Jackie Calmes New York Times

President Obama discussed maritime security, nuclear non-proliferation and disaster aid at an Asian summit on Friday, but just his presence on this resort island telegraphed his main message: that the United States is turning its focus to the booming Asia-Pacific region after a decade of preoccupation with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The last time the remote Australian city of Darwin played a significant role in American military planning was during the early days of World War II, when Gen. Douglas MacArthur used the port as the base for his campaign to reclaim the Pacific from the Japanese.

President Obama announced on Wednesday that the United States planned to deploy 2,500 Marines in Australia to shore up alliances in Asia, but the move prompted a sharp response from Beijing, which accused Mr. Obama of escalating military tensions in the region.

The down-to-the-wire partisan struggle over cuts to this year's federal budget has intensified concern in Washington, on Wall Street and among economists about the more consequential clash coming over increasing the government's borrowing limit.Congressional Republicans are vowing that before they will agree to raise the current $14.25 trillion fed...

US President Barack Obama, who is proposing his third annual Budget on Monday, will say that it can reduce projected deficits by $1.1 trillion over the next decade, enough to stabilise the nation's fiscal health and buy time to address its longer-term problems, according to a senior administration official.Two-thirds of the reductions that Obama wi...

William M. Daley will become the next White House chief of staff, Obama administration officials said Thursday. A senior executive with JPMorgan Chase and a former commerce secretary in the Clinton administration, Mr. Daley will bring an outsider's voice and decades of business experience to the West Wing.President Obama is expected to make the per...

US President Obama is seeking to rally anxious Democrats for the final two weeks of the midterm election campaign, traveling to the heart of the electoral battleground to urge them not to be discouraged -- "Don't let them tell you that change isn't possible" -- even as resurgent Republicans continued to expand their sights with the help of deep-poc...

The audience is getting into the act.For months President Obama has been delighting Democratic audiences with his metaphoric tale of how Republicans crashed the economy into a ditch, stood by as Democrats repaired it enough to drive again, and now want voters to give them the keys back.White House reporters quickly learned to be alert to Mr. Obama'...

President Obama discussed maritime security, nuclear non-proliferation and disaster aid at an Asian summit on Friday, but just his presence on this resort island telegraphed his main message: that the United States is turning its focus to the booming Asia-Pacific region after a decade of preoccupation with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The last time the remote Australian city of Darwin played a significant role in American military planning was during the early days of World War II, when Gen. Douglas MacArthur used the port as the base for his campaign to reclaim the Pacific from the Japanese.

President Obama announced on Wednesday that the United States planned to deploy 2,500 Marines in Australia to shore up alliances in Asia, but the move prompted a sharp response from Beijing, which accused Mr. Obama of escalating military tensions in the region.

The down-to-the-wire partisan struggle over cuts to this year's federal budget has intensified concern in Washington, on Wall Street and among economists about the more consequential clash coming over increasing the government's borrowing limit.Congressional Republicans are vowing that before they will agree to raise the current $14.25 trillion fed...

US President Barack Obama, who is proposing his third annual Budget on Monday, will say that it can reduce projected deficits by $1.1 trillion over the next decade, enough to stabilise the nation's fiscal health and buy time to address its longer-term problems, according to a senior administration official.Two-thirds of the reductions that Obama wi...

William M. Daley will become the next White House chief of staff, Obama administration officials said Thursday. A senior executive with JPMorgan Chase and a former commerce secretary in the Clinton administration, Mr. Daley will bring an outsider's voice and decades of business experience to the West Wing.President Obama is expected to make the per...

US President Obama is seeking to rally anxious Democrats for the final two weeks of the midterm election campaign, traveling to the heart of the electoral battleground to urge them not to be discouraged -- "Don't let them tell you that change isn't possible" -- even as resurgent Republicans continued to expand their sights with the help of deep-poc...

The audience is getting into the act.For months President Obama has been delighting Democratic audiences with his metaphoric tale of how Republicans crashed the economy into a ditch, stood by as Democrats repaired it enough to drive again, and now want voters to give them the keys back.White House reporters quickly learned to be alert to Mr. Obama'...