The president assured the chancellor that the United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of the chancellor.

We believe that it is very important that we have hopefully averted what would have been the most substantial headwind of all, which is a default for the first time in our history, and that that will contribute to a more positive environment that we hope will allow for greater growth and job creation.

I think, if you're a candidate and you want to be totally safe, and assure that what you say is not going to be recorded or broadcast on the Internet, you have to have something like safe cone. Everything is so viral right now that you have to assume as a candidate that anything you say will be broadcast.

Raising the debt ceiling is not additional spending. It is simply saying, you, the United States of America, can continue to borrow the money you need to pay the bills you have already rung up.

The president assured the chancellor that the United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of the chancellor.

When I go stand up at the podium in front of the White House press corps, I never lie. I never say something that I know is untrue. Credibility is enormously important to a press secretary.

Obama wanted to offer his support to birth control activist Sandra Fluke. He wanted to express his disappointment that she has been the subject of inappropriate personal attacks and thank her for exercising her rights as a citizen to speak out on an issue of public policy.