Bambang Yudhoyono the following morning. Clinton will "discuss the close and growing partnership with Indonesia and perspectives on common interests in Southeast Asia," according to the State Department Web site. She began her trip in Japan, where she met ...