Editor's note: How would you rate President Obama's first 100 days? You'll get a chance to make your opinion known at 7 p.m. ET Wednesday on the CNN National Report Card.

Supporters say President Obama is tackling an aggressive agenda, while critics say he's leaving Republicans behind.

(CNN)  -- More than two years ago, a junior senator with presidential aspirations stood on the steps of Illinois' Old State Capitol in Springfield and warned of politicians who fail to live up to expectations.

"Too many times, after the election is over, and the confetti is swept away, all those promises fade from memory, and the lobbyists and the special interests move in, and people turn away, disappointed as before, left to struggle on their own," then-Sen. Barack Obama said as he announced his intentions to pursue the Democratic nomination.

Now, after 100 days in office, observers are asking the same of him: Has President Obama lived up to the expectations that candidate Obama created?

"What Obama has successfully done is keep his persona intact, which is a man of deep family values and a core moral center. And I think that people are learning to trust Obama that when he talks, he's not just articulate, but he's shooting straight," said presidential historian Doug Brinkley.

Obama won the White House campaigning on a message of hope and a promise of change. As he emerged a frontrunner for the Democratic nomination, he pushed an ambitious agenda, vowing to overhaul health care, education and energy policy.

But as the severity of the economic meltdown took hold and Obama moved into the White House, his inspirational rhetoric was injected with a sobering dose of reality. Obama encouraged patience and cautioned that, "change doesn't happen overnight."

In his first 100 days, Obama laid the groundwork for many of his campaign promises and faced criticism that he's trying to do too much.

"Nobody will ever be able to accuse him of being an idle man during his first 100 days," Brinkley said. "He's clearly showing himself to be a progressive in the tradition of Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, with the moral core of Jimmy Carter."

So far Obama is showing himself to be "the same guy that we had on the campaign trail," Brinkley said.

Given the items on his agenda, Obama is living up to expectations, CNN senior political analyst Bill Schneider said. "The public is patient and is not expecting to see a quick turnaround in the economy," he said.

"I count 10 major items -- jobs, health care, education, energy, housing, banks, automakers, deficit reduction, taxes and the war in Afghanistan. Plus, a pledge to take up immigration reform and climate change in the near future. Any one of those things would be a significant agenda," he said.

But some Republicans say the president has failed when it comes to his pledge to reach across the aisle.

After Democrats moved ahead with a $787 billion stimulus bill that garnered no Republican support in the House and just three Republican votes in the Senate, "That's when it became clear to me that all of this post-partisan talk and working down the middle and working together was a ruse," said John Boehner, House minority leader.

Obama's approval ratings remain high -- hovering around 65 percent. Those numbers are on par with where President Reagan and President Carter stood at this point in their presidencies. But one year later, their approval ratings dropped to about 40 percent.

Obama has maintained his popularity, Republican strategist and CNN contributor Mary Matalin said, but he's lost support from Republicans and some independents "because what he is not is what he was perceived to be in the campaign -- a centrist."

Schneider said Obama's agenda -- which includes massive government spending -- represents a challenge to the Republicans' core principle of smaller government. Republicans haven't responded to Obama's outreach, and "it's causing serious political damage to their

Question: What will he not be accused of?

Question: Who claims Obama did not act like a centrist?

Question: What was Obama's message?

Question: What was the main message of the compaign?

Question: What does the agenda represent?

Answer: idle man

Answer: Mary Matalin

Answer: hope and a promise of change.

Answer: hope and a promise of change.

Answer: overhaul health care, education and energy policy.

Summary:
As a candidate, Obama campaigned on a message of hope and change .
"Nobody will ever be able to accuse him of being an idle man," historian says .
GOP strategist says Obama not acting like the centrist he was during the campaign .
Obama's agenda represents a challenge to GOP principles, analyst says .


Editor's note: How would you rate President Obama's first 100 days? You'll get a chance to make your opinion known on at 7 p.m. ET Wednesday on the CNN National Report Card. Franklin D. Roosevelt had an ambitious first 100 days, CNN's Bill Schneider says. WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Senior White House adviser David Axelrod has called the 100-day benchmark an "odd custom, the journalistic equivalent of the Hallmark holiday.'' But where did the notion of a president's "First 100 Days" originate? With Franklin D. Roosevelt, another president who took office at a time of dire economic crisis. Roosevelt used his first 100 days to launch the New Deal, his plan to jumpstart the economy and put people back to work. Democrats had just won huge majorities in Congress and were ready to do the president's bidding. But, should Congress fail to act, Roosevelt would ask for "broad executive power to wage a war against the emergency, as great as the power that would be given to me if we were, in fact, invaded by a foreign foe," he warned in his inaugural address.  Watch what FDR's First 100 Days were like » Congress gave Roosevelt nearly nearly everything he wanted -- 15 major bills in the first 100 days, including the Emergency Banking Relief Act, the Public Works Administration, the Civilian Conservation Corps, the Tennessee Valley Authority, the National Industrial Recovery Act and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Congress also approved the Beer-Wine Revenue Act that anticipated the end of Prohibition. A White House adviser remarked that members of Congress had forgotten to be Republicans or Democrats. Comedian Will Rogers joked at the time that, "Congress doesn't pass legislation any more. They just wave at the bills as they go by." Nothing since has equaled FDR's first 100 days. But as Obama nears the symbolic benchmark, he may have had the boldest 100-day agenda since FDR. Still, Congress has passed only a few major bills, including the $787 billion economic stimulus package, the public lands preservation bill and an expansion of children's health insurance. So what has changed? Presidents can no longer count on the kind of bipartisan cooperation FDR got in 1933 -- even at a time of crisis.

Question: Who used his first 100 days to launch the New Deal?

Question: Obama took office during economic crisis, like who?

Question: Roosevelt quickly acted on how many major bills?

Question: Who launched the New Deal?

Question: Roosevelt quickly acted on 15 what?

Question: what did roodevelt

Question: Roosevelt took office during what type of crisis?

Question: who is barack obama

Answer: Franklin D. Roosevelt

Answer: Franklin D. Roosevelt,

Answer: 15

Answer: Franklin D. Roosevelt,

Answer: major bills

Answer: Roosevelt used his first 100 days to launch the New Deal,

Answer: economic

Answer: President

Summary:
Franklin Roosevelt used his first 100 days to launch the New Deal .
Roosevelt, like President Obama, took office during an economic crisis .
Roosevelt quickly acted on 15 major bills .
Obama has bold agenda, but little legislation to show for it .


Editor's note: Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow in constitutional studies at the Cato Institute, a libertarian public policy research foundation, and editor-in-chief of the Cato Supreme Court Review. Before joining Cato, he was special assistant/adviser to the Multi-National Force-Iraq and practiced law at Patton Boggs LLP and Cleary Gottlieb LLP. Earlier, Shapiro clerked for Judge E. Grady Jolly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Ilya Shapiro says the Sotomayor appointment is a case of identity politics rather than a choice on the merits. (CNN) -- In picking Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama has confirmed that identity politics matter to him more than merit. While Judge Sotomayor exemplifies the American Dream, she would not have even been on the short list if she were not Hispanic. She is not one of the leading lights of the federal judiciary, and far less qualified for a seat on the Supreme Court than Judges Diane Wood and Merrick Garland or Solicitor General Elena Kagan. To be sure, Sotomayor has a compelling story: a daughter of working-class Puerto Ricans raised in Bronx public housing projects, diagnosed with diabetes at 8, losing her father at 9, accolades at Princeton and Yale Law, ending up on the federal bench. Still, in over 10 years on the Second Circuit, she has not issued any important decisions or made a name for herself as a legal scholar or particularly respected jurist. In picking a case to highlight during his introduction of the nominee, President Obama had to go back to her days as a trial judge and a technical ruling that ended the 1994-95 baseball strike. Moreover, Sotomayor has a mixed reputation among lawyers who have practiced before her, some questioning her abilities as a judicial craftsman, others her erratic temperament, according to a piece by Jeffrey Rosen in The New Republic, which itself has come in for criticism. Such anecdotal criticism is to be taken with a grain of salt -- while Justice Antonin Scalia's bench-side manner is more vinegar than honey, even his detractors recognize his brilliance -- but it does need to be investigated. So, too, do certain statements she made in presentations at Berkeley and Duke, respectively, the former arguing that a Latina necessarily sees the law differently than a white man, the latter suggesting that, at least to some degree, judges make rather than interpret law. Again, this does not mean that Sotomayor is unqualified to be a judge -- or less qualified to be a Supreme Court justice than, say, Harriet Miers. It also does not detract from the history she would make as the first Hispanic Supreme Court nominee -- if you don't count Benjamin Cardozo, a descendant of Portuguese Jews. But a Supreme Court nomination is not a lifetime achievement award, and should not be treated as an opportunity to practice affirmative action. Ironically, it is race-based employment practices of another kind that will likely get this nomination in hottest water. Sotomayor was on a panel that summarily affirmed the dismissal of claims brought by firefighters, including one Hispanic, whose promotions were denied because they would be based on a (race-neutral) exam whose results didn't yield the "right" racial mix. Curiously, the Ricci v. DeStefano appellate panel issued a cursory "unpublished" opinion that failed to grapple with the complex legal issues presented in the case. Sotomayor's colleague José Cabranes, a liberal Democrat, excoriated the panel, without expressing a view on the merits of the case. Cabranes' dissent from the Second Circuit's decision not to rehear the case caught the Supreme Court's attention and, based on the oral argument, the court will probably reverse Sotomayor's panel when it rules on the case next month. iReport.com: Sotomayor 'the new face of America' We are thus likely to have the unusual scenario of a Supreme Court decision having a direct personal effect on a nominee's confirmation process, which will not only force Sotomayor onto the defensive but cost the president significant political capital. It will also show that Obama's calls for "empathy," echoed by Sotomayor's citing

Question: What does he say her life story is?

