President Barack Obama is so fired up about the last stretch of this election that his stump speech is "coming from his loins," top campaign adviser David Axelrod told reporters Friday.

Axelrod made the comment during an impromptu briefing with reporters in Lima, Ohio, along with senior White House adviser David Plouffe. 

Responding to this reporter’s question, "Can you tell us how the president feels right now?" Axelrod responded: "I can say I've known him for 20 years, we’ve worked closely for 10 years; I’ve never seen him more exhilarated than he is right now."

Pablo Martinez Monsivais / AP

Senior Campaign Adviser David Axelrod, left, and White House Senior Adviser David Plouffe, talk Friday during a campaign event for President Barack Obama at Springfield High School in Springfield, Ohio.

"You can see in the speech that he’s delivering that this is coming from his loins," he continued. As giggles emanated from the assembled press, he added, jokingly, "I just wanted to say loins."

Despite the light moment, the advisers spent most of the gaggle drilling down into homestretch campaign strategy.

The Obama team was specifically asked about the fact Republican Mitt Romney’s campaign is making a late run for Pennsylvania, evidenced by Romney visiting there Sunday.

Axelrod suggested Romney’s late play for the Keystone state was a result of the Republicans' dwindling hopes in all-important Ohio.

"The fact is their campaign had a car wreck in Ohio and now they’re trying to make up for it in Pennsylvania," he said.

The comment was a clear reference to Romney’s opposition to the auto bailout, which resonates with Ohio voters. But when pressed about why the Obama team would send former President Bill Clinton to Pennsylvania this weekend if they are so confident, Axelrod replied: "All it reflects is our prudence that we’re going to defend what we have."

Plouffe pointed to the fact that there are about a million more Democrats registered in Pennsylvania than Republicans. Still polls show the race is tightening in Pennsylvania with both campaigns pouring money into advertising there – a sign there is at least some unease within the Obama campaign ranks. 

The race is also close in Ohio where Obama spent the day hammering Romney for saying on the stump and in ads that Jeep planned to ship jobs to China. The claim has been widely discredited by the car company and newspapers throughout Ohio. Still, the Romney campaign stands by the claim arguing that the companies will eventually expand production overseas.

When a reporter asked the Obama campaign officials if they saw any tangible sign that Romney’s Jeep ad has hurt him in Ohio, Plouffe responded: "There is no bit of data that we’ve seen in this last week that makes us less confident."

Axelord quipped that reporters will have the answers to all their questions soon: "Everybody is fascinated to know what is going to happen on Tuesday; we're going to know on Tuesday."

Brendan Smialowski / AFP - Getty Images

President Barack Obama greets supporters after speaking during a campaign event at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio on Wednesday.

A day after the second presidential debate, which included a robust discussion about women's healthcare and equal pay, President Barack Obama aimed to build momentum with women voters as he campaigned in key battleground states on Wednesday.

During a stop in Mount Vernon, Iowa, Obama seized on Mitt Romney’s widely panned “binders full of women” comment, to suggest his Republican opponent is out of touch: “I’ve got to tell you, we don’t have to collect a bunch of binders to find qualified, talented, driven young women, ready to learn and teach in these fields right now,” the president told a crowd of supporters.

During the Tuesday night debate, Romney said that while he was governor of Massachusetts, he asked women’s groups to help him find qualified female applicants for his cabinet. Those groups then brought him “binders full of women,” he said. The phrase immediately touched off a social media storm on Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr.

The Obama campaign hopes to capitalize on the "binders" comment and other issues related to women, believing they can erode some of the inroads Romney may have made with that voting bloc. The latest USA Today Gallup Poll showed Romney and Obama in a tie among women in battleground states. The latest NBC News/WSJ poll showed the president with a double-digit lead among women in Ohio, Florida and Virginia.

While on the campaign trail Wednesday, Obama knocked Romney on fair pay, arguing that Romney has yet to clarify where he stands on the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, which makes it easier for women to sue employers for pay discrimination. The president also hammered Romney for supporting the so-called Blunt amendment, which would allow employers to deny women access to contraceptives based on religious beliefs.

