President Obama ruled out publicly releasing photographs of the deceased Osama bin Laden on Wednesday, and White House officials said they would give no new details about the raid on his compound in Pakistan, an information clampdown that followed fitful attempts to craft a riveting narrative about the killing of al-Qaeda's leader.

Obama said his decision not to release the photos — described by others as extremely gory depictions of a bloodied bin Laden — was an effort to prevent a global backlash.

As President Obama celebrates the signature national-security success of his tenure, he has a long list of people to thank. On the list: George W. Bush.

After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Bush waged wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that have forged a military so skilled that it carried out a complicated covert raid with only a minor complication. Public tolerance for military operations over the past decade has shifted to the degree that a mission carried out deep inside a sovereign country has raised little domestic protest.

As U.S. helicopters secretly entered Pakistani airspace Sunday, the Joint Operations Center at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan was under the control of a square-jawed admiral from Texas who had labored for years to find Osama bin Laden's elusive trail.

Vice Adm. William H. McRaven, one of the most experienced terrorist hunters in the U.S. government, had tapped a special unit of Navy SEALs for the mission two months earlier. A former SEAL himself, McRaven had overseen weeks of intensive training for a covert operation that could cripple al-Qaeda if it worked, or strain an already troubled alliance with Pakistan if it went awry.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — As neighbors and reporters swarmed the streets around Osama bin Laden's compound this week, men in sunglasses and white tunics lurked about on motorbikes. Residents presumed they were Pakistani intelligence agents, there to keep tabs on who spoke to whom.

That counted as nothing unusual in a nation where the security establishment has cultivated an image as a nearly omnipresent force that is watchful above all of foreigners who go near military installations.

Yet given the choice between pleading incompetence or complicity in bin Laden's years-long stay in the garrison city of Abbottabad, Pakistani authorities have opted for the former. It is an explanation that strains credulity for many international observers, including U.S. policymakers, who have demanded an investigation into whether Pakistan sheltered the al-Qaeda leader.

I would have released the Osama bin Laden photos.

I understand why President Obama decided otherwise, and of course I respect that decision. But I think showing the world evidence — however gruesome — of the terrorist butcher's death would have been the better call.

Why? Because while gory photographs would have inflamed some jihadists and wannabes, I believe they would have disillusioned and deflated others. A heroic myth of invulnerability had been built around bin Laden. He was supposed to have cheated death while fighting the Russians in Afghanistan, walking tall through fields of fire as the bullets somehow missed. He escaped the Americans who cornered him at Tora Bora. He evaded capture for a decade, despite the best efforts of the West's spies and soldiers.

As President Obama celebrates the signature national-security success of his tenure, he has a long list of people to thank. On the list: George W. Bush.

After the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Bush waged wars in Afghanistan and Iraq that have forged a military so skilled that it carried out a complicated covert raid with only a minor complication. Public tolerance for military operations over the past decade has shifted to the degree that a mission carried out deep inside a sovereign country has raised little domestic protest.

President Obama ruled out publicly releasing photographs of the deceased Osama bin Laden on Wednesday, and White House officials said they would give no new details about the raid on his compound in Pakistan, an information clampdown that followed fitful attempts to craft a riveting narrative about the killing of al-Qaeda's leader.

Obama said his decision not to release the photos — described by others as extremely gory depictions of a bloodied bin Laden — was an effort to prevent a global backlash.

On a day when the White House declined to release photos of Osama bin Laden's corpse, the Reuters news agency released a series of bloody pictures of the attack's aftermath. Reuters said the images depict the deaths of three men who were with the al-Qaeda leader when he was killed in his Pakistani compound.

Reuters said it bought the photos from an unidentified Pakistani security agent who had entered the house in Abbottabad an hour after U.S. commandos raided it. On Sunday, Navy SEALs shot bin Laden to death and took his body with them.

Senior Republicans conceded Wednesday that a deal is unlikely on a contentious plan to overhaul Medicare and offered to open budget talks with the White House by focusing on areas where both parties can agree, such as cutting farm subsidies.