Question: On what is the  choice of Sotomayor based?

Question: What is the choice of Sotomayor based on?

Answer: a daughter of working-class Puerto Ricans raised in Bronx public housing projects, diagnosed with diabetes at 8, losing

Answer: identity politics

Answer: the merits.

Summary:
Ilya Shapiro: Choice of Sotomayor is based on identity politics, not merit .
He says her life story is compelling but she should be thoroughly vetted .
Shapiro: Sotomayor may suffer from failure to deal with issues in New Haven case .
He says Republicans should educate public about differences over the law .


Editor's note: In our Behind the Scenes series, CNN correspondents share their experiences covering the news. Here, CNN Anchor Rick Sanchez describes spending some time with day laborers for a report that will air on 'Out in the Open' tonight at 8 ET. CNN's Rick Sanchez, pictured center, visits a street corner where many people gather to seek manual labor jobs. PALISADES PARK, New Jersey (CNN) -- For four hours Friday morning, I joined about 200 immigrants -- legal and illegal -- at a day-laborer site at the corner of East Columbia Avenue and Broad Avenue in downtown Palisades Park, New Jersey. My goal was not to find a job; rather it was to see how day laborers go about finding one themselves. Dressed in jeans, running shoes and a short-sleeve shirt, I looked like one of them. I also carried over my shoulder a bag containing a hidden camera. Day laborer sites like this one have sprung up all over the country. The laborers -- mostly immigrants, mostly men -- come to them to find jobs in construction or masonry or painting or landscaping. Some communities encourage the formation of these sites. In others, they have become lightning rods of controversy. In Palisades Park, they have become fixtures. At the site I visited, the last thing the folks there needed was more competition for jobs, but they nonetheless welcomed me into their group. They gave me pointers about how to get a good job. "Always ask how much," one man told me in Spanish as he prepped me in the art of negotiating for a days' wage. Another said it's better to be paid by the day instead of the hour. That way you're assured of a decent payment even if the work is cut short or the job is finished early. The guys I met told me they come here seven days a week. They wait and wait and wait for work. "Sometimes there's no work, sometimes there is work. Not every day," one man said. It gets worse when winter comes. "When it's cold, there's no work," another told me. A good week, they said, is one where they get offered jobs on two days for about $90 a day. That's a weekly salary of $180. It's barely enough to put food on the table, but it's better than the alternative. Life in Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico, they said, offers little in the way of income -- about $5 a week for manual labor. "We don't have a choice but to try to save a little bit and go back to our country," a 23-year-old Guatemalan man told me. The routine is simple: Show up early and wait for hours until a prospective employer shows up, if one shows up. As more people flock to these sites the competition for jobs gets intense. "There are a lot of people ... and I mean a lot of people at the stop here. So you no longer get a lot of work," the Guatemalan said. On Friday, I was there for 3½ hours until I finally witnessed a job offer. It came from, ironically, another immigrant. He was from the Ivory Coast, Africa, new in America himself, and delighted to provide work for fellow immigrants. He was looking for someone to help him move furniture and other belongings. These immigrants -- the African with a job and the Latinos seeking work -- negotiated the job terms in broken English, with African and Spanish accents swirling in the air. "I need two," said the African employer referring to the number of workers. "Two dollars is not enough," responded the Guatemalan. After much arm waving and false starts, they eventually figured out what the other was saying and a deal was struck. Many of the men here have a love-hate relationship with the United States. They miss their home countries but feel compelled to stay

Question: They hope to earn enough to do what?

Question: Where did the people in Palisades Park come from?

Question: Laborers where say two days of work at $90 per day is good?

Question: Where is Palisades Park?

Question: What do the laborers work for in hopes of doing?

Question: Amount laborers in Palisades Park make a day?

Question: How much do these people make a day?

Answer: put food on the table,

Answer: New Jersey.

Answer: Palisades Park, New Jersey.

Answer: New Jersey

Answer: save a little bit and go back to our country,"

Answer: $90

Answer: $90

Summary:
Laborers in Palisades Park say two days of work at $90/day is a good week .
They hope to earn enough money to send some to family in other countries .
Some seem bitter about life in the U.S., but claim they stay for the money .


Editor's note: In our Behind the Scenes series, CNN correspondents share their experiences in covering news and analyze the stories behind the events. Here, CNN's Arwa Damon describes the hardships faced by Iraqi women. Her documentary airs this weekend on CNN and CNN International. Nahla's husband returned to Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein. He was killed in a bomb blast in 2007. BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- The pain here is choking -- it's a dark, suffocating sorrow. "They took my husband away in front of me. I found his body in the morgue a few days later. He had multiple bullet wounds and his eyes had been gouged out," one woman tells me, forcefully twisting a tissue in her hands as if it somehow could ease her agony and erase the chilling memory. She didn't want her story told, too afraid that she would meet the same fate as the man she loved. Her husband's body bore the "signs of torture." How many times has that phrase been used? It's such a common phrase it's as if what really happened gets glossed over: skin scraped off their bodies, fingernails ripped out, horrifying screams of pain before death. How many times have we reported death tolls from one horrific bombing or another and not been able to get across that these are lives that literally were blown apart? No matter how hard we in the media try, Iraq remains a nation filled with untold tragedies, the scope of which so often is overwhelming. And no matter how hard Iraqis try to shield themselves and those they love from the horrors here, more often than not they fail. Yet they keep fighting.  See the sacrifices of Iraq's women » Nahla works at a radio station and is one of those women. She's tall, slender, elegantly dressed and has a firm handshake. I look at her and it's nearly impossible to imagine what she's been through. "This numbers game, you always think that you are exempt from the numbers," Nahla tells me, referring to the daily death toll. "You're pained by them, but you are outside of them."  Watch Nahla's struggle to live on » On April 14, 2007, her world shattered. There was an explosion on a bridge in the capital and 10 people were killed. Her husband, Mohammed, was one of them. "And with it, I am motionless," she says. "Truly, life was in color and now it is in black and white. I feel like it is a game of musical chairs we used to play with others. ... One time you are hit with the chair; another time, someone else is. Now, my son and I are out of the game completely, completely." The image of the man she loved, tall and proud, is of a doctor who moved his family back to Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein because he believed his country needed him. He was a father who doted on their 6-year-old autistic son. Also etched into her memory is the image of his charred body, melted together with nine others, a twisted pile of black, scorched flesh. Yet Nahla's voice is calm as she speaks, only breaking at the very end of our conversation, when the pain, buried so deep, rises to the surface. She couldn't suppress her gut-wrenching dry sobs. I don't know how many times I have heard stories like hers after nearly five years of war here, and yet I still get chills. I can't stop being in awe -- nor can I stop looking at these women in amazement. Life in Iraq has forced people to confront horror that would leave many of us paralyzed.  Watch a divorcee forced to live amid squalor with her kids » Where do they find the strength to keep going? Some don't and choose to live out their lives as hollow shells, just waiting for this wretched existence to be over. But so

Question:
When was her husband killed?
When was one woman's husband killed?
Where is the woman from?
Who does Arwa Damon work for?
What does Arwa Damon reveal?
what did cnn reveal

Answer: 2007.

Answer: 2007.

Answer: Iraq

Answer: CNN

Answer: the hardships faced by Iraqi women.

Answer: hardships faced by Iraqi women.

Summary:
Mentally ill inmates in Miami are housed on the "forgotten floor"
Judge Steven Leifman says most are there as a result of "avoidable felonies"
While CNN tours facility, patient shouts: "I am the son of the president"
Leifman says the system is unjust and he's fighting for change .


Editor's note: In our Behind the Scenes series, CNN correspondents share their experiences in covering news and analyze the stories behind the events. Here, CNN's Jaime FlorCruz writes about press freedoms covering the Olympics. Journalists surf the Internet at the main Olympics press center in Beijing. BEIJING, China (CNN) -- For many overseas reporters now in Beijing, covering the Summer Games has turned into an Olympian task. We go through tedious security checkpoints to cover events and conduct interviews even as we deal with bureaucratic and linguistic barriers. But we face one particularly irritating issue: China's limits on Internet access. Despite Beijing's earlier promise to allow open reporting and unfettered access to information, Internet access remains erratic and unpredictable. "It's so counter-intuitive to find the Internet restricted, even if only selectively," one western journalist told me in Beijing. Last week, colleagues working in the Media Press Center faced a blank computer screen whenever they clicked on sites deemed sensitive to the Chinese authorities -- like Amnesty International and Falun Gong. That is attributed to China's sophisticated filter system, also known as the "Great Firewall." Why the paranoia? Pro-democracy activists, as well as advocates for Tibet independence and the spiritual group Falun Gong, have Web sites carrying information and views that the Chinese authorities deem "subversive." These sites reinforce Beijing's worst fears about cyberspace. China has groomed "Internet police" to patrol its networks and is constantly upgrading software to filter sites. Under Chinese law, using the Internet to "harm national interests," "spread rumors" or "leak state secrets" is punishable by stiff prison terms. Journalists and politicians alike cried "foul" but other critics turned their criticism on the International Olympic Committee (IOC.) When Beijing submitted its Olympic bid seven years ago, the Chinese promised: "There will be no restrictions on journalists in reporting on the Olympic Games." The U.S. Congressional-Executive Commission on China, which monitors human rights and rule of law issues in China, has compiled documents that show that International Olympic Committee agreements with the Chinese government, from the start, were based on abiding by China's domestic laws. Those laws, the commission says, give authorities a lot of "wiggle room" to define actions that might "endanger state security" or "disrupt social order." Chinese regulations, for example, include a "service guide" for the foreign media. That guide notes the regulations apply to "the coverage of the Beijing Olympic Games and the preparation as well as political, economic, social and cultural matters of China by foreign journalists, in conformity with Chinese laws and regulations." China's "Provisions on the Technical Measures for the Protection of the Security of the Internet," which went into effect in 2006, note the regulations are aimed at "promoting the sound and orderly development of the Internet and safeguarding the state security, social order and public interests."  Learn more how China monitors the Internet » Last week, foreign journalists discovered Internet access to Web sites such as Amnesty International or sites with Tibet in the address were still restricted. After a media uproar, China seems to have relented. Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said: "If there are some needs to adjust on the Chinese side, we will do that."  Amnesty International's site, for example, has been accessible since August 1. However, the site of Falun Gong remains taboo. Andrew Lih, a new media expert based in Beijing, says that "unblocked sites are still subject to the sophisticated keyword blocking system of the GFW (the Great Firewall of China.)" China has also tightened its grip on other media sources. The English version of Time Out, the monthly listings and entertainment guide, has been told to close. Freelance journalists are finding it hard to renew Chinese visas and accreditation for smaller, niche publications have become virtually impossible. Even a writer from Saveur, a food magazine, was denied a visa. Last Tuesday, relations between

Question: Where are the Olympics being held?