During the debate, Romney said the president misrepresents his position on women’s access to healthcare.

“I’d just note that I don’t believe that bureaucrats in Washington should tell someone whether they can use contraceptives or not," Romney said. "I don’t believe employers should tell someone whether they could have contraceptive care or not. Every woman in America should have access to contraceptives.”

On Wednesday, Kerry Healey, Romney’s former lieutenant governor, appeared on MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Reports to defend the former Massachusetts governor: “This whole discussion about contraception and binders of women is a distraction form the Obama administration’s failure on women’s issues generally.”

When Mitchell asked Healey if employer-subsidized contraceptives are a “pocketbook issue” for women, Healey dodged the question.

“One of the core freedoms that we have as people here in America is our religious freedom. And we cannot infringe on that," she said.

The Romney campaign has worked to portray him as moderate on women’s issues. On Wednesday, the campaign released a new ad featuring a female Obama supporter who says straight to camera: "Those ads saying Mitt Romney would ban all abortions and contraception seemed a bit extreme. So I looked into it. Turns out, Romney doesn't oppose contraception at all. In fact, he thinks abortion should be an option in cases of rape, incest or to save a mother's life."

The ad is correct that Romney supports abortion in cases of rape and incest. But the GOP candidate has also said that he supports ending federal funding to Planned Parenthood, which provides reproductive health care services including abortions.

Obama campaign aides say they will continue to highlight the differences between the president and his Republican challenger on women’s issues – crucial, given that in 2008, women made up 53 percent of voters.

Slideshow: Twin sons of different parties

From tramping through cornfields to munching ice cream cones to holding babies – the time-honored traditions of the campaign trail leave President Barack Obama and GOP challenger Mitt Romney looking surprisingly alike.

Launch slideshow

COLUMBUS, OH -- Feathers were ruffled on Sesame Street on Tuesday when the Obama campaign launched a campaign ad starring Big Bird.

The new spot, which airs on cable networks, mocks Mitt Romney for saying during last week’s debate that he would cut public funding to the Public Broadcasting Service – even though he likes Big Bird.

But Sesame Workshop – the nonpartisan nonprofit behind Sesame Street – wasn’t pleased. In a statement, Sesame Workshop objected to the ad: “We have approved no campaign ads, and, as is our general practice, have requested that both campaigns remove Sesame Street characters and trademarks from their campaign materials.”  

The ad begins with an ominous voiceover listing the names of Wall Street criminals, including Bernie Madoff and Kenneth Lay. The deep, dramatic voice then says, “It’s not Wall Street you have to worry about; it’s Sesame Street.”

The camera then cuts to a shot of Big Bird sleeping.

President Barack Obama has seized on Romney’s Big Bird comment to argue that his Republican challenger would crack down on beloved American institutions such as Sesame Street but would allow Wall Street to run wild.

Speaking to a crowd of 15,000 in Columbus, OH the President said, “Today (Romney) decided we’re going after Big Bird. Elmo’s making a run for the border and Oscar is hiding out in a trash can.”

Emphasizing the Sesame Street theme, recording artist will-i-am kicked off his performance at the Ohio event by playing the Sesame Street theme song.  

The Obama campaign has also dispatched Big Bird mascots to stand outside Romney campaign events and even Michelle has entered the fray. On Tuesday, the first lady told supporters in Loudon, Va.: “We all know good and well that cutting Sesame Street is no way to balance a budget.”

Related: 'Sesame Street' wants Obama campaign to yank ad mentioning Big Bird

Speaking in Van Meter, Iowa, Romney fired back: “These are tough times with real serious issues. You have to scratch your head when the president spends the last week talking about saving Big Bird.”

The Romney campaign noted that Obama has in recent days made more public references to Big Bird than Libya – where the U.S. consulate was recently attacked and the ambassador killed. 

But the Obama campaign stands by its strategy.

“The point we’re making here is that when Mitt Romney was given the opportunity to lay out how he would address the deficit … his first offering was to cut funding to Big Bird and that is absurd and hard to take seriously,” Obama campaign spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters.

