Blog Posts by Olivier Knox, Yahoo! News

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un raises his hand with other officials to adopt a statement during a plenary meeting of the Central Committee of the ruling Workers' Party in Pyongyang, N.K. (AP/KCNA via KNS)
The White House on Monday denied provoking North Korea with unusual military maneuvers while playing down the seriousness of the Stalinist regime’s threats, saying in effect that Pyongyang has been all talk and no action.

“I would note that—despite the harsh rhetoric we’re hearing from Pyongyang—we are not seeing changes to the North Korean military posture, such as large-scale mobilizations and positioning of forces,” press secretary Jay Carney told reporters at his daily briefing. "We haven’t seen action to back up the rhetoric.”

Carney denied that the U.S. response to weeks of escalating rhetoric from North Korea has intensified rather than defused the standoff.

The U.S. has beefed up its missile defenses and flown nuclear-capable B-2 and B-52 bombers over the Korean Peninsula. B-2 stealth bombers even dropped dummy munitions during military exercises with South Korea.

Asked if such actions were making matters worse, Carney replied, "Not at all."

The spokesman insisted the U.S. response has been prudent and designed "to reassure our allies, demonstrate our resolve to the North, and reduce pressure on Seoul to take unilateral action."

He added, "We believe this has reduced the chance of miscalculation and provocation."

President Barack Obama consoles Donovan Frazier during the boy's Easter egg roll. (Jason Reed/Reuters)

Taking a turn as comforter-in-chief, President Barack Obama on Monday consoled a 5-year-old boy, distraught after losing his Easter egg roll, with a hug and a kind, "Shake it off."

The boy, Donovan Frazier, and his dad, Donnie Frazier, 35, came from Scranton, Pa., for the annual celebration. They joined some 30,000 Americans from all 50 states who got tickets for the festivities on the South Lawn of the White House. There, in the spring sunshine, groups of about 10 kids at a time raced to see who would be the first to push their hard-boiled Easter egg with a spoon across the finish line.

[Slideshow: White House Easter Egg Roll]

The younger Frazier apparently did not win, and did not take it well, slumping on the grass and crying. Obama stopped to comfort him.

"Here, you want the egg? You get to keep it. Shake it off. Shake it off. There you go," the president said, according to a pool report from Alex Leary of the Tampa Bay Times.

So apparently the White House basketball court is part of red-state America.

President Barack Obama went 2-of-22 on his home court Monday as he took part in the White House’s fitness-themed Easter Egg Roll.

How rough was it out there? Here's part of the pool report from Alex Leary of the Tampa Bay Times (the full report is at the bottom of this entry):

"Obama started to take shots amid the kids and pros. Miss. Miss. Off the rim. Miss. Miss. Off the rim. Airball. He moved closer to the net. But time and again, he missed. Of 22 shots POTUS took, he made two."

"At one point, POTUS handed a ball to a boy and asked for help. The boy made the layup. 'He couldn't make one. I had to help him out,' said Kahron Campbell, 10, of Landover, MD."

It's no "U.S. Army training special cat unit," but the White House on Monday rolled out an April Fools' joke video starring "Kid President"—9-year-old viral video maker Robby Novak.

"It looks like you were expecting somebody else," Novak, dressed in a dark suit and wearing a red power tie, says from the podium in the White House briefing room. “April Fools on all y’all! I’m Kid President and I hope everyone has an awesome day. It’s everybody’s duty to give the world a reason to dance. I made it to the White House! I’m here! Peace.” (Peace? Or budding Richard Nixon imitator?)

President Barack Obama (2nd L) and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L) eat Matzo bread delivered to them by miniature robots (C) as they tour a technology expo at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem March 21, 2013. (Jason Reed/Reuters)President Barack Obama’s trip to the Middle East quickly earned the moniker “Operation Desert Schmooze” and drew comparisons to both his 2012 campaign style and the way he handles (or fails to handle) the polarized U.S Congress. But those superficial assessments fall short of the mark when it comes time to judge what may turn out to be one of the most consequential foreign trips of his second term.