Question: What were IOC agreements based on?

Question: What did China promise journalists when it bid for the Olympics?

Question: What remains erratic?

Question: What is the name of the host city?

Answer: Beijing.

Answer: abiding by China's domestic laws.

Answer: allow open reporting and unfettered access to information,

Answer: Internet access

Answer: Beijing,


Editor's note: In our Behind the Scenes series, CNN correspondents share their experiences in covering news and analyze the stories behind the events. Here, Soledad O'Brien takes users inside a jail where many of the inmates are mentally ill.

An inmate housed on the "forgotten floor," where many mentally ill inmates are housed in Miami before trial.

MIAMI, Florida (CNN) -- The ninth floor of the Miami-Dade pretrial detention facility is dubbed the "forgotten floor." Here, inmates with the most severe mental illnesses are incarcerated until they're ready to appear in court.

Most often, they face drug charges or charges of assaulting an officer --charges that Judge Steven Leifman says are usually "avoidable felonies." He says the arrests often result from confrontations with police. Mentally ill people often won't do what they're told when police arrive on the scene -- confrontation seems to exacerbate their illness and they become more paranoid, delusional, and less likely to follow directions, according to Leifman.

So, they end up on the ninth floor severely mentally disturbed, but not getting any real help because they're in jail.

We toured the jail with Leifman. He is well known in Miami as an advocate for justice and the mentally ill. Even though we were not exactly welcomed with open arms by the guards, we were given permission to shoot videotape and tour the floor.  Go inside the 'forgotten floor' »

At first, it's hard to determine where the people are. The prisoners are wearing sleeveless robes. Imagine cutting holes for arms and feet in a heavy wool sleeping bag -- that's kind of what they look like. They're designed to keep the mentally ill patients from injuring themselves. That's also why they have no shoes, laces or mattresses.

Leifman says about one-third of all people in Miami-Dade county jails are mentally ill. So, he says, the sheer volume is overwhelming the system, and the result is what we see on the ninth floor.

Of course, it is a jail, so it's not supposed to be warm and comforting, but the lights glare, the cells are tiny and it's loud. We see two, sometimes three men -- sometimes in the robes, sometimes naked, lying or sitting in their cells.

"I am the son of the president. You need to get me out of here!" one man shouts at me.

He is absolutely serious, convinced that help is on the way -- if only he could reach the White House.

Leifman tells me that these prisoner-patients will often circulate through the system, occasionally stabilizing in a mental hospital, only to return to jail to face their charges. It's brutally unjust, in his mind, and he has become a strong advocate for changing things in Miami.

Over a meal later, we talk about how things got this way for mental patients.

Leifman says 200 years ago people were considered "lunatics" and they were locked up in jails even if they had no charges against them. They were just considered unfit to be in society.

Over the years, he says, there was some public outcry, and the mentally ill were moved out of jails and into hospitals. But Leifman says many of these mental hospitals were so horrible they were shut down.

Where did the patients go? Nowhere. The streets. They became, in many cases, the homeless, he says. They never got treatment.

Leifman says in 1955 there were more than half a million people in state mental hospitals, and today that number has been reduced 90 percent, and 40,000 to 50,000 people are in mental hospitals.

The judge says he's working to change this. Starting in 2008, many inmates who would otherwise have been brought to the "forgotten floor"  will instead be sent to a new mental health facility -- the first step on a journey toward long-term treatment, not just punishment.

Leifman says it's not the complete answer, but it's a start. Leifman says the

Question: Which news organization toured the facility?

Question: What is Judge Leifman fighting for in Miami?

Question: Where was CNN touring?

Question: Is there a special area where mentally ill prisoners are kept in Miami?

Question: Do they receive medical support?

Question: Are the inmates behind bars for serious crimes?

Question: Who is fighting for change?

Question: Where are mentally ill inmates held?

Question: What was Leifman's response?

Question: What is the forgotten floor?

Question: Which judge is presiding over the case?

Question: Who toured facility?

Question: In what city are mentally ill inmates housed on the "forgotten floor"?

Question: What does the patient shout during the CNN tour?

Question: Who is housed of the "forgotten floor"?

Question: Which judge stated that most are there as a result of "avoidable felonies"?

Question: What did a patient shout during the CNN tour of the facility?

Question: Who are housed in Miami?

Answer: CNN

Answer: justice and the mentally ill.

Answer: Miami-Dade pretrial detention facility

Answer: The ninth floor of the Miami-Dade pretrial detention facility

Answer: never got treatment.

Answer: face drug charges or charges of assaulting an officer

Answer: Judge Steven Leifman

Answer: Miami-Dade county jails

Answer: says about one-third of all people in Miami-Dade county jails are mentally ill.

Answer: The ninth

Answer: Steven Leifman

Answer: Soledad O'Brien

Answer: Miami

Answer: "I am the son of the president. You need to get me out of here!"

Answer: inmates with the most severe mental illnesses

Answer: Steven Leifman

Answer: "I am the son of the president. You need to get me out of here!"

Answer: mentally ill inmates


Editor's note: Ivan Watson is CNN's correspondent based in Istanbul, Turkey. The Bamiyan Valley is a visually and archaeologically stunning part of Afghanistan. The region hopes to build its tourism industry. (CNN) -- Thursday is "Chinese night" at the Hotel Silk Road in Afghanistan's Bamiyan province. Hungry guests sip cans of Coke and nonalcoholic beer and pick at a buffet that includes General Tsao's chicken, egg drop soup and slices of sweet green melon grown in nearby fields. When a vegetarian diner arrives, the hotel's Japanese owner, Hiromi Yasui, runs back to the kitchen to whip up a dish of spinach, garlic and steamed rice. "This is the most clean kitchen in Bamiyan," she boasts in heavily accented English, as she directs her staff of Afghan assistants in fluent Dari. Yasui proudly points to an electric dishwasher, perhaps the only one of its kind in this battle-scarred Afghan province. The Hotel Silk Road has been open for less than two years. The green concrete walls of this compound jar somewhat with the brown, mud brick architecture of Bamiyan Valley. But the hotel is probably the largest foreign private investment in Bamiyan's fledgling tourism industry since the overthrow of the Taliban eight years ago.  See photos of the Bamiyan Province » Aid workers say tourism is one of the greatest economic hopes for reviving this isolated, yet visually -- and archaeologically -- stunning part of Afghanistan, a region that has seen little infrastructure development over the last eight years, even though Bamiyan is one of the safest parts of the country.  Tour the Bamiyan Valley's caves » "The natural resources and cultural resources here are probably the single best place for economic development to happen, around revitalizing the tourism industry here," says Bob Thelen, the representative for the Aga Khan Development Network in Bamiyan. The nonprofit organization has been working with the government of New Zealand to distribute $1.2 million over a three-year period to develop eco-tourism as an industry in Bamiyan. Bamiyan first attracted widespread international attention in 2001, when Taliban militants spent weeks blowing up two giant statues of Buddha. For more than 1,500 years, these colossal figures -- one was 53 meters (174 feet) high, the other 35 meters (115 feet) -- stood like sentries overlooking this alpine valley. Today, the massive caves where the Buddhas once stood are huge, empty pockets carved into cliffs that dominate the countryside. Despite the loss of these archaeological treasures, the cave network of monasteries that honeycomb the cliffs, as well as Bamiyan's breathtaking mountains and alpine lakes, continue to attract a trickle of both Afghan and foreign tourists. Hotel Silk Road owner Yasui spotted Bamiyan's potential when she first traveled here as a photojournalist in 1996. "Before the war, this was a touristic place," she says. "More than 7,000 cars a day visited here." In the '60s and '70s, Afghanistan was a Central Asian stop on the Hippie Trail, a destination favored by hash-smoking Western visitors driving Volkswagen vans. But the Soviet invasion of 1979 plunged the country into a decades-long spiral of conflict. Bamiyan became the site of horrific massacres during the civil war of the 1990s and the subsequent rise of the Taliban. The Taliban's overthrow in 2001 seemed to open the door to new opportunity. In 2002, with the help of her Afghan husband and a Japanese investor who fronted hundreds of thousands of dollars, Yasui purchased a plot of land next to a bend in the river that runs through the valley. The couple then spent the next five years building their hotel. "I like Afghanistan, I like Bamiyan," Yasui explains. "[But in the past,] I didn't want to stay more than three days, because there was no shower, no place to sleep." Yasui's hotel opened in 2007. Rooms cost $100 a night, pricing them far out of the range of most Afghans. Guests must remove their shoes at the entrance and wear slippers, in accordance with Yasui's strict

Question: Where is the safest parts of Afghanistan?

Question: What once towered over the valley?

Question: name of safest parts of afganistan

Question: Where is the safest part of Afghanistan?

