All Blog Posts from Political Hotsheet

Updated 11:11 a.m. Eastern Time

President Obama will announce his new strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as well as any troop increase in the region, in a speech next Tuesday at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time at the United States Military Academy at West Point, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs told reporters this morning.

In the speech at West Point, which is located 50 miles north of New York City, the president is expected to announce he is deploying between 30,000 and 35,000 additional troops to Afghanistan. Gibbs said today that the president has not yet informed him of a final decision.

The press secretary said the president will discuss how to get additional troops into Afghanistan, how to train Afghan forces to take their place, and how to get them out.

"This is year nine of the United States in Afghanistan and we're not going to be there in another eight or nine years," he said, adding: "Our time there will be limited."

Gibbs said the president will discus how to ramp up training of Afghan personnel so security forces "can keep the gains that have been made."

Following a meeting with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh yesterday, the president vowed to "finish the job" that began more than eight years ago in Afghanistan following the Sept. 11 attacks.

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The White House has released the menu for tonight's state dinner honoring Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. It is both tailored to Indian tastes and to the predilections of the prime minister, who has reportedly been "described by aides as an abstemious vegetarian." (Abstemious: "sparing or moderate in eating and drinking; temperate in diet.")

Here's the menu, which will be prepared by guest Chef Marcus Samuelsson and White House Executive Chef Cristeta Comerford. (At left, check out photos from CBS News' Frank Thorp of the table settings for the event.) You'll note the only non-strictly vegetarian option are the green curry prawns:

Potato and Eggplant Salad
White House Arugula w/ Onion Seed Vinaigrette
2008 Savingnon Blanc, Modus Operandi, Napa Valley

Red Lentil Soup w Fresh Cheese
2006 Riesling, Brooks "Ara", Wilamette Valley
Roast Potato Dumplings w Tomato Chutney
Chick Peas and Okra or Green Curry Prawns w caramelized Salsify w smoke Collard Greens and coconut aged basmati
2007 Granache Beckman Vineyards, Santa Ynez, CA

Pumpkin pie tart
Pear tatin
Whipped Cream and Caramel sauce
Sparkling Chardonnay, Thibaut Janisson Brut, Monticello, VA

Petits fours and Coffee
Cashew Brittle
Pecan Pralines
Passion fruit and vanilla gelees
Chocolate dipped fruit

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On @katiecouric this week, former Arkansas governor and Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee told Katie Couric that President Obama's bow to the Japanese emperor was "inappropriate" and "offensive."

"I think that, as a private citizen, for him to bow and show deference and respect is one thing, but as the president of the United States it's not appropriate to bow to foreign leaders because he's representing the country," Huckabee said.

"Isn't he just following custom though?" asked Couric. She later added that "it doesn't seem characteristic of you to focus on it."

"I just thought that that deep bow to the waste to the Japanese emperor was symbolic of saying, 'we're deferring,'" responded Huckabees. "It's not merely a custom and a greeting."

EARLIER: Official: Reaction to Japan Bow Left Obama "Speechless"

Couric noted that a Fox News poll found that 53 percent of Republicans believe it is okay to bow when it's customary.

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On this week's installment of @katiecouric, Mike Huckabee told Katie Couric that once you begin to change the definition of marriage to include gay people marrying each other, "then there is really no limit" to how it will be defined in the future.

"Can we change it to multiple spouses?" he asked. "If not, why not? You know, I hear people say, 'Well, what would be wrong?' What would be wrong, then, with a man having two or three or six or seven wives? Or a woman having six or seven husbands all at the same time? Other than the financial challenge of doing that."

He then used what he called the "illustration of polygamy" to further argue the point.

"Are we being just as bigoted and intolerant and lacking compassion 'cause we don't promote and accept and put a sanction on polygamy?," he asked. "I don't think so."

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Mike Huckabee spelled out his feelings on Sarah Palin and discussed the Republicans he believes have the biggest political futures on this week's installment on @katiecouric.

Palin, he told Katie Couric, is "a very charismatic person who is rock star status in the Republican Party." (watch at left.) He said he would vote for the former Alaska governor against President Obama, although "in the primary, it would depend on who else was running."

"I don't know that much about her job as governor, because she was coming into office as I was leaving," said Huckabee. "And so we didn't have a lot of cross over time where we interacted at the National Governor's Association, or Republican Governor's Association. But I think that she's not anywhere near the person that sometimes she's been portrayed to be – as completely lacking of any intellectual capacity."

