President Obama made a surprise visit to Afghanistan today on the one year anniversary of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden.    While in country Obama and President Karzai signed the Strategic Partnership Agreement outlining the U.S.-Afghanistan relationship over the next decade.  The president will also address the nation live from Afghanistan at 7:30pm ET.

Today's visit to Afghanistan is President Obama's third since taking office.  His most recent visit was to the base at Bagram in December 2010.  Bad weather kept the president from traveling the almost 30 miles to Kabul.  His first visit was on March 28, 2010.

It was 9 years ago today when then-President George W. Bush declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq.  Under a banner that read "mission accomplished," President Bush addressed the country live from the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln in the Persian Gulf.

A senior administration official confirms the first woman to serve as U.S. Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, will receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

The Medal of Freedom is the nation’s highest civilian honor.

A White House release described the Presidential Medal of freedom as an honor presented to individuals "who have made especially meritorious contributions to the security or national interests of the United States, to world peace, or to cultural or other significant public or private endeavors."

The White House had previously announced former University of Tennesee women's basketball coach Pat Summitt and former Polish Underground officer Jan Karski, who was one of the first people to provide accounts of the Holocaust to the outside world, will also receive honor.

A ceremony honoring them will take place sometime later this year at the White House.

Iowa City, IA (CNN) -- President Obama targeted House Republican Todd Akin from Missouri in his remarks on student loan interest rates at the University of Iowa Wednesday.

He did not call out Akin by name, instead citing Akin's recent remarks about how the federal government should not be in the business of student loans.

"America has got the equivalent of the stage three cancer of socialism because the federal government is tampering in all kinds of stuff it has no business tampering in," Akin said in a debate with his two Republican opponents Saturday, according to a report by the Columbia Daily Tribune.

Akin, who represents suburbs west of St. Louis, is in a Republican primary contest to oppose Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO).  She is facing perhaps the toughest re-election fight of any incumbent Democratic senator this cycle.
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Boulder, CO (CNN) – President Obama kicked off a tour of three battleground states today with a speech at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. This two-day college blitz is, on it's face, about pressing Congress to prevent interest rates on federally subsidized student loans from doubling this summer. In political reality, the president's latest excursion from Washington is all about energizing part of his base – youth voters – in an election year.

"For each year that Congress doesn't act, the average student with these loans will rack up an additional $1,000 in debt - an extra $1,000," President Obama told a supportive crowd of mainly students at UNC Chapel Hill. "That's basically a tax hike for more than 7 million students across America, more than 160,000 students here in North Carolina alone."

In 2007, with bipartisan support, a Democratic-led Congress cut interest rates on Stafford loans from 6.8% to 3.4%, the current rate. On July 1, that rate is set to return to 6.8% for new loans. As some congressional Republicans voice concern about the $6 billion price tag for maintaining the low rates, the White House is coordinating with congressional Democrats to frame Republicans as threatening to raise costs on college students.

On Monday, presumed Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney gave a full-throated endorsement of extending the low interest rates, trying to blunt the president's momentum on the issue. Congressional Republicans accuse President Obama of trying to distract from his performance on the economy and point out that under the president's own budget proposal student loan rates would double in 2013.

In 2008, 66 percent of voters age 18 to 29 voted for Obama. Thirty-two percent went for Sen. John McCain. The latest CNN/ORC poll shows a similar breakdown among young people in an Obama-Romney match-up, but a number of polls show an enthusiasm gap for Obama among young voters compared to 2008 when they flocked to cast ballots in unprecedented numbers.

President Obama is scheduled to speak at the University of Colorado Boulder Tuesday night. On Wednesday he addresses students at the University of Iowa.

CNN Chief White House Correspondent Jessica Yellin reports the latest in the investigation surrounding allegations that Secret Service agents brought prostitutes to their hotel rooms in Cartagena, Colombia.

CLEVELAND, Ohio (CNN) - The company building the controversial Keystone XL pipeline has submitted a proposal for a new route, a spokesman for Nebraska's environmental authority said Wednesday.

The new route is east of the initially proposed route that went over an environmentally sensitive aquifer, said spokesman Brian McManus of the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality. TransCanada is the company constructing Keystone XL.

The pipeline is intended to carry between 500,000 to 700,000 barrels of crude oil a day from Canada's oil sands to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

U.S. President Barack Obama in January denied a permit for the 1,700-mile pipeline, a decision that prompted Republican criticism that the president was not doing everything possible to create jobs and combat high gasoline prices.
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The following is a statement from Assistant Director Paul S. Morrissey, U.S. Secret Service Office of Government and Public Affairs:

"Although the Secret Service's investigation into allegations of misconduct by its employees in Cartagena, Colombia, is in its early stages, and is still ongoing, three of the individuals involved will separate or are in the process of separating from the agency:

*    One supervisory employee was allowed to retire from the agency.

*    Another supervisory employee has been proposed for removal for
cause, which requires a 30-day notice, an opportunity to respond and the
right to be represented by private legal counsel.
*    A third non-supervisory employee has resigned.

The remaining eight employees continue to be on administrative leave.
Their security clearances remain suspended.

The Secret Service continues to conduct a full, thorough and fair investigation, utilizing all investigative techniques available to our agency.  This includes polygraph examinations, interviews with the employees involved, and witness interviews, to include interviews being conducted by our Office of Professional Responsibility in Cartagena, Colombia.

Since these allegations were first reported, the Secret Service has actively pursued this investigation, and has acted to ensure that appropriate disciplinary action is effected.  We demand that all of our employees adhere to the highest professional and ethical standards and are committed to a full review of this matter.

(CNN) – The U.S. Secret Service is set to announce agent resignations following a prostitution scandal in Colombia, according to a source with knowledge of the investigation. The resignations could occur as early as Wednesday evening, the source said, adding that not all 11 agents involved in the scandal are expected to resign.  

BOCA RATON, Fla. (CNN) – Without mentioning the names of his Republican rivals, President Barack Obama took his ideological opponents to task on Tuesday during a speech on Tuesday at Florida Atlantic University. Trumpeting themes of fairness and equal sacrifice, the president used facts and figures to argue that a continuation of current tax breaks to the nation’s top-earners would be the wrong way to tackle the country’s mounting debt.

“A lot of the folks who were peddling these trickle-down theories, including members of Congress and some people who are running for a certain office right now who shall not be named- they're doubling down on these old, broken down theories,” the president said, pointing to the budget recently passed by House Republicans as an example.

In Obama’s description, the budget “showers the wealthiest Americans with even more tax cuts and then pays for these tax cuts by gutting investments in education, in medical research, in clean energy, in health care.”

The president warned his young audience that if the plan’s proposals became law, many of them would lose $1,000 each in financial aid funding for college, and by the time they retired Medicare would have been replaced by a voucher system, the value of which would be quickly outpaced by rising health care costs. FULL POST

Seoul, South Korea (CNN) - President Barack Obama used his first visit to the demilitarized zone that splits the Korean peninsula to peer through binoculars into North Korea where flags flew at half-staff to mark the 100-day anniversary of the death of Kim Jong Il.
The stop at the border Sunday marked the start of a three-day trip to South Korea where the American president is to attend an international nuclear summit.
Top officials from 54 countries including China and Russia will attend the summit. But its message of international cooperation has been overshadowed by North Korea's announcement last week that it is planning to carry out a rocket-powered satellite launch in April.

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