On the eve of debt-reduction talks led by Vice President Biden, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (Va.) said Republicans remain convinced that reining in federal retirement programs is the key to stabilizing the nation's finances over the long term. But he said Republicans recognize they may need to look elsewhere to achieve consensus after President Obama "excoriated us" for a proposal to privatize Medicare.

The federal government owns at least 12,000 structures it no longer needs, and the White House is unveiling plans today that could eventually save taxpayers about $15 billion by getting rid of them.

If enacted by Congress, the Obama administration's proposal would establish a panel of seven experts modeled on the military's Base Closure and Realignment Commission to review the thousands of addresses. Officials with the Office of Management and Budget are scheduled to share more details with reporters later Wednesday.

This semester, a group of American University journalism students studied the impact of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on their generation. They surveyed hundreds of Millennials and posted the project online on Friday.

Then, Sunday night, they learned Osama bin Laden was dead.

Many of their classmates carpooled to the White House to celebrate. The university put out a press release, headlined "America's Most Political Students React," that spotlighted a student who checked in to "Post-Osama Bin Laden World" on Foursquare.

This is reposted from Campus Overload blog.

A Stephen Colbert Scholarship? Well, sort of.

The University of Virginia recently received a donation from the famous comedian and his wife, Evelyn McGee Colbert, who graduated from the college in 1985.

A Stephen Colbert Scholarship? Well, sort of.

The University of Virginia recently received a donation from the famous comedian and his wife, Evelyn McGee Colbert, who graduated from the college in 1985.

The College of Arts & Sciences is using the money to set up an Arts Scholars program for students studying studio art, dance, drama or music. Each year, 15 to 20 incoming arts students will be selected to join the prestigious group, which will have easy access to the college's top art faculty and receive invitations to special events.

President Obama decided Wednesday not to release photos of Osama bin Laden's body, saying such images could incite violence and be interpreted as displaying "trophies" of his death, the White House said.

"It's important for us to make sure that very graphic photos of somebody who was shot in the head are not floating around as an incitement to additional violence or as a propaganda tool," Obama said in an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes" program. "That's not who we are. We don't trot out this stuff as trophies."

TRIPOLI, Libya — In an attempt to portray itself as an ally in the battle against al-Qaeda, Libya reminded the United States on Wednesday that Moammar Gaddafi's government, not anyone in Washington, was the first to issue an arrest warrant against Osama bin Laden, back in 1998.

The warrant, approved by Interpol, came after two German anti-terrorism agents were gunned down in the Libyan city of Sirte in 1994, an attack the government in Tripoli blamed on the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, a militant organization linked to al-Qaeda.

JERUSALEM — The Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas formalized a reconciliation agreement at a ceremony in Cairo on Wednesday, raising hopes of an end to the bitter four-year-old rift that has left Palestinians under rival governments in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

"We announce . . . to our Palestinian people that we turn forever the black page of division," said Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, who heads Fatah. He promised to soon visit the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, where he has not set foot since the militant Islamist group seized power in 2007 after a brief factional war.

NEW DELHI — Pilots with India's state-owned airline entered the eighth day of an indefinite nationwide strike Wednesday, demanding higher wages and a probe into what they call the company's near-destruction by corrupt or incompetent officials.

With more than 90 percent of Air India's domestic flights canceled and tens of thousands of passengers affected, the pilots' action has reignited a polarizing debate here over the privatization of such ailing state-owned enterprises.

In recent days, Indian news media and social commentators have urged the government not just to sell Air India but to get out of the business of running businesses entirely. The federal government owns at least 217 companies, including hotels, and steel, tire, textile and machine-tool plants, with a total investment of $129 billion, according to a Finance Ministry report.

LONDON — In the fragrant rose garden behind No. 10 Downing Street, David Cameron and Nick Clegg presented themselves to the British public one year ago as a political dream team: Cameron, a Conservative, as prime minister and Clegg, a Liberal Democrat, as his deputy, in a coalition government blurring the lines between the right and left wings.

Yet as Britons vote in a referendum Thursday that could change the way they elect their governments, the coalition is no longer smelling so sweet.

