Teacher:In this task, you are given a text of many news articles seperated by special token "|||||". Your task is to summarize them.
Teacher: Now, understand the problem? Solve this instance: The Obama campaign recently found itself in a little hot water after it was caught asking for an off-the-record interview from the Des Moines Register — the largest newspaper in Iowa. Normally, the Register publishes its interviews with presidential candidates, but in this case, it agreed to an off-the-record conversation with President Obama. Afterwards, however, it revealed the situation in an editorial, which led to an embarrassing moment for the campaign. In response, the Obama campaign allowed the Register to publish the interview, as is custom. 
  
 This interview didn’t need to be kept from the public — it’s a familiar statement, from the president, on why he deserves a second term. If there’s anything remarkable about it, it’s that Obama is unusually clear in making his case. Take this, for example: 
  
 “The suggestion somehow that if we hadn’t pursued Obamacare, somehow we would have gotten additional stimulus out of the Republicans, for example, that we could have primed the pump more, that’s just not borne out by any of the evidence 
  
 “In fact, the first stimulus, when we were contracting at 8 percent a quarter, as I was on my way up — a month after I’d been elected, or two months after I’d been elected — as I was on my way up to meet the House Republicans to share with them my ideas about how we should pass this Recovery Act, they already said they’d vote against it 
  
 “Now, it was a political strategy that won them back the House, but it wasn’t good for the country.” 
  
 I don’t know if this is a winning message for the president, but it’s certainly one that voters should have been hearing from the campaign. If there’s a question people have for the last four years, it’s “what happened?” There was supposed to be bipartisan agreement and progress, but it didn’t happen. Republicans have offered their version of the story: Obama was too partisan. Obama has been a little more reticent to offer his version of events, perhaps for fear that it will seem like he’s trying to dodge blame. But here, he offers his view of what happened, pins the blame on Republicans, and defends the actions his administration took in the first year. It’s good stuff and he would have been well-served by it in the first debate (to use one example). 
  
 If there’s anything that might have raised eyebrows in the interview, it’s this short section on Obama’s hopes for immigration reform: 
  
 “The second thing I’m confident we’ll get done next year is immigration reform. And since this is off the record, I will just be very blunt. Should I win a second term, a big reason I will win a second term is because the Republican nominee and the Republican Party have so alienated the fastest-growing demographic group in the country, the Latino community. And this is a relatively new phenomenon. George Bush and Karl Rove were smart enough to understand the changing nature of America. And so I am fairly confident that they’re going to have a deep interest in getting that done.” 
  
 This doesn’t sound “blunt” to me, it sounds like reality: Republicans have alienated Latinos in a huge way since 2008, which has contributed to their overwhelming support for President Obama — a nearly 50 point advantage, according to an average of polls from Latino Decisions. 
  
 If this interview raises a question, it’s this: Why hasn’t Obama been this clear more often in articulating his case for a second term, and his plans for the next four years? It’s not that he doesn’t have them, but until recently, talking about them has been less of a priority for Team Obama. Why? ||||| Obama offers different view on defense sequester 
  
 By Erik Wasson - 
  
 President Obama said he is prepared to use the $109 billion sequester as leverage to force action on a grand deficit bargain in an initially off-the-record interview with the Des Moines Register that was released Wednesday. 
  
 The president predicted that a $4 trillion deal to reduce the debt would come in the first six months of his second term. 
  
 His remarks on the automatic spending cuts are a contrast to comments in Monday night's debate when Obama reassured the public there is no way the sequester will ever happen. 
  
 “In the short term, the good news is that there’s going to be a forcing mechanism to deal with what is the central ideological argument in Washington right now, and that is: How much government do we have and how do we pay for it?” Obama said. 
  
 “So when you combine the Bush tax cuts expiring, the sequester in place, the commitment of both myself and my opponent — at least Governor Romney claims that he wants to reduce the deficit — but we’re going to be in a position where I believe in the first six months we are going to solve that big piece of business,” Obama said. 
  
 The Obama campaign released a transcript of the interview after the Des Moines Register complained about it not being for public release. 
  
 During the third presidential debate on Monday, Obama said that the defense portion of the sequester — $55 billion in cuts coming in January — “will not happen.” He blamed Congress for coming up with the idea, even though White House officials were intimately involved in designing the sequester last year to force action with a stalled Congress on the deficit. 
  
 The White House on Tuesday walked back Obama’s comments, saying that he still intends to use the sequester unless he gets the balanced replacement with tax increases that he is seeking from Congress. 
  
