Remark

Eric Kronfeld, president and chief operating officer of PolyGram's domestic music division, was released from his contract Tuesday--five months after making an allegedly racist remark in a court deposition. Kronfeld, who oversaw legal affairs and human relations for PolyGram's U.S. labels, suggested in the Oct. 17 deposition that if record companies were prevented from hiring people with criminal records, no African Americans would be working in the music industry.

WASHINGTON - A defiant President Obama dismissed as a "sideshow" the controversy over his administration's handling of last year's armed assault in Benghazi, Libya, accusing critics of trying to make political hay from the deaths of four Americans. "We dishonor them when we turn things like this into a political circus," Obama told reporters Monday. Obama's angry remarks were his first since House hearings last week about the September 2012 attack on the U.S. facility in Benghazi, and his first public reaction to fresh evidence indicating the White House weighed political calculations as it released information in the days that followed.

Mitt Romney, who just two weeks ago was the Republican Party's standard-bearer, seen by many as the all-but-elected president of the United States, has turned into a punching bag for fellow Republicans looking to distance themselves from his controversial “gifts” remark. “What the president's campaign did was focus on certain members of his base coalition, give them extraordinary financial gifts from the government, and then work very aggressively to turn them out to vote,” Romney said during a call with campaign donors Wednesday . Whether it's an instance of politicians smelling blood in the water as the party, following Romney's defeat, finds itself without a figurehead, or genuine outrage, a number of Republicans have eagerly castigated their former nominee.

Eleven minutes and 22 seconds of what was once expected to be a major half-hour string quartet is not, quite yet, a comeback. But a little more than 11 minutes of very good music by a wonderful composer, loved by audiences and performers alike and simply one of the great musical forces of our time, is a start. What's to be done about Osvaldo Golijov other than wait? Probably nothing. His "Qohelet," which the St. Lawrence String Quartet played at Irvine Barclay Theatre on Sunday afternoon, had its first performance at Stanford University in 2011.

President Obama dismissed Republican claims that Vice President Joe Biden had a nefarious intent when he said the GOP would “put y'all back in chains” at a campaign stop in Virginia on Tuesday, telling People magazine in an interview his remarks had to be considered in context. Rather than being about “division and hate and anger,” as Mitt Romney said of Biden's remarks, the president said his running mate was saying only that "you, consumers, the American people, will be a lot worse off if we repeal these [Wall Street reform]

President Obama's comments about California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris' good looks continue to generate controversy. “You have to be careful to, first of all, say she is brilliant and she is dedicated and she is tough, and she is exactly what you'd want in anybody who is administering the law, and making sure that everybody is getting a fair shake,” said Obama during a California fundraiser on Thursday. “She also happens to be by...

WASHINGTON -- The fallout from Newark Mayor Cory Booker's criticism of the Obama campaign's use of Bain Capital against Mitt Romney continues, with Booker objecting to "being used by the GOP" to help the Romney campaign. Booker, who said that frequent Obama campaign attacks on Romney were “nauseating” during a Sunday appearance on NBC's “Meet the Press,” has been trying to refine and refute his remarks. In an interview with MSNBC's Rachel Maddow on Monday, he expressed dismay over becoming the center of a Republican National Committee "I Stand With Cory Booker" petition.

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) lashed out at protester who held a poster depicting President Obama with a Hitler-style mustache during a heated town hall meeting on the healthcare overhaul. "On what planet do you spend most of your time?" Frank asked the woman, who had stepped up to a microphone at a senior center to ask why Frank supported what she called a Nazi policy. "As you stand there with a picture of the president defaced to look like Hitler and compare the effort to increase healthcare to the Nazis . . . it is a tribute to the 1st Amendment that this kind of vile, contemptible nonsense is so freely propagated," Frank said.

MSNBC suspended political analyst Mark Halperin on Thursday morning after he used an anatomical epithet to describe President Obama on the “Morning Joe” show. Halperin, an editor at Time magazine, was discussing Obama’s barbed comments aimed at Republicans made at Wednesday’s press conference and said that he thought the president was a being “kind of a .... " “Mark Halperin's comments [Thursday] morning were completely inappropriate and unacceptable,” MSNBC said in a statement.

A wealthy backer of GOP presidential contender Rick Santorum left his interviewer scratching her head Thursday when he suggested that in the olden days, birth control was less expensive because women just squeezed an aspirin between their knees to prevent them from having sex. Foster Friess, the retired mutual fund executive from Wyoming who has been basking in the spotlight recently thanks to his six-figure donations to a 'super PAC' backing Santorum,...