Question: where is colossal buddha

Question: Hotels have opened where?

Question: When was the Taliban overthrown?

Question: What draws tourist there?

Question: What is one of the safest parts of Afghanistan?

Question: Is it dangerous in Bamiyan ?

Question: What have been destroyed by Taliban there ?

Answer: Bamiyan

Answer: two giant statues of Buddha.

Answer: Bamiyan

Answer: Bamiyan

Answer: Bamiyan.

Answer: Afghanistan's Bamiyan province.

Answer: eight years ago.

Answer: the cave network of monasteries that honeycomb the cliffs, as well as Bamiyan's breathtaking mountains and alpine lakes,

Answer: Bamiyan

Answer: is one of the safest parts of the country.

Answer: two giant statues of Buddha.

Summary:
Bamiyan is one of the safest parts of Afghanistan .
Since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, hotels have opened in the region .
Colossal Buddha statues destroyed by the Taliban once towered over the valley .
Stunning terrain and a cave network of monasteries draw tourists .


Editor's note: Jack Cafferty is the author of a new book, "Now or Never: Getting Down to the Business of Saving Our American Dream." He provides commentary on CNN's "The Situation Room" daily from 4 to 7 p.m. ET. You can also visit Jack's Cafferty File blog. CNN's Jack Cafferty says "the pain won't go away" until Bush administration's misdeeds are addressed. (CNN) -- It doesn't go away by itself. Watergate "went away" when Richard Nixon resigned the presidency in disgrace and left town never to be heard from in an official capacity again. The Bush presidency is thankfully over...but the damage he and Dick Cheney did continues to press on the nerve of the American people like an impacted wisdom tooth. And until the questions surrounding arguably the most arrogant and perhaps most corrupt administration in our history are addressed, the pain won't go away. From Nancy ("Impeachment is off the table") Pelosi to President Barack ("I want to look forward, not backward") Obama, the country is being poorly served by their Democratic government. And on this subject President Obama is dead wrong. George W. Bush and his accomplices damaged this country like it's never been damaged before. And it's not just the phony war in Iraq or the torture memos that justified waterboarding. It's millions of missing emails and the constant use of executive privilege and signing statements. It's the secretive meetings with Enron and other energy executives and the wholesale firing of federal prosecutors. It's trying to get the president's personal attorney seated on the Supreme Court and that despicable Alberto Gonzales sitting in front of congressional investigators whining, "I don't remember, I don't know, I...etc." It's the domestic eavesdropping in violation of the FISA Court, the rendition prisons, and the lying. It's looking the other way while the City of New Orleans drowned and its people were left to fend for themselves. It's the violations of the Geneva Conventions, the soiling of our international reputation and the shredding of the U.S. Constitution. It's the handing over of $700 billion to the Wall Street fat cats last fall, no questions asked. Where is that money? What was it used for? It's the no-bid contracts to firms like Halliburton and Blackwater and the shoddy construction and lack of oversight of reconstruction in Iraq that cost American taxpayers untold billions. If the Republicans were serious about restoring their reputation, they would join the call for a special prosecutor to be appointed so that at long last justice can be done. It's too late for George W. Bush to resign the presidency. But it's not too late to put the people responsible for this national disgrace in prison. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Jack Cafferty.

Question: Which administration left a trail of misdeeds?

Question: Who should be investigated by a special prosecutor?

Question: What needs to be addressed?

Question: What did Cafferty say?

Question: Who is Cafferty?

Question: Who says the Bush administration has left behind a trail of misdeeds?

Answer: Bush

Answer: George W. Bush

Answer: Bush administration's misdeeds

Answer: "the pain won't go away"

Answer: author of a new book, "Now or Never: Getting Down to the Business

Answer: CNN's Jack Cafferty

Summary:
Jack Cafferty: Bush administration left behind a trail of misdeeds .
Cafferty: Obama is wrong to say he only wants to look forward, not back .
Cafferty: Damage will last until Bush-Cheney deeds are addressed .
Cafferty: A special prosecutor should be named to investigate .


Editor's note: Jack D. Hidary co-founded a technology company, Earth Web/Dice, and a financial research company, Vista Research. He works currently in the fields of clean energy technology and policy and is chairman of SmartTransportation.org which successfully pushed for the use of hybrid cars as taxis in New York City. Jack Hidary says the Cash for Clunkers program promotes fuel economy and safety while boosting the economy. NEW YORK (CNN) -- Our country is facing a daunting economic challenge this year and we must take steps to pull ourselves out of this ditch. One such program that has hit the ground running is Cash for Clunkers. It's helping consumers move beyond these hard times and has reignited a whole industry. Cash for Clunkers is now working in more than 10 countries around the world. In Germany, consumers have junked more than 1.2 million guzzlers in the last five months and significantly boosted the economy there. So we know that Clunkers programs get the job done. How many other government programs can you say that about? The Senate has joined the House in passing an additional $2 billion for Cash for Clunkers, allowing the program to move forward. This will bring additional buyers to the showroom. One key feature of the Clunkers program is that it is not just $3 billion of new money into the economy. It is injecting $21 billion -- since consumers must bring the rest of the money to pay for the new car. That is a lot of stimulus for the dollar. Cash for Clunkers is saving jobs up and down the auto supply chain: from dealers to assembly workers and parts markers. Dealerships alone lost 50,000 jobs in the last 18 months and would continue to shed jobs without this program. If you look at the new cars consumers are buying with the program, 45 percent are from Detroit's Big Three automakers. That is a lot of new sales for Ford, GM and Chrysler. Cash for Clunkers also helps autoworkers across the country. Let's remember that lots of the Toyotas and Hondas sold in the program are made by American workers right here in this country. They are in states such as Kentucky, Tennessee and Alabama. This program helps all American autoworkers, not just those up North. Some people ask why we should help the auto industry and not other industries in this same way. Cash for Clunkers actually helps all of us -- even those of us who do not participate in the program or work in the auto industry. First, the auto industry has so many connected jobs in real estate, finance, manufacturing and other industries, that is hard to separate it out. Second, one of the biggest drags on our economy is our trade imbalance. We import about $700 billion more than we export. That hurts our capital flows, credit and other key indicators. Guess what amounts to 50 percent of that trade imbalance? Oil. We use 21 million barrels of oil every day in the United States and import 62 percent of that -- mainly from countries that really don't like us. We use that oil mainly for transportation -- cars, SUVs, and other vehicles. Unless we scrap guzzlers at a faster rate, we will never reduce our oil consumption. Cash for Clunkers is a step in the right direction. It educates the consumer on how much they are paying for having a low-MPG car and encourages them to get into a more efficient vehicle. A family can save $750-$1,000 a year by jumping just 10 mpg in efficiency. Those savings will increase as gas prices go back up. Gas has already shot up from $1.50 a gallon to $2.60. Do you want to be stuck with a 10 mile-per-gallon guzzler when gas jumps back to $4 a gallon? Third, Cash for Clunkers saves lives. When you bring in a clunker that has no airbags, anti-lock brakes or other modern safety features and get a new car that does, you are protecting your family. Forty thousand people die every year on American highways and many more get serious injuries. You can reduce

Question: What can lead to more safety and save cash?

Question: Which program is boosting economy and auto industry?

Question: What did Jack Hidary say about the Cash for Clunkers program ?

Question: What is the name of the program?

Question: What does the  Cash for Clunkers program save?

Question: What is being saved?

Question: What is the reason as to why Cash for Clunkers is saving jobs?

Question: What will decrease dependence on foreign oil?

Answer: fuel economy

Answer: Cash for Clunkers

Answer: promotes fuel economy and safety while boosting the economy.

Answer: Cash for Clunkers

Answer: fuel economy and safety while boosting

Answer: jobs up and down the auto supply chain: from dealers to assembly workers and parts markers.

Answer: It's helping consumers move beyond these hard times and has reignited a whole industry.

Answer: Cash for Clunkers

Summary:
Jack Hidary: Cash for Clunkers program boosting economy and auto industry .
He says getting clunkers off the road will help decrease dependence on foreign oil .
He says switching to a more efficient car can improve safety and save cash .
Hidary: Cash for Clunkers is saving jobs up and down the auto supply chain .