Cameron's Conservatives grudgingly agreed to the referendum to appease the Liberal Democrats — traditionally Britain's third-largest political force after the Conservative and Labor parties and whose support Cameron needed to form a government after a close vote last May. But passage of the ballot measure would arguably aid the Liberal Democrats the most, while hurting the Conservatives in future elections. The Conservatives are being accused of waging a misinformation and smear campaign against their own coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, to defeat it.

LONDON — In the fragrant rose garden behind No. 10 Downing Street, David Cameron and Nick Clegg presented themselves to the British public one year ago as a political dream team: Cameron, a Conservative, as prime minister and Clegg, a Liberal Democrat, as his deputy, in a coalition government blurring the lines between the right and left wings.

Yet as Britons vote in a referendum Thursday that could change the way they elect their governments, the coalition is no longer smelling so sweet.

Cameron's Conservatives grudgingly agreed to the referendum to appease the Liberal Democrats — traditionally Britain's third-largest political force after the Conservative and Labor parties and whose support Cameron needed to form a government after a close vote last May. But passage of the ballot measure would arguably aid the Liberal Democrats the most, while hurting the Conservatives in future elections. The Conservatives are being accused of waging a misinformation and smear campaign against their own coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, to defeat it.

LONDON — In the fragrant rose garden behind No. 10 Downing Street, David Cameron and Nick Clegg presented themselves to the British public one year ago as a political dream team: Cameron, a Conservative, as prime minister and Clegg, a Liberal Democrat, as his deputy, in a coalition government blurring the lines between the right and left wings.

Yet as Britons vote in a referendum Thursday that could change the way they elect their governments, the coalition is no longer smelling so sweet.

Cameron's Conservatives grudgingly agreed to the referendum to appease the Liberal Democrats — traditionally Britain's third-largest political force after the Conservative and Labor parties and whose support Cameron needed to form a government after a close vote last May. But passage of the ballot measure would arguably aid the Liberal Democrats the most, while hurting the Conservatives in future elections. The Conservatives are being accused of waging a misinformation and smear campaign against their own coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, to defeat it.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Fred Couples is a couple of decades older since finishing second in the last major tournament at Shoal Creek, and he has the aching back to prove it.

But Couples is happily here anyway for the Champions Tour's Regions Tradition at the scenic course that hosted two PGA Championships a couple of decades ago before controversy erupted over its all-white membership — and the founder's comments that the club wouldn't be pressured into accepting blacks.

The Tradition, the first of five Champions Tour majors, opens Thursday.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Alabama football coach Nick Saban spends much of his spare time in tornado-ravaged parts of Tuscaloosa. Former NBA star Charles Barkley had never seen anything like the destruction in the Birmingham suburbs of Pleasant Grove and Pratt City.

"It was far and away the worst thing I've seen in my life," said Barkley, a native of nearby Leeds who played college basketball at Auburn.

They spoke Wednesday of the deadly tornado that struck a week earlier after a pro-am for the Champions Tour's Regions Tradition. The PGA Tour has pledged $100,000 to help in rebuilding the area, and an auction Tuesday night raised nearly $50,000.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Bubba Watson's favorite memory from two years ago at Quail Hollow wasn't how close he came to winning.

"That was the first time I beat Tiger Woods," Watson said Wednesday. "And you can tell him that."

That kind of celebration for besting Woods is fading these days as it becomes more routine. And Watson thinks he knows why Woods is struggling: too much thinking.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — No one else at Quail Hollow has won more majors, and no is close to his PGA Tour victories. Not surprisingly, no one had more fans following his every move Wednesday at the Wells Fargo Championship.

That used to be the case for Tiger Woods.

This time it was for Arnold Palmer, the King, but only for a day.

One of the most reliable debates among D.C. sports fans concerns Maryland and Georgetown and basketball, why the teams never play (scheduled) games, and whether they should.

