Scott Horsley

The president is attending the G-8 summit in France Thursday, where the agenda is dominated by discussions about shoring up the new democracies in the Arab world. President Obama is asking his allies among the major industrial nations to be generous in the aid to Egypt, Tunisia and the rebels in Libya.

President Obama told a boisterous crowd in Ireland on Monday that both their country and the United States will recover from tough economic times, just as they have in the past.

Ireland was the first stop for Obama on a six-day European tour. He stressed the strong ties between the two countries — fostered in part by millions of Americans with Irish ancestry — and also paid tribute to his own Irish forebears by visiting the village his great-great-great-grandfather came from.

President Obama is in Ireland on Monday kicking off a six-day European trip during which he will visit Buckingham Palace, address British Parliament, attend the Group of Eight summit in France and meet with Central European leaders in Poland.

First, though, the president has some family business to attend to: As Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny explained on St. Patrick's Day, the land of O'Connells, O'Neills, and O'Donnells is also the land of Obamas.

President Obama declared Thursday that the United States will promote democratic reform across the Middle East, challenging not only adversaries like Syria but also allies like Bahrain. In a speech at the State Department, Obama offered his first comprehensive response to the political uprisings that have gripped the region over the last six months. He also called for Israel and the Palestinians to resume negotiations over the shape of a two-state solution.

President Obama plans to outline steps to boost the economies of Egypt and Tunisia, when he delivers a major policy address on the Middle East today. The White House says economic improvements would help to reinforce the positive political changes sweeping the region.

President Obama met Thursday with Senate Republicans to discuss the nation's debt ceiling and long-term efforts to control the deficit. Meanwhile, a group of Main Street businesses are urging Congress to raise the debt ceiling without delay.

President Obama meets with Senate Democrats Wednesday to discuss how to address the country's long-term deficits. Obama follows up Thursday by meeting with Senate Republicans.

The White House meetings come just days before the federal government is expected to start bumping up against its debt ceiling. But so far, at least, financial markets don't seem overly worried.

Top lawmakers from both parties agree that sooner or later they'll have to vote to raise the debt limit. But the vote may come at a price.

There are at least a dozen Republicans considering a run for the White House in 2012. As part of a series, NPR is profiling some of them to find out what first sparked their interest in politics.

In the fall of 1976 — the bicentennial — Rick Santorum was a freshman at Penn State University. He didn't know what he wanted to major in, so he signed up for Political Science 1. The course was called "Introduction to American Politics," and that's just what it was for the young Santorum.

President Obama announced at the White House Sunday night that terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden had been killed in a U.S.-led operation. The announcement comes just months before the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

President Obama and Panamanian President Ricardo Martinelli discussed a new trade agreement Thursday that the White House hopes will win quick congressional approval.

The deal is one of three the Obama administration has been working on as part of the president's push to double U.S. exports.

The White House inherited the three trade agreements — including deals with South Korea and Colombia — from the Bush administration. And at first, President Obama had reservations about all of them.

Gas prices were on the program for President Obama this week. He visited Virginia, Nevada and California, highlighting the cost of gasoline among other hardships the American people are dealing with. The president offered little in the way of short-term relief, though.

It didn't take any prompting from the audience to get Obama started on the subject of gas prices. He brought it up himself, again and again — as if to say no matter how far removed Washington may seem, he understands the challenges American drivers face.

House Republicans introduced a budget last week to deal with the country's long-term debt. That GOP plan calls for big tax cuts and a major overhaul of Medicare for future retirees. NPR's Scott Horsley reports on what the government's own workforce shows about how the Republican plan might work.

There's a tradition in which politicians try to hold back criticism of the president while he's on foreign soil. President Obama had not even stepped off Air Force One Wednesday when Speaker John Boehner released a letter listing pointed questions on the administration's plan for Libya.