Editor's note: Jameel Jaffer and Amrit Singh are attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union and co-authors of "Administration of Torture: A Documentary Record from Washington to Abu Ghraib and Beyond". Jaffer is counsel to the plaintiffs in ACLU v. Department of Defense, a lawsuit that has forced the release of more than 100,000 pages of government documents concerning the abuse of prisoners. Singh is lead counsel in the suit seeking disclosure of photographs of U.S. personnel abusing prisoners at overseas locations. Jameel Jaffer says the courts have ruled that refusal to disclose the abuse photos was unlawful. (CNN) -- Last week President Obama announced that he would suppress prisoner abuse photographs that he earlier said he would release. Given the president's stated commitment to government transparency, this reversal was both surprising and profoundly disappointing. The ACLU has sought release of these photos for almost six years. In October 2003, we filed a request under the Freedom of Information Act for records -- including photographs -- relating to the abuse of prisoners in U.S. detention facilities overseas. In 2005, a federal judge in New York ruled that the Bush administration's refusal to disclose the photographs was unlawful, and in 2008 a federal appeals court unanimously affirmed that decision. The Bush administration continued to suppress the photos, and now President Obama has vowed to do the same. The photos are a critical part of the historical record. The government has acknowledged that they depict prisoner abuse at locations other than Abu Ghraib, and it's clear that the photos would provide irrefutable evidence that abuse was widespread and systemic. The photos would also shed light on the connection between the abuse and the decisions of high-level Bush administration officials. As the district court recognized, the photos are "the best evidence of what happened." In explaining his change of heart, President Obama said that the release of the photos "would not add any additional benefit" to the ongoing public debate about the abuse of prisoners. But the ongoing public debate is rife with false claims, and the photos would expose the truth. The Bush administration told the public that abuse was aberrational and isolated, and many media organizations adopted this fraudulent narrative as their own. But even President Obama, in explaining his reversal, perpetuated the myth that the abuse of prisoners "was carried out in the past by a small number of individuals." President Obama's statement was meant to explain why the photos would not inform the public debate, but it only underscored why the release of the photographs is so important. Many Americans still believe that abuse took place in spite of policy rather than because of it. The truth is that senior officials authorized the use of barbaric interrogation methods that the U.S. once prosecuted as war crimes, and even abuse that was not expressly authorized was traceable to a climate in which abuse was tolerated and often encouraged. The photos would help tell this story. President Obama's other rationale for suppressing the photographs is that they would "inflame anti-American opinion and put our troops in greater danger," an argument that was repeatedly rejected by the courts when made by the Bush administration. Nobody, of course, wants to see anyone get hurt by the release of this or any other information. But the fundamental problem with the government's argument is that it lacks a limiting principle. Any photograph of prisoner abuse, civilian casualties in Afghanistan, or U.S. military operations in Iraq could be used to "inflame anti-American opinion"; indeed, the same is true of any news article that discusses (for example) torture, Guantanamo, or the CIA's secret prisons. iReport.com: Did Obama make the right decision on photos? To give the government the power to suppress information because it might anger an unidentified set of people in an unspecified part of the world and ultimately endanger an ill-defined group of U.S. personnel would be to invest it with a virtually unlimited censorial power. And by investing it with such power, we would effectively be affording the greatest protection from disclosure to records that depict the worst kinds of government misconduct. President Obama has inherited a legacy

Question: What would the release of photos show?

Question: What did they say the courts could not withhold?

Question: What did the ACLU  lawyers do?

Question: The lawyers claimed that courts have ruled what?

Question: What did the lawers say the photos would show?

Question: What do they say about the courts?

Question: What do the photos show?

Answer: provide irrefutable evidence that abuse was widespread and systemic.

Answer: abuse photographs

Answer: sought release of these photos

Answer: refusal to disclose the abuse photos was unlawful.

Answer: personnel abusing prisoners at overseas locations.

Answer: have ruled that refusal to disclose the abuse photos was unlawful.

Answer: prisoner abuse

Summary:
ACLU lawyers: We filed Freedom of Information request for abuse records .
They say courts have ruled that government can't withhold the photos .
Lawyers: Release of photos would show extent of prisoner abuse .
They say government shouldn't stop release because of possible negative reaction .


Editor's note: James Alan Fox is Lipman Family Professor of Criminal Justice and professor of law, policy and society at Northeastern University in Boston. Fox has written 16 books, including "Extreme Killing: Understanding Serial and Mass Murder" and is writing a book on school violence and security. James Alan Fox says perpetrators of mass shootings usually do not suddenly go berserk. (CNN) -- Massacre/suicide has become an all too familiar sight on the electronic pages of this and other news sites. But Tuesday's rampage in Samson, Alabama -- with a body count reaching to the double digits -- forces us to struggle mightily in search of plausible explanations and effective solutions. What could have prompted 28-year-old Michael McLendon to shoot to death his mother, grandmother, uncle, cousin and six others -- some of whom appear just to have been in the worst place at the worst time -- before turning the gun on himself? Mayor Clay King summarized the collective bewilderment in Samson in the immediate aftermath of the bloodshed. "I don't think anybody has any idea of what the motive is," he said. In just over a few moments of horror, this rural community of a couple thousand residents that hadn't had a single homicide in well over a decade, based on FBI crime reports, now had a multitude of questions about the will to kill. "Apparently something just snapped," speculated Wynnton Melton, mayor of Geneva, Alabama, the community just outside Samson where McLendon ended his own life after a police chase. Because McLendon chose suicide, the complete truth to his motivation may never be known. But from what can be learned from countless similar episodes in America and abroad, the crime may not be so unfathomable after all Contrary to the widely held belief of "snap judgment," perpetrators of mass murder -- and family annihilation in particular -- generally do not suddenly go berserk. If he was like most others who have walked in his shoes, McLendon would have contemplated his actions for some period of time, surely more than the few moments it took to load his assault rifle. With a list of enemies and a large arsenal, his planning would probably have reflected calm deliberation and cool determination. In decades of research in collaboration with my Northeastern University colleague Jack Levin, certain common characteristics of mass killers emerge time and time again. First, the perpetrators tend to have experienced a long history of frustration and failure, resulting in a diminished ability to cope with life's disappointments. Second, they typically externalize blame, frequently complaining that others didn't give them a decent chance. Without this, their destructiveness would instead be directed inward. In addition, these killers generally lack emotional support from friends or family. They are loners as well as losers. Lacking this support system and reality check, they come to perceive some precipitating event as being absolutely catastrophic. This most often involves some kind of major disappointment: the loss of a job, the breakup of a relationship or financial ruin, surely a major issue in today's economy. Finally, they need access to a weapon powerful and rapid enough to satisfy their intense need for revenge. Without much hope for a brighter tomorrow, these assailants often decide that life is not worth living; rather than just taking their own life in quiet solitude, they are eager for payback. It becomes their all-consuming mission to avenge, with a death penalty, against those who caused them to suffer -- in reality or perhaps only in their paranoid interpretation of events. Experiencing disappointment and failure so profound as to extinguish their desire to survive, most mass killers deliberately and methodically execute those closest to them, those they hold responsible for their troubles. There is little surprise, therefore, that mass murder overwhelmingly involves family members or co-workers, not total strangers. Although there certainly are many well-known episodes of random slaughter of complete strangers, these are more the exception than the rule. In the wake of extraordinary shooting sprees like the Alabama tragedy, calls for tighter gun control typically surface as a possible policy response

Question:
who raise questions about motive?
Who says they blame others?
What did the evidence say?
Where did the shootings happened?

Answer: FBI

Answer: the perpetrators

Answer: society

Answer: Samson, Alabama

Summary:
James Alan Fox: Alabama and Germany shootings raise questions about motive .
Evidence in many cases shows killers don't suddenly go berserk, he says .
Fox says mass killers react after losses and lack social support system .
He says they blame others, rather than themselves, for their failures .


Editor's note: Jane Velez-Mitchell is host of the HLN show, "Issues with Jane Velez-Mitchell," a topical event-driven show with a wide range of viewpoints.  Velez-Mitchell is the author of "Secrets Can Be Murder: What America's Most Sensational Crimes Tell Us About Ourselves." Jane Velez-Mitchell says tougher penalties are needed to keep sex offenders from committing more crimes. NEW YORK (CNN) -- Early last month, beautiful 25-year-old Laura Garza went missing. Her family holds out hope she is still alive. An aspiring dancer from Texas, Garza moved to New York City to pursue her career. On December 2nd, she went to the posh Manhattan nightclub Marquee to blow off some steam with her friend. Security video shows Garza leaving the club with convicted sex offender Michael Mele, according to the New York Police Department. NYPD officials confirmed that Mele then drove Garza about an hour away toward his apartment. Garza was reported missing the next day. New York state police searched Mele's apartment and court documents indicate officers observed apparent bite marks on Mele's hand and scratches on his back and shoulder. According to court records and state police, large pieces of carpet were missing from his apartment and days later, carpet pieces that seemed to match Mele's were found on the side of a nearby road. Search parties have been combing roads, woods, and swampland, and police divers searched for clues in a nearby lake, but the search has gone cold in recent weeks. Mele is in jail for violating probation and is a suspect, but he has not been charged in Garza's disappearance, according to state police. Laura Garza is still missing more than a month later. Her family has joined search efforts in New York and prays they will find her alive, but police are treating the case as a homicide. The worst part about this tragic story? It may have been preventable. Laura Garza had no idea she was leaving that club with a sex offender. After all, most of them look pretty normal. Few fit the Hollywood stereotype of the creepy guy wearing a trench coat and driving a white van. Laura Garza may have been unaware who she was with that night, but the legal system certainly knew him. Michael Mele previously pleaded guilty to four counts of sexual assault, including one count of masturbating in front of two women. And he was violating probation. And he had an outstanding warrant for allegedly exposing himself to a woman in a mall parking lot. Mele hasn't been convicted of anything in this case or charged in Garza's disappearance, but even if he is innocent, the larger question of how the criminal justice system deals with sex offenders remains a vital issue. In a sane world, Mele is not a free man on that night, able to allegedly target Laura Garza. But we don't live in a sane world. We live in a world where sexual assault is business as usual. Where's the outrage? The Garza case is a microcosm of a societal problem. As a nation, we must realize there is no such thing as a "minor" sexual offense -- because sex offenders often start small and graduate to more serious crimes. According to a 2003 Department of Justice study, 78 percent of imprisoned sex offenders had prior arrests and 28 percent had prior arrests for sex crimes. According to the same study, one quarter of men serving time for rape and 19 percent of those serving time for sexual assault had been on probation or parole at the time of the offense that landed them in prison. The formula is simple. Sex offenders start off by nabbing the easy prey -- committing the so-called "minor" sexual offenses like flashing random women, or the crimes Michael Mele committed. Then, after getting away with it or receiving a slap on the wrist, they become hungrier and develop into full-fledged predators. And it's only when they sink their teeth into their prey that the legal system finally brings down the hammer. But it

Question: What did Jane Velez-Mitchell say about sex offenders?

Question: Who is Jane Velez Mitchell?

Answer: from committing more crimes.

Answer: host of the HLN show, "Issues with

Summary:
Jane Velez-Mitchell: Sex offenders are often let out on the street too soon .
Victims pay the price for inadequate punishment and rehabilitation, she says .
Velez-Mitchell says we must treat all sex offenses as serious crimes .


