Though the candidates and their advisers are carefully watching the European financial crisis and experts warn problems in the eurozone could knock the United States out of its fragile recovery, Gallup polling shows U.S. voters are not highly focused on the EU’s financial state. Of those polled, 49 percent said they are following Europe’s financial news, including 16 percent watching “very closely.” Read more »

As part of their series on twelve campaign issues facing the next president, the Brookings Institution recently hosted a panel discussion examining the U.S role in the world. Read more »

While Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has criticized President Barack Obama’s opposition to arming Syrian rebels, other members of his party seem divided on Syria, with some congressional Republicans sharing the president’s reluctance and others urging airstrikes (NYT). Read more »

Violence in Syria is back in the campaign spotlight as President Barack Obama faces tough criticism from GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney over his handling of the escalating situation. Read more »

GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney is attempting to campaign in Ohio and other swing states (TIME) on a bad economy, which he would like to blame on President Barack Obama. This line, however, puts in him at odds with the Republican governors who seem to be echoing Obama’s message of slow-but-promising progress. Read more »

The economy remains the biggest focus this election cycle, and will likely remain so, but some analysts suggest it takes just one big foreign policy/national security event to pivot the election debate and perhaps even decide the race.

In last week’s post for Foreign Policy’s “The List,” Uri Friedman looked at five potential events that could pull focus from the economy, including the classic “October surprise,” that thing no one can foresee. Read more »

On this week’s views, we have some interesting items via the site Worldcrunch, which kindly translates partner news outlets from around the world into English and has a section devoted to “Eyes on the U.S.”

To start, we head to Brazil to hear the story of Lucas Santos, who came to the United States illegally with his parents thirteen years ago as a boy of eight. Read more »

President Barack Obama took to the campaign trail Thursday in a speech in Iowa calling for clean-energy tax credits, saying they are good for both the environment and the economy (Politico). Read more »

Some analysts are saying Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s plan to overhaul education could make things worse, in a system where experts already worry that the United State faces difficulties creating a workforce to meet the demands of the 21st century job market. Read more »

The Romney campaign released a white paper proposing a major education system restructuring and is already touting support from Republican governors around the country, including Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, and Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell. Read more »