With polls showing Romney improving since the debate, it remains to be seen whether the president’s “Big Bird Offensive” will sway undecided voters.

But one thing is clear – Big Bird says the campaign ad doesn’t fly.

BOONE, IA -- During the first two stops of his Iowa campaign trip, President Barack Obama took direct aim at Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney’s newly-minted running mate.

But don’t expect the president to make Ryan his permanent foil on this trip.

An Obama campaign official told NBC News that the president isn’t going to talk about Paul Ryan at every event during his three-day swing through Iowa, saying the race is more about the vision for the top of the ticket – Mitt Romney – than it is about Ryan.

But that doesn’t mean the president won’t tie both members of the GOP team with Ryan’s day job in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, which, along with the Democrat-controlled Senate, is one of the most unpopular institutions in America.

On Monday morning in Council Bluffs, IA, Obama called on Ryan, the House Budget Committee chairman, to convince his colleagues to pass the farm bill, a crucial piece of legislation that was not taken up before Congress left for recess.

“So if you happen to see Congressman Ryan, tell him how important this farm bill is to Iowa and to our rural communities. It’s time to put politics aside and pass it right away,” Obama said.

But Obama dropped that direct appeal at his next stop at a park pavilion in Boone, IA, where he repeated what is already becoming a familiar, albeit softer, line of attack: “Over the weekend my opponent chose as his running mate the ideological leader of the Republicans in Congress. And I’ve gotten to know Congressman Ryan – he’s a good man, he’s a family man, he’s a very articulate spokesperson for Governor Romney’s vision. But it’s a vision I fundamentally disagree with."

Although it may have been politically advantageous for the president to directly address Ryan on Monday (while Ryan, riding high from this weekend’s rollout, also stumped in Iowa), it may be more beneficial for the president to refocus his attacks on the man running to unseat him: Mitt Romney. 

For months, President Barack Obama has urged his supporters to donate money to his campaign, warning that his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, will likely outpace him in fundraising. Now, for the first time this election cycle, Obama is putting some of his own money into his war chest.

On Tuesday, the Obama campaign released a YouTube video that shows the president donating $5,000 – the federal maximum allowed per person – to his campaign fund. The video opens with the president sitting at a computer, telling his supporters: “First of all, I think everybody should know that I really care about this campaign and I believe in what our administration is doing and I want to make sure that folks know I’m not just talking the talk, I’m walking the walk.”

He assures voters that the first lady is on board: “I have cleared this with Michelle; I want everybody to know.” 

But the issue of campaign finance is no laughing matter for team Obama (which includes the Obama Campaign, Obama Victory fund and the Democratic National Committee) which has been outpaced in fundraising for the past two months by team Romney (the Romney Campaign, the Republican National Committee and the Republican National Committee Victory Fund).  

The Obama campaign remains on top, with nearly $100 million in its coffers, according to federal election data at opensecrets.org. The Romney campaign, by contrast, has slightly more than $20 million.

Still, Republican-leaning super PACs have trounced their Democratic counterparts when it comes to hauling in cash. By all accounts, the super PACs have tipped the overall fundraising scales in the Republicans’ direction. 

It is not unusual for candidates to donate to their own campaign. According to Romney aides, he and his wife each donated $75,000 to the Romney re-election effort including the RNC and Romney Victory Fund in May.

But for Obama, this is a shift. In 2008, then-candidate Obama did not contribute to his campaign, according to an Obama for America official.

Locked in a tough re-election battle with Mitt Romney, President Barack Obama aimed to energize his core supporters – African American voters – by delivering a rousing speech and unveiling a new executive order at the Urban League’s annual convention in New Orleans Wednesday night.

The president told the largely African American crowd of roughly 3,700 people that the executive order will seek to improve educational achievement for African Americans at all levels “so every child has greater access to a complete and competitive education from the time they’re born to the time, all through the time they get a career” the president said to cheers.

An administration official tells NBC News the order will create a new White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African-Americans that will “work across Federal agencies and with partners and communities nationwide to produce a more effective continuum of education programs for African American students.”