Editor's note: Janet Tavakoli is president of Chicago-based Tavakoli Structured Finance and the author of "Dear Mr. Buffett: What An Investor Learns 1,269 Miles From Wall Street" (Wiley, 2009), a book about the causes of the global financial meltdown. Her company is a consulting firm for institutions and institutional investors on derivatives, the securitization of assets, and mergers and acquisitions. Her firm has done work for investment banks but not for Goldman Sachs; she worked for the company in the 1980s. Janet Tavakoli says Goldman Sachs' record profits were enabled by the taxpayer-funded bailout. CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) -- Goldman Sachs Group Inc. announced record earnings Tuesday of $3.44 billion for the second quarter of 2009. Goldman's stock price leapt 77 percent for the first half of 2009, and closed Tuesday at $149.66 a share. Without an ongoing series of front- and backdoor bailouts financed by U.S. taxpayers, most of Goldman's record profits would not have been possible. In April 2009, Goldman Sachs' CEO, Lloyd Blankfein, who received record salary and bonus compensation of $68.5 million in 2007, said that bonus decisions made before the credit crisis looked "self-serving and greedy in hindsight." Now, they look self-serving and greedy with foresight. Goldman set aside $11.4 billion for employee compensation and benefits, up 33 percent from last year. That's enough to pay each employee more than $390,000, just for the first six months of this year. In June, Goldman bought back its preferred shares, repaying $10 billion it received from the government's Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, and setting it free of limits on executive compensation and dividends. But pay is not the key issue. U.S. taxpayers deserve a large cut of the profits, not the chump change -- less than a half-billion dollars -- they got from preferred shares in the company and the relatively small amount they could get from warrants in its stock. U.S. taxpayers should insist that a large part of Goldman's revenues and profits belong to the American public. TARP money was just part of a series of bailouts and concessions that allowed Goldman to prosper at the expense of a flawed regulatory system. In March 2008, Goldman, a primary dealer in Treasury securities, was among the beneficiaries of a massive backdoor bailout by the Federal Reserve Bank. At the time, Henry Paulson, former CEO of Goldman Sachs, was treasury secretary. In an unprecedented move, the Fed created a Term Securities Lending Facility, or TSLF, that allowed primary dealers like Goldman to give non-government-guaranteed "triple-A" rated assets to the Fed in exchange for loans. The trouble was that everyone knew the triple-A assets were not the safe securities they were advertised to be. Many were backed by mortgage loans that were failing at super speed. The bailout of American International Group, or AIG, ballooned from $85 billion in September 2008 to $182.5 billion. Of that money, $90 billion was funneled as collateral payments to banks that traded with AIG. American taxpayers may never see a dime of their bailout money again, but Goldman saw plenty. Goldman may be the largest indirect beneficiary of AIG's bailout, receiving $12.9 billion in collateral, including securities lending transactions, from AIG after the government bailed out the insurance company. The key question is whether Goldman asked AIG to insure products that were as dodgy as the doomed deal from Goldman Sachs Alternative Mortgage Products exposed by Fortune's Allan Sloan in his October 16, 2007, Loeb Award-winning article: "Junk Mortgages Under the Microscope." If the federal government had not intervened and if AIG had gone into bankruptcy, Goldman probably would not have received its $12.9 billion from AIG. U.S. taxpayers and the American economy are owed some of the bailout money passed directly through AIG to Goldman. Wall Street firms also reaped trading windfalls when AIG needed to close out its derivative transactions. This was the most lucrative windfall business in the history of the derivatives markets. When AIG left money

Question: What did Goldman Sachs report?

Question: Who deserves a large share of what Goldman made?

Question: In what quarter did Goldman Sachs report record profits?

Question: Where was the record broken?

Question: What did she say?

Question: What was the record?

Question: Who broke the record?

Question: Goldman and Wall Street brought down what country's economy?

Answer: Group Inc. announced record earnings Tuesday of $3.44 billion for the second quarter of 2009.

Answer: U.S. taxpayers

Answer: second

Answer: CHICAGO, Illinois

Answer: Goldman Sachs' record profits were enabled by the taxpayer-funded bailout.

Answer: $3.44 billion for the second quarter of 2009.

Answer: Goldman Sachs Group Inc.

Answer: U.S.

Summary:
Tavakoli: Goldman Sachs reported record second-quarter profits .
She says Goldman and Wall Street helped bring down the U.S. economy .
Goldman reaped huge profit enabled by help it got in federal bailout, she says .
Tavakoli: Taxpayers deserve a large share of what Goldman made .


Editor's note: Jared L. Cohon is president of Carnegie Mellon University. Jared Cohon says Pittsburgh shows the power of education and innovation to revive an economy in crisis. (CNN) -- This week the international community is converging on my chosen hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, as heads of state gather for the G20 summit. Pittsburgh may seem like an unlikely choice for such a high-profile event, but a closer look shows why this city personifies the transformative power of education and research, and how the practical application of innovation can drive growth and improvement in quality of life the world over. Pittsburgh is a city that was largely written off as a rusted industrial center. But as heads of state from around the world tour the city this week, they will see running trails replacing former industrial railways and they will find green hotels and LEED-certified buildings rising where abandoned steel mills once stood. These changes are creating jobs, bringing new commerce and making Pittsburgh the most livable city in the United States, according to the Economist magazine. President Obama has praised our city as a "bold example" of the new green economy. A significant part of Pittsburgh's renaissance can be attributed to its two major research universities: Carnegie Mellon and the University of Pittsburgh. Having one such institution is an advantage in today's global economy; having two (very close to each other) puts Pittsburgh in a very small group of American cities. The shape of today's research university, with its heavy dependence on federally sponsored research, can be traced to World War II and its immediate aftermath, with a major boost a decade later when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik. But what began as a response to national security threats has turned into the engine of America's -- and the world's -- prosperity. As my colleague, the Dean of Carnegie Mellon's College of Engineering, Pradeep Khosla has written, the industries that have fueled economic growth have come out of the American research university enterprise. Biotechnology, nanotechnology, digital communications, and computers and software that have improved our quality of life and economic standing all have their origins in research universities. The companies that apply this research create jobs and fuel economic growth and wealth generation in ways that the world has never before experienced. According to one report prepared for the White House, 50 percent of the growth in the American economy in the last 40 years has been due to investments in research and development. Obviously, the private sector is a major driver of R&D, but federally funded research at universities throughout the United States plays a key role. The presence of a major research university does not, by itself, guarantee economic progress beyond the direct jobs that the university creates. Realizing the full potential of a university depends on effectively tapping into the brilliance and ingenuity of its faculty and students and the innovations they create. Technology commercialization -- shaping a bright idea into a commercially successful product -- has been described as a "contact sport". It requires an innovative and entrepreneurial campus culture and an ecosystem surrounding it that supports technology-based economic development with facilities, money and people who know how to take ideas to the market. More than a decade ago, Carnegie Mellon embraced Pittsburgh's economic development as one of its institutional strategic priorities. We changed our technology transfer policies to make it easier and faster for our faculty and alumni to create local companies based on our technology. We joined forces with the University of Pittsburgh and partnered with state and local government and industry to strengthen the entrepreneurial ecosystem on which we all rely. Today, there are more than 200 Pittsburgh companies commercializing Carnegie Mellon technology. Our economic development efforts have also included company attraction. With state and local government support, we built a building on campus for global technology companies, which see value in being so close to our faculty and students. There are now hundreds of new jobs in that building, created by Intel, Google and Apple. Disney set up their first research lab here, but they're across the street -- the new building is full. The success of the American research

Question: what played a key role

Answer: federally funded research at universities

Summary:
Jared Cohon: Pittsburgh economy has been reinvented through innovation .
He says universities have played a key role in economic revival .
He says G-20 meeting focuses attention on role of universities .
Cohon: Nations must focus on key role of education and research .


Editor's note: Jay S. Winuk, co-founder of MyGoodDeed, is the brother of Glenn J. Winuk, an attorney and volunteer firefighter and EMT who died in the line of duty when the South Tower of the World Trade Center collapsed on September 11, 2001. This week Glenn was posthumously honored with the 9/11 Heroes Medal of Valor from the United States of America. Jay Winuk says September 11 is best observed as a day of service to others. NEW YORK (CNN) -- The upcoming eighth anniversary of the attacks of September 11 raises a compelling question for millions of Americans: How should we best observe this uniquely tragic day in our nation's history? Surely, it should not be a holiday. This is no time for days off from work and three-day weekends to enjoy barbeques and white sales. No, September 11 is a day for reflection, and its historical and emotional significance should not lessen with time or be diminished in any way. It is a day to focus on the substantial lessons learned. I'm a 9/11 family member. My brave brother, Glenn J. Winuk, was a partner at a large law firm, Holland & Knight, located two blocks from the World Trade Center. For almost 20 years Glenn was also a volunteer firefighter and an emergency medical technician. When the Towers were hit, Glenn borrowed rescue equipment and ran from safety toward the South Tower to participate in the rescue effort. He died when the South Tower collapsed. Soon after the attacks, I co-founded, with my friend David Paine and other 9/11 family members and friends, a grassroots initiative called MyGoodDeed. Our goal? To establish the anniversary of September 11, 2001 as an annually recognized national day of service. Our widely shared view was that there would be no better way to pay tribute to those thousands lost and those millions who rose in spontaneous, compassionate and effective service to help rebuild our spirit and our nation in the aftermath of the attacks. Supported by all the leading 9/11 family, survivor and volunteer organizations, the initiative has since attracted the attention and participation of millions of people around the world, from all 50 states and more than 170 nations and territories. People choose whatever form of kindness and service they'd like to perform each 9/11. And with acts large and small, they are making a real difference in the lives of people and communities in need. Some make donations -- clothing, books, eyeglasses, money, blood. Some help repair schools and parks and beaches. Some send care packages to our troops overseas, or work in soup kitchens. Some read to the blind, or visit the elderly. This Sunday, retired New York Giants great George Martin is leading a fundraising walk from New York to New Jersey to raise money for the health care of thousands of rescue and recovery workers of Ground Zero who are ailing as a result of their service after 9/11. There is no limit to what people can do to participate. Of note is that just like those who died in the horror of that September morning, those who engage in service on 9/11 represent a wide range of political preferences, ages, races, religions, economic status and geographic locations. Unlike as suggested recently by some conservative journalists and bloggers, this 9/11 service phenomenon is not new and is certainly not about some kind of liberal agenda intended to diminish the meaning of September 11 or redefine it for political gain. Indeed, the notion of engaging in service to mark each 9/11 began during the Bush administration, and has been widely supported by both sides of the aisle on Capitol Hill. In fact, in 2004 the U.S. Congress unanimously passed House Congressional Resolution 473, saying the anniversary of September 11 should be a national day of service and compassion. In April of this year, President Obama signed the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act, substantially bi-partisan legislation that included a provision formally establishing September 11 as a "National Day of Service and Remembrance." The 9/11 community largely applauded this major step forward. And as I watched the president sign this legislation

Question: Does President Obama support 9/11 as a national day of service?