WASHINGTON - President Obama's message was one so imbued with hope that it actually ended with a promise that the sun will come out tomorrow. "The sun will rise over Boston," Obama declared Thursday in his first extended remarks about the bombings that killed three people and maimed dozens more at the finish line of the Boston Marathon. "Tomorrow, the sun will rise over this country that we love. This special place. This state of grace. " The warm note was quintessential Obama in a speech that embodied this president's style of response to national crisis.

A state coastal commissioner who vocally supported banning beach bonfires along a stretch of Orange County coastline has resigned under growing pressure from two state legislators. William Burke was serving as both a member of the state Coastal Commission and the South Coast Air Quality Management District, agencies that are at odds about whether the Southern California tradition of beach bonfires should be extinguished from San Clemente to Malibu. Coastal Commission staffers have recommended that Newport Beach's proposal to rip out 60 fire pits in Balboa and Corona del Mar be denied, while the air quality board is considering a regional ban on wood-burning fire pits for health reasons.

Here is a transcript of the remarks delivered by President Obama during an interfaith memorial service for those injured and killed by the Boston Marathon attack Monday, as provided by the White House: Hello, Boston! Scripture tells us to “run with endurance the race that is set before us.” Run with endurance the race that is set before us. On Monday morning, the sun rose over Boston. The sunlight glistened off the Statehouse dome. In the Common and the Public Garden, spring was in bloom.

Tom Garfinkel, president and chief executive of the San Diego Padres, has been welcomed to the world of texts, tweets, Facebook and smartphone recordings. And Dodgers pitcher Zack Greinke has an apology to show for it. In a meeting with season-ticket holders at Petco Park the day after the Greinke-Carlos Quentin brawl in San Diego, Garfinkel accused the Dodgers right-hander of hitting Quentin intentionally, blamed Greinke's broken collarbone on his decision to lower his shoulder protecting himself, and appeared to mock Greinke's social anxiety disorder by implying he has autism.

President Obama 's description of California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris as "by far the best-looking attorney general in the country" at a public appearance has divided even some of his strongest supporters. Some found the comment sexist, others harmless. On Friday, the president apologized for the remark. "He called her to apologize for the distraction created by his comments," spokesman Jay Carney told reporters. The president “did not want in any way to diminish the attorney general's professional accomplishments and her capabilities.

WASHINGTON -- President Obama apologized to California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris for commenting on her appearance during a fundraiser earlier this week, an aide said Friday. During an event in Northern California on Thursday, Obama referred to his fellow Democrat as “the best-looking attorney general,” drawing laughs from the crowds but later creating a stir among critics. A few hours after the fundraiser at a private residence, Obama called Harris to say he was sorry for creating a distraction, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said Friday afternoon.

Debbie Wasserman Schultz and other Democrats were quick to pounce on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s remark in Tampa on Thursday that he can relate to the jobless because “I’m also unemployed.” “I’m networking,” Romney reportedly told a small gathering of job seekers. “I have my sight on a particular job.” Romney was speaking light-heartedly, but Democrats called it a clueless and insensitive reference in a state with a double-digit unemployment rate.

As Republican rivals pounced on a remark that New Hampshire front-runner Mitt Romney made this morning in Nashua about firing people who don't provide the level of service he expects, Romney tried to clarify the context of his remarks at a news conference after an afternoon event at a metal fabrication plant. While discussing his plans to improve health insurance coverage before members of the Nashua Chamber of Commerce this morning, Romney argued that health insurance companies have few incentives to offer better care because most Americans get healthcare from their employers and have little choice in their providers.

President Obama in no way mean to "diminish" California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris' credentials when he described her as "by far the best-looking attorney general in the country" during a talk, his spokesman said Friday. The White House was responding to criticism over the remark, which some found to be sexist. On Friday, the president apologized for the remark. "He called her to apologize for the distraction created by his comments," spokesman Jay Carney told reporters. The president “did not want in any way to diminish the attorney general's professional accomplishments and her capabilities.

President Obama's comments about California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris' good looks continue to generate controversy. “You have to be careful to, first of all, say she is brilliant and she is dedicated and she is tough, and she is exactly what you'd want in anybody who is administering the law, and making sure that everybody is getting a fair shake,” said Obama during a California fundraiser on Thursday. “She also happens to be by...