The official added that the initiative would be housed in the Education Department, which will work with the Executive Office and other Cabinet agencies to identify practices that will improve African Americans’ achievement in schools and colleges. The administration official did not yet know how much funding the program would receive but said more information would be released Thursday when the president signs the executive order.

The president has previously received criticism from some black leaders for not doing enough to help the African American community as rates for school dropout and unemployment among African Americans continue to be higher than the national numbers.

For example, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, the dropout rate for African American students ages 16 to 25 was 8 percent in 2010; by comparison, white students in that age range had a 5.1 percent dropout rate. Further, the unemployment rate for African Americans is 14.4 percent, significantly higher than the national average of 8.2 percent.

Last August, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA) told a crowd of Congressional Black Caucus members in Detroit, “We want to give the president every opportunity to show what he can do and what he’s prepared to lead on. But our people are hurting and the unemployment rate is unconscionable.”

Obama has in the past responded to such criticism. In an interview on BET last September he answered a question about why he didn’t create more policies specifically targeted at African Americans: “That’s not how America works,” the president replied, “America works when all of us are pulling together and everybody is focused on making sure that every single person has opportunity.”

When asked if this latest executive order is timed to mobilize African American voters ahead of the election, one White House official said it is “one more step along a path that the president has been walking.” The official cited the fact that the president enacted the Race to the Top initiative and new flexibility on No Child Left Behind, actions aimed at improving educational opportunities for all students including minorities, according to the Official.

On Tuesday, the president admitted there was still a lot more work and asked the Urban League crowd for their continued support: “If we don’t keep fighting for better jobs and a better future, who will? That’s our challenge. We don’t quit.”

From the Romney camp, spokeswoman Tara Wall responded to the speech, saying, "As black Americans, we all take pride in Barack Obama's historic election - but unfortunately his performance as president has not matched that enthusiasm."

Exit polls show that 95 percent of African American voters supported president Obama in 2008. Analysts believe he will need them to turn out in similarly large numbers if he hopes to win key swing states such as Ohio, Virginia, North Carolina.

The president wrapped up his remarks with a familiar plea for voters to turnout in November; “I still believe in you and if you still believe in me I ask you stand with me. March with me. Fight with me and … I promise we will finish what we started, turn this economy around, seize our future and remind the world why the United States of America is the greatest nation on earth.”

DES MOINES, IA – President Barack Obama delivered one of his most direct attacks against Mitt Romney here Thursday night, painting Romney as an out-of-touch corporate raider.

At this event, held before an enthusiastic crowd of 2,500 at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, Obama reminded the crowd that Romney said “corporations are people,” while stumping in Iowa last August during the Republican primary. The president said there may be value in Romney’s experience in corporate buyouts, “but it’s not in the White House.”

He also noted that the former governor doesn’t talk about his record in Massachusetts.

Speaking directly to Iowans, Obama used local lingo to slam Romney: “Governor Romney came to Des Moines last week and warned of a prairie fire of debt,” he said. “But he left out some facts. His speech was more like a cow pie of distortion.”

Then he quipped, “I don’t know whose record he twisted the most – mine or his.”

Obama warned his supporters that this race would be tougher than 2008 and argued that he represents the future and Romney the past.

"We don't need another political fight about ending women's right to choose or getting rid of Planned Parenthood," Mr. Obama said as the crowd erupted into cheers.

The president portrayed the event as a homecoming – Iowa helped launch Mr. Obama's campaign in 2008.

"Four or five years ago it was you who kept us going when pundits had written us off,” he told the audience. “In front porches, in backyards, our movement for change began."

Several people in the crowd yelled back: "We love you!"

NAYPYITAW, Myanmar – Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with Myanmar’s President Thein Sein on Thursday to discuss how the reclusive regime can continue its reform efforts and enter the international mainstream. 

“I am here today because President Obama and myself are encouraged by the steps that you and your government have taken to provide for your people,” Clinton said.

Sein called the secretary’s visit “historic” and a “new chapter” for Myanmar.  Clinton presented Myanmar’s president with a letter from President Obama.  The meeting took place at the presidential palace in Naypyitaw and lasted several hours.