Question: who is jay winuk

Question: What day should you not skip work or go shopping?

Question: Which day in September is recognized as a national day of service?

Question: On which day in September do people choose to do acts of kindness?

Answer: signed the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act, substantially bi-partisan legislation that included a provision formally establishing September 11 as a "National

Answer: co-founder of MyGoodDeed,

Answer: September 11

Answer: 11

Answer: 11,

Summary:
Jay Winuk: 9/11 has been recognized as a national day of service .
He says it's not a day to skip work or go shopping .
He says people choose to do acts of kindness, large or small .
Winuk: There's no political agenda, Bush and Obama have supported it .


Editor's note: Jeffrey D. Sachs is director of the Earth Institute and a professor at Columbia University. He also serves as special advisor to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on the U.N. Millennium Development Goals. From 2002 to 2006, he was director of the U.N. Millennium Project. He is president and co-founder of Millennium Promise, a nonprofit organization aimed at ending extreme global poverty and achieving the Millennium Development Goals. He has twice been named among the 100 most influential leaders in the world by Time magazine and is the author of the bestsellers "Common Wealth" and "The End of Poverty." Jeff Sachs says the G-20 countries must take steps to cushion the poor from the financial crisis. (CNN) -- The G-20 meeting in London, England, on April 2 will be watched by the entire world with urgency and with a yearning for hope, vision and programmatic clarity. The preparatory work is not adequate. The G-20 discussions do not move sufficiently beyond financial regulation. I would like to suggest the following main points for G-20 leadership in the global recovery. The G-20 needs to combine stimulus, economic development and sustainability: stimulus to get the world recession reversed, development to ensure that all of the world (not merely the rich countries or the G-20) shares in the benefits, and sustainability to address the world's grave risks of climate change, water stress and loss of biodiversity. The world's 3 billion poor, especially the 1 billion poorest of the poor, are suffering powerful and destabilizing blows from the crisis, and these will get worse and threaten global security unless there is specific attention and action. The G-20 cannot limit its focus to regulating the financial sector, reforming the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, avoiding protectionism and reciting the measures that individual countries are taking. This would leave the world gasping for direction and hope. The G-20 must offer a vision that is big enough to quell global fears and action bold enough to protect the desperately poor while guiding the cooperative decision-making of the world's economic authorities. The G-20 must push forward based on real policy coordination. The world does not have a system of effective cooperation. The United States, for example, does not engage in comprehensive and deep coordination with other countries. The poor countries, with half the world's population, and the poorest countries, with roughly one-fifth of the world's population, have not been brought into the equation. The G-20 package for stimulus should include: First, fulfillment by all countries of stimulus measures already announced and a commitment to undertake new joint stimulus measures, especially priority public outlays on infrastructure, the social safety net and sustainable energy, as may be needed during the coming years. Second, establishment of a high-level G-20 coordination group, backed especially by China, the European Union, Japan and the United States, to work full-time on coordinating monetary, fiscal and financial policies for stimulus and long-term recovery. Such cooperative macroeconomic programming does not now exist. Third, increased currency support extended from the world's five major central banks (the U.S. Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan and the People's Bank of China) for emerging market economies facing the loss of loans from international banks (e.g. Eastern Europe). The Fed's currency swap lines to Brazil, Mexico, Korea and Singapore last fall played an important stabilizing role. The other central banks can and should do more, as can the Fed vis-à-vis other countries. Fourth, a G-20 commitment to gradual and orderly currency readjustments to help rebalance the world's financial and trade flows. The Asian currencies should gradually appreciate against the euro, which in turn should appreciate gradually against the dollar. Squabbling about bilateral rates between the dollar and Chinese renmenbi should be put to rest. G-20 actions for the poor should include: First, establishment of an urgent special food security program, which would make grants to low-income, food-deficit countries (including Africa, Haiti, Afghanistan and elsewhere

Question: What group must do more than just financial regulation

Question: What number of poor are suffering from the global economic crisis

Question: Who is meeting?

Answer: The G-20 discussions

Answer: especially the 1 billion poorest of the

Answer: G-20

Summary:
Jeffrey Sachs: When G-20 meets, it must do more than just financial regulation .
He says the world's 3 billion poor are suffering from global economic crisis .
Sachs: World needs food security plan for poor nations with aid from U.S., others .
He says health and clean energy should be key priorities for the G-20 .


Editor's note: Jeffrey Wright is a stage and screen actor who has won a Tony, Emmy and Golden Globe. Wright has appeared in "Angels in America," "Basquiat," "The Manchurian Candidate," "Syriana," "W." and "Casino Royale." Actor Jeffrey Wright says a nation that put a man on the moon should be able to take race out of policing. NEW YORK (CNN) -- President Obama expressed what many Americans feel regarding the recent arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis "Skip" Gates -- that the Cambridge, Massachusetts, police responded "stupidly." Obama is catching some flak for that, but I applaud him for having had the courage to speak his heart and mind. I wonder if the president himself has ever experienced the blunt end of racial profiling, or if he personally knows of anyone other than Professor Gates who has. Among African-American males in this country, the small minority is those who have not or do not. Did some prior experience or knowledge inform his response about the Gates incident? I have no facts to back this up, but, to me, it seemed personal. If it was, I understand. I was arrested last July in Shreveport, Louisiana, outside a bar where dozens of members of the cast and crew of the movie "W." and I had gathered to celebrate the end of filming. There was no bar brawl as widely reported -- nor even a pre-election political argument. Nine police cars and a fire engine responded; seven people were arrested. Two of the seven suffered minor head wounds at the hands of the Shreveport police. Josh Brolin and I were pepper sprayed by cops, and while face down in the street, I was made to feel the business end of a Taser. The truth of what led to the whole morass has never been accurately reported. I was asked to leave the bar by a white female bartender who took exception to a comment I made. As with Professor Gates, the police in my case backed unquestioningly the suspicion of a white woman that the black man she accused must be guilty of something. Once that die of accusation was cast, a ghost of racial bias, misperception, and the potential abuse of police authority was set free to make mischief. The bar was one of two places in downtown Shreveport that serves food after 10 p.m. A few nights before my arrest, I had gone there very late after work to grab a bite to eat. It was before closing, and there were a few customers and employees inside, but the door was locked. I knocked and asked, over the music streaming from inside, if I might buy a small pizza. The bartender insisted that they were closed. "Whatever," I said with a shrug of resignation and walked back to my hotel room. Four nights later and in a festive mood, we gathered at this same establishment. Upon seeing the bartender who had a few nights before told me that the place was closed, I asked her for a drink, which she poured. I quipped, "Ah you're going to serve me tonight!" At that, she pulled the drink away and told me that I had to leave. I asked if she was kidding. She went on to say that if I didn't leave, she would call the police. As I stepped away to tell friends what had happened, a call was made to Shreveport police. Two cops, the first of many, arrived in minutes, and I was physically escorted outside although neither of them had the curiosity to ask what had transpired before they arrived. A mess ensued. To their credit, Josh and the others arrested followed me outside with a few others from our group. The cops physically released me and were seeming to be ready to let me go altogether when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw another member of the film crew driven headlong into the sidewalk by two newly arrived cops. Josh verbally objected to their actions, at which point

Question: who catches flak for remarks on professor's arrest?

Question: who applauds obama

Question: who applauds Obama for having courage to speak his mind?

Question: who caught flak?

Question: What does Wright applaud Obama for?

Answer: Obama

Answer: Jeffrey Wright

Answer: Actor Jeffrey Wright

Answer: Obama

Answer: having had the courage to speak his heart and mind.

Summary:
Jeffrey Wright: President Obama catches flak for remarks on professor's arrest .
Wright applauds Obama for having courage to speak his mind .
Actor says he too was victim of arrest in which race played a part .
He says political leaders need to address race and policing .


Editor's note: Jim Rogers is chief executive officer of Charlotte, North Carolina-based Duke Energy, which generates much of its power from coal-burning plants and is making investments in clean energy technology in China. Jonathan Lash is the president of the World Resources Institute. Ming Sung is Asia Pacific representative of the Clean Air Task Force.

Jim Rogers, CEO of coal-burning Duke Energy, wants the U.S. to join with China against greenhouse gases.

(CNN) -- There is a lot of rhetoric on Main Street and in our nation's Capitol these days portraying China as a job-stealing polluter whose economy is growing at the expense of the United States.

But business leaders and policy advocates who work in China see a different picture: a China that is investing heavily in innovation and determined to win the global race to supply its citizens and the world with clean energy technologies.

China is the largest producer of solar water heaters, with 50 percent of the world's production and 65 percent of all installations.