Aside from a few aging fans with relentless memories and strong grudge-holding powers, everyone acknowledges that yes, they should play, because it would be awesome for the fans and great for the players and pure manna for the media. And now, at least, we seem to have an ally in College Park, one who can speak this truth without mentioning who played in which gym in 1926.

CHICAGO — Derrick Rose's night started with a trophy presentation from Commissioner David Stern and ended with those familiar "MVP! MVP!" chants from the crowd.

In between, he dominated in spurts. He struggled at times, too.

In the end, all that mattered was this: The Bulls and Hawks are now tied.

John Wall always felt that if he had not injured his left foot in November, which led to him later suffering a bone bruise in his right knee, he would've received more consideration for rookie of the year this season. But Coach Flip Saunders believed that another factor -- a 6-foot-10, slam-dunking, nightly-highlight-producing factor -- played a more significant role in Wall's s rookie campaign being overshadowed.

"If Blake Griffin wasn't a rookie this year and was a rookie last year, the accolades John would be getting would be off the charts," Saunders said late in the season.

Sam Cassell met with the Houston Rockets on Tuesday to discuss their vacant head coaching position, according to multiple reports. Cassell has been an assistant with the Wizards the past two seasons and worked closely this season with rookie John Wall.

Cassell spent the first three of his 15 seasons in Houston, winning back-to-back championships in 1994-95, and has a decent relationship with Rockets owner Leslie Alexander. He has not responded to multiple phone or text messages seeking comment.

The Rockets have already interviewed several candidates to replace Rick Adelman, who split with the team a few weeks ago. Former New Jersey Nets coach Lawrence Frank, former Atlanta Hawks coach Mike Woodson, Milwaukee Bucks assistant Mike Woodson, Sacramento Kings assistant and former Rockets player Mario Ellie, and Rockets assistant Jack Sikma have also spoken with the team.

PHILADELPHIA — Rick Eckstein emerged from the visitors' batting cage inside Citizens Bank Park and hopped up the steps to the Washington Nationals' clubhouse on Wednesday afternoon. Sweat glistened on his forehead as he scurried through the room, head swiveling, eyes wide, searching for the next group of hitters he needed to coax out of slumps. It was a long list.

The title of Nationals hitting coach carries with it a tough job description these days, one made more exasperating with the Nationals' 7-4 loss to the Philadelphia Phillies before a crowd of 44,123. After Vance Worley allowed one run over six innings and the Phillies' bullpen shut out Washington for two, a spasm of offense in the ninth salvaged another unsightly offensive showing.

The Nationals scratched left fielder Michael Morse just before tonight's game with right knee soreness, an ailment he felt as he went through his final warm-up for the game. The Nationals will check on Morse before Thursday's game to determine if he can play.

"Right before the game, [Morse] indicated to me he did something pregame, he just couldn't shake," Riggleman said. "I guess he was going to try to play through it. He just said, 'You know what, this is not feeling good.' He let me know that, and we made the change."

Still sore from surgery, Ryan Zimmerman began his rehab this morning by walking one mile on a treadmill. It took him 30 minutes to complete. "I was flying," he said.

After undergoing the operation on Tuesday and speaking with Bill Meyers, the specialist who performed the procedure, Zimmerman still thinks he will remain out for six weeks, which the doctor and the Nationals expected before surgery.

"There was a decent tear in there that he fixed," Zimmerman said. "But with what he looked at in the MRI, it was exactly what he thought it was going to be when he went in there. Most importantly, he thinks that the timetable that they set before he went in there is right, about the right time. So that's good to hear."

UPDATE, 7:20: Michael Morse was a late scratch. In his place, Laynce Nix will play left field and bat sixth. No word yet on why Morse is out of the game.

7:25:Morse has right knee soreness, a team spokesperson said. He could pinch-hit later in the game.

LAS VEGAS — Shane Mosley knew what was coming from the minute he signed to fight Manny Pacquiao. He's been in enough big fights to understand his role in this one.

What Mosley believes boxing fans don't understand is he's got a real shot to pull off an upset over the best boxer in the world.

"It's going to get very interesting, very quick," Mosley said.