Huckabee, a 2008 GOP presidential candidate and former Arkansas governor, is pushing a new book called "A Simple Christmas: Twelve Stories that Celebrate the True Holiday Spirit." A recent Gallup poll found that 71 percent of Republicans would seriously consider voting for him in 2012.

"That was higher than Mitt Romney or Sarah Palin," Couric noted during the 40-minute interview. She asked Huckabee who the Republicans with the "biggest political futures" are today.

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Updated 1:13 p.m. ET

President Obama vowed to "finish the job" in Afghanistan today, less than 24 hours after his final meeting to determine a new strategy going forward in the war.

At a brief press conference following a meeting with India's Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh, at the White House, Mr. Obama said that "after eight years, some of those years in which we did not have, I think, either the resources or the strategy to get the job done, it is my intention to finish the job."

"And I feel very confident that when the American people hear a clear rationale for what we're doing there, and how we intend to achieve our goals, that they will be supportive," he continued.

Washington Unplugged: Dissecting Obama's Promise

The president was responding to a question from CBS News White House correspondent Mark Knoller, one of only two questions he took at the appearance.

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College Football's Bowl Championship Series has turned to Ari Fleischer, the former press secretary to President George W. Bush, to spiff up its image.

The much-debated BCS is facing organized opposition in the form of a federal political action committee "dedicated to discarding the Bowl Championship Series and instituting a competitive post-season championship for college football."

Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii) and Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) have backed the PAC effort, calling the BCS ranking system "arbitrary and anti-competitive," "fundamentally unfair" and "a farce."

Opponents want the BCS ranking system, which relies in part on polls and complicated data calculations to determine the top teams in the country, replaced with a more traditional playoff system. They say the current system effectively freezes out teams that do not come from the bigger conferences.

Politico, which first reported Fleischer's hire, quotes the former press secretary saying, "Playoff advocates have had an easy ride where they have never been called on to explain exactly how they would create an alternative."

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Politics Today is CBSNews.com's inside look at the key stories driving the day in politics. Because of the holiday, the column will not appear again until Monday. Happy Thanksgiving!

**President Holds Final Meeting on Troop Levels

**Said to be Planning to Add 34,000; Announcement to Come Next Tuesday

**Obama Hosting First Official State Dinner

Afghanistan: Following his latest (and apparently final) meeting with his national security team on a new U.S. strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan last night, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said President Obama "has the information he wants and needs to make his decision and he will announce that decision within days."

According to McClatchy Newspapers, which cites unnamed U.S. officials, the president will announce that he will send 34,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, slightly fewer than then 40,000 being sought by the top U.S. commander there, Gen. Stanley McChrystal. There are 68,000 U.S. troops in the country now, including the 21,000 already deployed by the president.

The president will make a primetime address Dec. 1 on the Afghanistan decision, CBS News confirmed.

"Obama is expected to announce his long-awaited decision on Dec. 1, followed by meetings on Capitol Hill aimed at winning congressional support amid opposition by some Democrats who are worried about the strain on the U.S. Treasury and whether Afghanistan has become a quagmire, the officials said," reports McClatchy's Jonathan S. Landay, John Walcott and Nancy A. Youssef.

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Former Vice President Dick Cheney again harshly criticized President Obama this morning, telling a conservative talk show host that the president's much-debated bow to Japan's Emperor Akihito was "fundamentally harmful" to the country and suggesting that Mr. Obama doesn't understand the negative impact of the time he has taken to craft a strategy going forward in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The Weekly Standard reports that Cheney told Scott Hennen that the bow reflected the fact that Mr. Obama "doesn’t fully understand or have the same perception of the US role in the world that most Americans have."

Cheney also said the decision to put Khalid Sheikh Mohammad and other Guantanamo Bay detainees on trial in civilian court was a misguided effort at a "show trial" that will allow terrorists "to stand up and spread the terrible ideology that they adhere to."

And he again made the case that the president's "dithering" on what to do in Afghanistan and Pakistan is hurting the country.

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Members of the Republican National Committee are pushing a resolution built on "conservative principles and public policies" and opposition to "Obama's socialist agenda" that Republican candidates would have to largely accept and adopt if they want the party's support.

The New York Times reports that ten RNC members have signed onto the resolution, which was circulated today. It contains ten principles, among them support for the Defense of Marriage Act, gun rights and "military-recommended troop surges" in Iraq and Afghanistan; opposition to President Obama's health care reform efforts, cap and trade legislation, a card check bill and amnesty for illegal immigrants; and support for "smaller government, smaller national debt, lower deficits and lower taxes."

Any Republican who breaks with more than two of the ten principles, the resolution says, would be denied

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