It produces 30 percent of the world's photovoltaic sets and is installing wind turbines faster than any other nation.

China's expanding middle class is increasingly mobile, with more than 50 million electric bicycles, and China is developing the first mass-produced plug-in hybrid electric car.

The country has 14 nuclear power plants under construction and plans to start 10 more next year.

Although there has been much talk about creating "green jobs" in the United States, China leads the world with its massive investment in energy efficiency and renewable power.

China's growth has come with a heavy price: pollution.

China produces 80 percent of its electricity from coal and now leads the world in greenhouse gas emissions and other pollutants.

Dirty air and contaminated water affect many millions of Chinese and are two of the nation's most serious problems.

Although the United States has made great strides in reducing pollution in recent decades, we are still the world's second largest source of greenhouse gas emissions, with emissions per capita four times higher than China's.

Our nation is also heavily dependent on coal and imported oil. We are moving ahead in solar energy, wind and efficiency, but we are doing so in a fragmented, state-by-state approach that reflects our democracy and regulatory structures.

By forging relationships with leading Chinese state-owned and private energy and technology companies, U.S. companies -- at times working with the federal government -- can create a "ladder of cooperation" with the Chinese to lead the world forward on climate change.

We will not climb this ladder overnight but one rung at a time.

With the United Nations' climate change conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, just two months away, it is imperative that our two nations establish a more trusting, give-and-take relationship upon which good business partnerships are built.

The World Resources Institute, the Clean Air Task Force and Duke Energy have started this work, with great prospects for results.

WRI, an independent, non-partisan environmental research organization, is working with China to calculate its greenhouse emissions as a key part of its next national Five-Year Plan to advance its economy.

The intent is to develop reportable and verifiable measures in the plan that could facilitate China's participation in an international climate agreement.

Duke Energy recently announced a memorandum of understanding with the China Huaneng Group, China's largest power generator, and the ENN Group, one of the nation's largest private energy companies.

The focus of these efforts is to cooperatively develop and commercialize an array of clean energy technologies.

The Clean Air Task Force -- an environmental organization advancing clean technology in the United States and China -- is pivotal to Duke Energy efforts.

It has created a network of a dozen Chinese and U.S. companies to develop joint business ventures to build advanced, low-carbon coal technology in China and around the world.

This network is expanding to include an array of other renewable and clean energy technologies.

Historically, Americans have known little about China and, at times, are

Question:
who are the biggest polluters
what do the authors want
Who should cooperate?

Answer: China

Answer: the U.S. to join with China against greenhouse gases.

Answer: United States and China

Summary:
Authors urge 80 percent less greenhouse gas by 2050 .
They want big polluters U.S., China to cooperate .
Goal: Create path for Chinese participation in climate agreement, authors say .
They say Clean Air Task Force to build low-carbon coal technology in China .


Editor's note: John Feehery worked as a staffer for former House Speaker Dennis Hastert and other Republicans in Congress. He is president of Feehery Group, a Washington-based advocacy firm that has represented clients including the News Corp., Ford Motor Co. and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He formerly was a government relations executive vice president for the Motion Picture Association of America. John Feehery says Al Franken's victory gives liberal Democrats a dominant position in Washington (CNN) -- The metric system is the kind of thing that you can expect from the 60-vote filibuster-proof majority Democrats now have in the United States Senate. After the Watergate scandal in 1974, Democrats trounced Republicans in the mid-term elections, getting 61 seats in the Senate and 291 in the House. In the Senate, they adjusted the rules to make it harder for Republicans to filibuster (reducing the magic number from 67 to 60 to invoke cloture, which ends debate). In the House, they passed all kinds of reforms to take power away from senior members and give it to junior members. And Congress mandated that the American people embrace the metric system. The metric system idea never really caught on, and although the pain of Watergate afflicted Republicans for another two elections, they eventually pulled themselves out of their deep hole, with some good ideas and a charismatic leader, who promised to restore America to greatness. Democrats have once again reached the magic number of 60, as Norm Coleman finally threw in the towel against the one-time joke writer for Saturday Night Live, Al Franken. Republicans have little reason to laugh, though, as they look at their diminished ranks and wonder how they have put themselves in such a weakened position. It was only four-and-a-half years ago that the GOP was on the top of the world, and some of their more smug strategists were confidently predicting a permanent Republican majority. This is a good time for such self-reflection. Republicans lost three top-notch senators in the last election -- Norm Coleman, Gordon Smith and John Sununu -- who lost not because they were bad senators, or because they had scandals, or because they had lost touch with constituents. All three lost because they were Republicans. In other words, the brand killed them. And if you look at the latest polls, the GOP brand hasn't gotten any better in the last six months. In fact, according to Gallup, even 38 percent of Republicans have a negative view of the Republican Party. But let's not throw in the towel yet, my Republican friends. Just as in the mid-1970s, when Democratic overreach led to a Republican resurgence, the house that Franken has built will inevitably collapse on its own leftward-self. A new Gallup poll shows that the American people are starting to catch on that Democrats are pushing the country to a place that it doesn't want to go. The poll "finds a statistically significant increase since last year in the percentage of Americans who describe the Democratic Party's views as being "too liberal," from 39 percent to 46 percent. This is the largest percentage saying so since November 1994, after the party's losses in that year's midterm elections." It is no surprise that Americans would have that impression of Democrats in the White House and in Congress. When they passed a so-called stimulus bill that Republicans branded as pork-filled, they lost their credibility on fiscal responsibility. When the president assumed control over General Motors, dictated terms to Chrysler, and then refused to allow some banks to pay back their TARP loans, independent voters grew nervous about the government's stepped-up intervention in the private sector. And last week, when Democrats passed a climate change bill that Republicans insist will sharply raise energy prices for middle-class families, moderate Democrats started to jump ship. In fact, 44 Democrats defied intense pressure from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and voted no. Democrats are now making plans to intervene in the health care marketplace, with some liberals insisting on a government-run

Question:
What does Feehery do?
Feehery says what about Democrats?
Where are liberals dominant?

Answer: president of Feehery Group,

Answer: a dominant position in Washington

Answer: Washington

Summary:
John Feehery: The Republican Party is struggling, but isn't dead .
He says there are five good reasons to think the GOP will bounce back .
U.S. system is designed to provide checks on the majority party, he says .
Republicans are in position for creative thinking about ideas, Feehery says .


Editor's note: John Feehery worked for former House Speaker Dennis Hastert and other Republicans in Congress. He is president of Feehery Group, a Washington-based advocacy firm that has represented clients that include News Corp., Ford Motor Co. and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He formerly was a government relations executive vice president for the Motion Picture Association of America. John Feehery says he's proud Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize, but now the president needs to earn it. WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Usually, when a president wins the Nobel Peace Prize, it is uniformly seen as a positive development for America and for the world. Both opponents and allies tend to celebrate the fact that an American president actually got recognized by a bunch of Norwegians for something he achieved. But with Barack Obama, who surprisingly picked up his first Nobel Prize on Friday, the reaction was not altogether positive from either the left or the right. You would expect that conservatives would raise questions about the president's award. Conservatives raise questions about everything the president does. But liberals also joined in. Mickey Kaus of Slate said that the president should say thanks, but no thanks. "Turn it down! Politely decline. Say he's honored but he hasn't had the time yet to accomplish what he wants to accomplish." Liberal columnist Richard Cohen wrote a mocking column, comparing Obama's award to a fictional award given to Sarah Palin for promising to "read a book someday." We are all glad that Norway loves Obama, but come on. Let's get serious. I am reminded of when Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf decided to retire the jersey of longtime White Sox player Harold Baines. It was a little premature for Baines to get his uniform retired when he himself was playing for another team. (Baines played a couple more years, surely the only instance where a player's uniform was retired before the player was.) Awarding Obama the Nobel Peace Prize is similarly premature. In fact, the White House seemed as surprised as anybody about the gesture. I imagine that when Obama first picked up the line, he thought it was a crank call. "I won what?" he must have exclaimed. But it is no joke. It seems that President Obama won his first Nobel Peace Prize, for, well, being President Obama. Just the very idea of a President Obama is enough to make the Nobel Selection Committee swoon. The president said he was humbled by this award. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, he has much to be humble about. When it comes to peace, it is hard to see what notable accomplishments have been achieved thus far in the Obama presidency. That is not a slap at him. Peace takes time. It took John Hume and David Trimble about 30 years of really hard and dangerous work in Northern Ireland before they got a Nobel Peace Prize. And despite all of that hard work, peace and reconciliation is still elusive in that region. Mr. Obama hasn't even been able to get a peace deal between Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, who continue to snipe at each other over the health care public option and Afghanistan. Peace hasn't exactly broken out in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Israel, or Iran either. Nobel Prizes usually go for some fairly notable accomplishments. Nelson Mandela spent much of his life protesting apartheid and serving a prison sentence. He is a man who deserved a peace prize. Mikhail Gorbachev allowed the Soviet Union to collapse without much of a whimper. That was an accomplishment that deserved a peace prize. But what exactly has President Obama done to deserve such an award? And if he actually does something in the future, does that mean he gets another one? Apparently, the voting on the peace prize started shortly after the president was sworn in. Perhaps he is getting the peace prize because of his inaugural address. Yep, a lot of people came to that speech, and peace mostly reigned on that day (except for those people with tickets to the Inauguration who got stuck

Question:
Who was elected president?
who won nobel prize?
Whose  win surprised the right?

Answer: Dennis Hastert

Answer: Obama

Answer: Barack Obama,

Summary:
John Feehery: Obama's Nobel Prize win surprised the right, the left, Obama himself .
Hard to see any notable achievements for peace by Obama so far, Feehery says .
He says Obama won because he was elected president and wasn't George Bush .
Obama voters should share the prize, because they elected him, Feehery says .