Obama earned rave reviews for his speech in Jerusalem on reviving the stalled Middle East peace process and creating an independent Palestinian state. He reassured Israelis worried about his commitment to their security—notably in facing down Iran’s suspect nuclear program. He announced plans for more aid to Jordan, where one camp of refugees fleeing violence in Syria is now the country’s fifth-largest city.

But perhaps the biggest diplomatic victory occurred on Friday, out of sight, in a trailer not far from Air Force One on the tarmac at Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion Airport.

American-born Islamist militant Omar Hammami, also known as Abu Mansur al-Amriki (Farah Abdi Warsameh/AP)An Alabama-born jihadist fighter thought to be in Somalia took to Twitter on Friday to mock the U.S. government’s $5 million bounty on his head—jokingly offering to raise some cash for his cause by selling off one leg.

Omar Hammami—who stars in his own YouTube videos, sometimes rapping his Islamist message, and has an aggressive Twitter presence—was reportedly added to the Rewards for Justice program that offers piles of cash for information leading to the capture or killing of high-profile extremists. CNN first broke the news.

Apparently unbowed, Hammami joked about the bounty on Twitter:

As I'm a bit low on cash, how much is my left leg going for? I figure, shamil basayev did the one-leg jihad thing.

— abu m (@abumamerican) March 22, 2013

That was a reference to a dead Islamist commander of a Chechen rebel movement, who lost a leg while fighting the Russian army, noted Agence France-Presse.

U.S. officials say Hammami, initially a recruiter for al-Shabab in Somalia, which Washington

Black smoke rises from a building due to Syrian government forces shelling in Aleppo, Syria. (Aleppo Media Center, AMC/AP)Democratic Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin and the panel’s top Republican, Sen. John McCain, pressed President Barack Obama on Thursday to consider “limited military options” to help rebels topple Syrian President Bashar Assad.

“We believe there are credible options at your disposal, including limited military options, that would require neither putting U.S. troops on the ground nor acting unilaterally,” McCain and Levin urged Obama in a letter.

The goal, they said, would be to work with key allies in the Middle East and Europe “to stop the killing in Syria and force Bashar al-Assad to give up power.” The means? Target Syria’s air force and support Turkey if it is prepared to set up a “safe zone inside of Syria’s northern border," they wrote—notably by deploying Patriot missile batteries to deter Assad’s air power and to protect against Scud missile attacks.

The two lawmakers urged “precision airstrikes” against Syrian aircraft, noting that the top military commander in the Middle East, Gen. James Mattis, testified last week that they could take out “a fair amount” of their targets.

“Such a mission could also include Assad’s SCUD missile batteries and would not require American or allied pilots to fly into the reach of Syria’s air defenses,” Levin and McCain said. “We urge you to work with our friends and allies, as well as regional organizations, to consider this limited option.”

President Barack Obama listens as Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the White House about proposals to reduce gun violence in January. (Susan Walsh/AP)Public mass shootings like the slaughter of schoolchildren and staff at Sandy Hook Elementary have left 547 people dead and 476 more injured in the U.S. since 1983, according to a new report from the Congressional Research Service.

The CRS study—which was made public by the Federation of American Scientists—does not weigh in on whether restricting access to guns or ammunition would prevent future incidents, a cause President Barack Obama has championed since the December tragedy in Newtown, Conn.

The CRS study—which counts only the deaths of people other than the shooter or shooters—shows that mass shootings represent a relatively small portion of overall deaths by firearms in the United States. FBI figures show that guns were used to kill 8,583 people in 2011 alone.

“While tragic and shocking, public mass shootings account for few of the murders or non-negligent homicides related to firearms that occur annually in the United States,” the CRS study said.

What qualifies as a public mass shooting? CRS defined such incidents as “occurring in relatively public places, involving four or more deaths—not including the shooter(s)—and gunmen who select victims somewhat indiscriminately.The violence in these cases is not a means to an end—the gunmen do not pursue criminal profit or kill in the name of terrorist ideologies, for example.”

So the CRS study did not include Army Maj. Nidal Hasan’s rampage at Fort Hood, which killed 13 and wounded 40 more, because it has been described as a terrorist attack. And the CRS definition excludes drug trafficking and gang activity as well.