Iran and the United States both denied any deal had been reached for one-on-one nuclear talks, as The New York Times reported -- even though the White House said it was open to such a dialogue.

The Times report on Saturday came at a key point in the U.S. presidential campaign, with incumbent Barack Obama set to face Republican rival Mitt Romney on Monday in their last of three debates, this one focused on foreign policy.

Win or lose, President Barack Obama will spend election night in his hometown of Chicago and will speak at a smaller venue than the large park where he held his victory speech four years ago, a source said Wednesday.

Obama, who is battling Republican Mitt Romney for a second four-year term in the White House, will deliver remarks on November 6 at McCormick Place, Chicago's convention center, according to the source with knowledge of the matter.

The Internet exploded with memes Wednesday mocking Mitt Romney for his "binders full of women" remark at his town-hall debate with President Barack Obama the night before.

"Captain of finance, binder of women," snickered one meme featuring a smiling portrait of the equity-fund tycoon turned politician and Republican White House challenger.

President Barack Obama's deputy national security advisor was in Baghdad this week for talks with Iraqi leaders on issues including the spillover from the unrest in Syria, the White House said Wednesday.

Dennis McDonough met Monday with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki, the speaker of Iraq's parliament as well other top officials, said National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor.

President Barack Obama swung straight back onto the campaign trail Wednesday after out-maneuvering his White House rival Mitt Romney in a comeback debate and re-energizing his faltering re-election bid.

Most observers, backed by anecdotal instant polls, gave Obama victory in Tuesday's second election showdown between the pair. But both candidates were determined to maintain their momentum with less than three weeks until polling day.

Barack Obama and Mitt Romney disagree on many things, but their teams reached consensus on one issue -- the room temperature in the hall at their second debate on Tuesday.

By bipartisan agreement, the non-profit Commission on Presidential Debates kept the room at a cool 62 to 64 degrees Fahrenheit (17 to 18 degrees Celsius), according to CNN, whose reporter Candy Crowley moderated the debate.

A combative Barack Obama landed telling blows on challenger Mitt Romney Tuesday as naked dislike boiled over between the White House foes in a tense debate three weeks from election day.

President Obama bounced off the ropes after a dismal showing in their first encounter two weeks ago, knowing his tumbling poll numbers could doom him to the historical ignominy of a single term without a sharp intervention.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Monday she takes the blame for any shortcomings in the handling of an attack last month on the U.S. mission in the Libyan city of Benghazi.

"I take responsibility," she said, according to the news networks CNN and Fox, which interviewed her during a visit to the Peruvian capital Lima.

Three weeks before election day, the White House race between U.S. president Barack Obama and his Republican foe Mitt Romney remains statistically tied, with Obama maintaining just a slight advantage, a new opinion poll found Monday.

The latest ABC News/Washington Post survey showed that likely voters favored Obama over Romney by 49 percent to 46 percent, which is within the poll's margin of error.

The majority of weapons secretly shipped to Syria at the behest of Saudi Arabia and Qatar go to hardline Islamic rebel groups rather than more secular organizations favored by the West, The New York Times reported Monday.

Citing unnamed officials, the newspaper said this was the conclusion reached in classified reports presented to President Barack Obama and other senior officials.