LAS VEGAS — Shane Mosley knew what was coming from the minute he signed to fight Manny Pacquiao. He's been in enough big fights to understand his role in this one.

What Mosley believes boxing fans don't understand is he's got a real shot to pull off an upset over the best boxer in the world.

"It's going to get very interesting, very quick," Mosley said.

NEW YORK — Junior middleweight champion Saul "Canelo" Alvarez will defend his title for the first time against Ryan Rhodes of England on June 18 in Guadalajara, Mexico.

The redheaded, freckle-faced 20-year-old phenom became the youngest man to win the 154-pound title when he dominated Matthew Hatton on March 5 in Anaheim, Calif. Now he'll return to his native Mexico, where Canelo — Spanish for cinnamon — is wildly popular.

"I am very excited that my first world title defense will be in Guadalajara," Alvarez said this week. "I promise I will work extremely hard to give all my fans a great performance."

Soon, all across this fair land, assembled multitudes of young people will sit restlessly listening to commencement addresses. On such solemn occasions, the distinguished speakers, as they look out upon the bright, shining faces of the graduating classes, typically feel obliged to do more than just talk and tell jokes. Instead, they declaim, they orate, they moralize, they rise to the heights of what is commonly called rhetoric. "Let not this generation be one which . . . " "Into your capable hands I bequeath to you this challenge." "Go forth with eager heart and sturdy mind."

If I had a six-shooter (and didn't work in the District), I'd be firing it off in celebration of "Doc," Mary Doria Russell's fantastic new novel about Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp. Since winning top honors for her science fiction 15 years ago, Russell has blasted her way into one genre after another, and now she's picked up the old conventions of the Wild West and brought these dusty myths back to life in a deeply sympathetic, aggressively researched and wonderfully entertaining story.

"Doc" is no colorized daguerreotype; it's a bold act of historical reclamation that scrapes off the bull and allows those American legends to walk and talk and love and grieve in the dynamic 19th-century world that existed before Hollywood shellacked it into cliches. (Stay tuned: Next year Val Kilmer will star in "The First Ride of Wyatt Earp.") With open disdain for those low-down, stinkin' writers who prefer "well-dressed drama to bare-naked fact," Russell can evoke plenty of grandeur and hell-raising without squaring every lawman's jaw and waxing every villain's mustache to a deadly point. And just to prove it, she mentions that famous gunfight at the O.K. Corral several times in these 400 pages but then draws her story of Doc Holliday and the Earp brothers to a perfect close before they ever get to Tombstone. Take that, dime novels.   

LOS ANGELES — With his boyish looks and his thick head of blond hair, Jackie Cooper seemed to be eternally young. He was "Skippy," taking the popular comic strip character to the big screen in a turn that would garner a best actor Oscar nod at age 9.

Cooper remained the youngest player to be nominated for that category, an accolade that he likely didn't care much about at the time: The handsome kid with the winning smile fell asleep during the ceremony in the lap of another nominee, Marie Dressler.

NEW YORK — New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg was present, in the rain on Grand Army Plaza, for the opening of the sculpture installation "Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads," by Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. Bill T. Jones, the choreographer, was there, as well as artist Julian Schnabel and Agnes Gund, philanthropist and former president of the Museum of Modern Art.

Ai Weiwei was not there. Ai, 53, has been missing since early last month, when he was taken away by Chinese authorities.

"The very fact that we do not know where he is or when he will be released is very disturbing," the mayor said.

Broadway baby? You bet. Linda Lavin's first Tony Award nomination came in 1970 for Neil Simon's "Last of the Red Hot Lovers," and she was in the running again last year — for the fifth time — as the star of Donald Margulies's acclaimed drama "Collected Stories." The best actress trophy was hers in 1987 for Simon's "Broadway Bound."

So it's fitting for Lavin to be singing the showbiz anthem "Broadway Baby" in the Kennedy Center's highly anticipated revival of Stephen Sondheim's "Follies" beginning Saturday, even though she's far better known as a TV queen. If you're old enough, you know Lavin's voice: raspy, wry and warm, the single mother with singing dreams slinging hash in Mel's Diner, where another sassy waitress famously chirped, "Kiss my grits!" Starting in 1976 and lasting nine years, Lavin was Alice on the CBS sitcom "Alice."