 Obama said that to get a deal, he will cut healthcare entitlements. He said the process would “probably be messy” and that “it won’t be pleasant.” 
  
 “I’m willing to cut more, and I’m willing to work with Democrats and Republicans when it comes to making some adjustments that bring down the cost of our healthcare programs, which obviously are the biggest drivers of our deficit,” he told the paper, in a context he believed was off the record. 
  
 After striking such a deal, Obama said his next priority will be immigration reform. 
  
 Corporate tax reform, which is seen as a top priority for Republicans and many Democrats in Congress, would come after that, Obama said. 
  
 “So assume that you get those two things done in the first year, and we're implementing Wall Street reform, 'ObamaCare' turns out not to have been the scary monster that the other side has painted. Now we're in a position where we can start on some things that really historically have not been ideological,” Obama said. 
  
 Obama said the picture will be different if Mitt Romney is elected. He said that Romney’s embrace of his running mate Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) budget is a recipe for gridlock. 
  
 “There’s no way that, if he’s president, he can avoid having a showdown on a budget that his running mate introduced, or a variation of it, because he’s committed to cutting spending by 20 percent across the board on discretionary and increasing defense spending by $2 trillion,” Obama said. 
  
 The full interview transcript is here. ||||| Iowa is one of the swing states, and in Iowa the Des Moines Register is probably the most influential newspaper. President Obama sought the paper’s endorsement this week, but with a catch: His conversation with the paper’s editors had to remain off the record. No recording could be released and the paper could not characterize its conversation with the president. Editor Rick Green is concerned: 
  
 Just four days before the Register’s presidential endorsement is released, Laura Hollingsworth and I received a phone call from the president. He was calling from Florida, on the heels of a morning campaign appearance and about 14 hours after his debate with GOP nominee Mitt Romney at Lynn University in Boca Raton, Fla. The conference call lasted nearly 30 minutes and was an incredibly informative exchange of questions, answers and an insightful glimpse into the president’s vision for a second term. He made a genuine and passionate case for our endorsement and for reelection. Just two weeks before Election Day, the discussion, I believe, would have been valuable to all voters, but especially those in Iowa and around the country who have yet to decide between the incumbent Democrat and his Republican opponent. Unfortunately, what we discussed was off-the-record. It was a condition, we were told, set by the White House. 
  
 The Register’s editors got just under an hour with Romney, and he allowed the paper to record the conversation and release the recording. It’s at the link above. The Register will announce its endorsement on Sunday. 
  
 Obama’s behavior here is kind of strange, no? The president will be on both Leno and MTV this week, and both of those interviews are very much on the record. He has made a habit of doing soft interviews with radio DJs and The View but, lately, has shied away from doing interviews with mainstream media. I’m certainly no advocate for granting the mainstream media any special favors, but Obama’s pattern of behavior raises questions. What did he say to the Register that he doesn’t want us to hear? 
  
 Update: Now the paper says the president is allowing the interview to go on the record. The appearance created is that he either bowed to pressure (again) or he manipulated the paper into hyping the interview before allowing it to be placed on the record. |||||
Student:
President Obama got in some hot water yesterday, after the Des Moines Register complained that the White House had insisted on an off-the-record endorsement interview. The 30-minute call "was an incredibly informative exchange" that "would have been valuable to voters," the editors lamented. Obama's critics pounced, noting that Romney's interview had been recorded and released online. "Obama's behavior here is kind of strange, no?" writes Bryan Preston at Pajamas Media. "The president will be on both Leno and MTV this week, and both of those interviews are very much on the record." In the face of that criticism, the White House released the entire interview without comment today, and Jamelle Bouie of the Washington Post thinks it's actually great. "This interview didn't need to be kept from the public. … If there's anything remarkable about it, it's that Obama is unusually clear in making his case." Some parts people are talking about: The part Bouie liked: Obama insists he couldn't have gotten more stimulus out of Republicans. "In fact, the first stimulus … as I was on my way up to meet House Republicans to share with them my ideas about how we should pass the Recovery Act, they already said they'd vote against it." Many are focusing on this quote: "Since this is off the record, I will just be very blunt. Should I win a second term, a big reason, a big reason I will win a second term is because the Republican nominee and Republican Party have so alienated the fastest-growing demographic group in the country, the Latino community." Obama also reveals that he's willing to use the $109 billion sequester as a "forcing mechanism" to forge a compromise on the deficit, the Hill points out. "In the first six months we are going to solve that big piece of business."