In her remarks to reporters after the meeting, Clinton said while the progress that Myanmar has taken is welcome it is just a start. She called on the country to release all political prisoners, hold free and fair elections and sever its “illicit ties with North Korea.”

The U.S. has long suspected that Mynamar might be working with North Korea to obtain nuclear weapons. Taking a frank tone, Clinton said, “the most consequential question facing this country is not its relationship with America or any other nation.  It is whether leaders will let their people live up to their God-given potential and claim their place at the heart of a Pacific Century? Or will this country, once again, be left behind?”

Clinton said the United States is prepared to take steps that would lessen Myanmar's isolation including:  an invitation to join a regional development initiative as an observer, allowing the IMF and World Bank assessment missions to start studying needs on the ground and possibly a joint effort to recover the remains of Americans who were lost during World War II – a step that helped the U.S. repair relations with Vietnam. 

In the long term the United States said they are discussing upgrading diplomatic relations with Myanmar and exchanging ambassadors. The United States hasn’t had an ambassador in the region for more than two decades.

Clinton ended her remarks with a challenge to Myanmar:  “President Obama spoke of ‘flickers of progress’ we know from history that flickers can die out. They can be stamped out. It will be up to the leaders of this country to fan flickers of progress into a flame of freedom that lights the path toward a better future.”

On Thursday evening Clinton met pro-democracy leader and Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi for a private home of the top-ranking U.S. diplomat  in Myanmar before a more formal meeting at Suu Kyi's residence on Friday.

Suu Kyi was a political prisoner in the country for the better part of the past two decades and was just released last year. She recently announced she would re-enter the political process.

It is the first time the pair have met in person, though they have spoken by telephone. Clinton will also present her with a letter from Obama.  

Related link: Clinton to get first top-level peek at Myanmar in over 50 years

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton embarks on an historic trip to Myanmar (also known as Burma) this week – it will be the first visit by a U.S. secretary of state to the isolated country in more than 50 years. 

Clinton is also scheduled to meet for the first time with Aung San Suu Kyi, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 and has been a political prisoner in Myanmar for 15 of the last 22 years until she was freed last year.

President Barack Obama announced on Nov. 18 that he was sending Clinton to Myanmar saying that he had seen “flickers of progress” in the country which has been governed by military rule for half a century.

“President Thein Sein and the Burmese Parliament have taken important steps on the path toward reform,” the president said speaking from Bali, Indonesia. “A dialogue between the government and Aung San Suu Kyi has begun. The government has released some political prisoners. Media restrictions have been relaxed. And legislation has been approved that could open the political environment.” Obama also said he had spoken with Suu Kyi and confirmed that she supports American engagement in the region and that she welcomed the visit by Clinton.

Still the trip is a potential foreign policy risk. On the one hand the United States could help Myanmar usher in a new era of open government while loosening China’s influence in the region. But Myanmar still has a long way to go – it currently holds a number of political prisoners, has been heavily criticized for its treatment of minorities and its relationship with North Korea.

U.S. Senator Richard Lugar released a statement saying that Myanmar’s relationship with North Korea should be closely scrutinized. “North Korea is believed to be continuing development of its nuclear, biological and chemical weapons program…over five years ago, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was informed…of Burma’s reported intention to develop nuclear weapons in coordination with North Korea,” Lugar said. For years the United States has imposed a number of sanctions against Myanmar and there is almost no chance that this trip will lead to a loosening of those sanctions.

Clinton has said that she will press Myanmar to enact more reforms and will assess how the United States can help the country move toward democracy.

Clinton’s first stop on her trip will be in Busan, South Korea where she will attend the world’s largest forum on international aid – the fourth High Level Forum on Aid and Effectiveness. The conference will focus on finding more efficient ways to give international aid to developing nations.

Then she will head to Myanmar where she will hold talks with government officials in Myanmar’s capital of Naypyidaw on Thursday and will meet with Suu Kyi on Friday – a moment that will undoubtedly be the highlight of the trip.

Clinton – who called for Suu Kyi’s release when she was first lady – has only spoken to Suu Kyi by telephone but has never met her in person – until now.