"Farragut North" is the kind of bluntly current political drama that Washington's inside-the-Beltway theaters don't much like. Dramaturgically, there's nothing very edgy about it: Beau Willimon's 2008 play is a straightforward campaign-trail potboiler, drawn in part from his insider's view as one of Howard Dean's aides in 2004.

Political crossfire is fine with the Olney Theatre Center, though, which has built a laudable track record of picking up topical material that downtown theaters barely sniff at (the post-9/11 dinner party fantasia "Omnium Gatherum," the Iraq War walkup "Stuff Happens"). Director Clay Hopper is making the most of the juicy back-stabbing in Willimon's joyfully profane and malicious play, which is soon to be an appealingly star-studded George Clooney picture. Hopper's production has verve and energy, and every actor is razor sharp.

Soon, all across this fair land, assembled multitudes of young people will sit restlessly listening to commencement addresses. On such solemn occasions, the distinguished speakers, as they look out upon the bright, shining faces of the graduating classes, typically feel obliged to do more than just talk and tell jokes. Instead, they declaim, they orate, they moralize, they rise to the heights of what is commonly called rhetoric. "Let not this generation be one which . . . " "Into your capable hands I bequeath to you this challenge." "Go forth with eager heart and sturdy mind."

I can't resist herbs, so I don't.

The long days of May, the warmth before the heat, the bare earth — all these things get my herb juices going. I usually buy more than I can plant or need. This spring was worse than most. I am looking at one receipt for $175.28, though I'm not sure for what, exactly.

There was the Spanish lavender cultivar named something or other, the Dutch lavender, the tarragon, the chives, three kinds of rosemary and the Greek and Italian oreganos. No wait, the oreganos came later.

Comcast suits told investors Wednesday that the company is committed to spending a couple of hundred million bucks more this year to try to pull NBC out of the ratings cellar, and that much of the money is earmarked for the network's 10 p.m. hour — the one the network nuked with its Great Jay Leno Experiment.

NBC Universal Chief Executive Steve Burke, addressing Wall Street in a conference call Wednesday morning, promised that the company would spend an additional $200 million on prime-time shows this year than last, shows that would try to breathe some ratings life into fourth-place NBC. Comcast, which bought a controlling interest in NBC in January, didn't say how much NBC Universal spent on shows last year.

Official White House photographer Pete Souza has taken countless photos of President Obama signing documents or shooting hoops or greeting officials. But on Sunday, Souza snapped his magnum opus: a Situation Room action shot — or watching-the-action shot — of the president and his national security team monitoring the hit on Osama bin Laden.

The tableau of the already iconic photo is powerful: the unfamiliar staring-daggers gaze of Obama; the operatic emotion of Hillary Rodham Clinton, cupping her mouth with her hand; the Where's-Waldo quality of National Security Council staffer Audrey Tomason popping up at the back of the room; and the mystery arms and elbows of otherwise unseen men.

NEW YORK — New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg was present, in the rain on Grand Army Plaza, for the opening of the sculpture installation "Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads," by Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. Bill T. Jones, the choreographer, was there, as well as artist Julian Schnabel and Agnes Gund, philanthropist and former president of the Museum of Modern Art.

Ai Weiwei was not there. Ai, 53, has been missing since early last month, when he was taken away by Chinese authorities.

"The very fact that we do not know where he is or when he will be released is very disturbing," the mayor said.

Soon, all across this fair land, assembled multitudes of young people will sit restlessly listening to commencement addresses. On such solemn occasions, the distinguished speakers, as they look out upon the bright, shining faces of the graduating classes, typically feel obliged to do more than just talk and tell jokes. Instead, they declaim, they orate, they moralize, they rise to the heights of what is commonly called rhetoric. "Let not this generation be one which . . . " "Into your capable hands I bequeath to you this challenge." "Go forth with eager heart and sturdy mind."