Obama Blasts Crackdown

Breaking his silence on protests in Libya, President Obama called violence against demonstrators “outrageous and unacceptable.” But the president didn’t directly name Muammar Gaddafi, who became a U.S. ally in 2003 after years as a pariah and he will send Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Geneva Monday to discuss Gaddafi at a U.N. Human Rights Council. Meanwhile, the U.S. is acting to evacuate all American citizens from the strife-torn country, despite protests from Gaddafi’s son Saadi, who told the Financial Times that most of Libya was “very calm and very safe.” The younger Gaddafi added that while reforms and new faces are needed in the government, his father must remain as “the big father who advises.”