Presidential candidate Barack Obama found himself in the midst of the increasingly politicized Anheuser-Busch takeover battle on Monday, become the latest politician to weigh in against InBev’s $46.3 billion bid during a news conference in the Budweiser brewer’s home town of St. Louis, Missouri.

“I do think it would be a shame if Bud is foreign-owned,” Obama said. “I think we should be able to find an American company that is interested in purchasing Anheuser Busch if in fact Anheuser Busch feels that it’s necessary to sell.”

Obama has plenty of company in his defense of what is seen as that most American of beers — a perception cemented by nearly half a billion dollars in annual ad spending. Missouri’s Gov. Matt Blunt and Sen. Claire McCaskill have also come out against the deal, although it’s not clear they’re in a position to stop it.

In another sign of how ugly the takeover battle could get, Anheuser Busch played the Cuba card, today saying that InBev, through a subsidiary, has a partnership with that country’s government to produce and sell products there. 

PE Hub’s Connie Loizos has an interview with Martin Pichinson, co-founder of Sherwood Partners, known to VC industry veterans as “the undertaker” for its speciality in shutting down failed companies. As one might imagine, Sherwood’s business is booming:

In January of 2007, the firm was being asked to take on three new clients a month. Fast forward to today and it’s taking on three to four newly imploding companies every week. Most of them are Web 2.0 startups backed by Valley VCs, but Sherwood also counts Google and Microsoft as clients.

I reached Pichinson — an extroverted 62-year-old who once managed musical acts and tends to pepper his speech with words like “caca” — yesterday, after he returned from a three-week trip to Poland. Here’s part of that conversation:

How long does it take you to wind down a company?

If we restructure the company — try to save it, it’s anywhere from 3 months to 12 months. If we close it, it takes up to a year because of all the legal ramifications.

Where are these startups, and their backers, going wrong?

Well, you’ve got to start bringing in companies like Sherwood early to work with managers and help shave off costs. It’s all about extending the runway long enough that customers can absorb a product. Everyone comes up with this cockapoo about startups. It’s not about being smart. It’s about being around long enough.

Cutting costs, negotiating better — these sound like business fundamentals that a startup’s VCs should be helping with.

This is what people don’t understand: decades ago, when a VC put money into a Cisco or HP and sat there and worked with them, they were managing a $2 million fund. Now, with funds the sizes they are, do VCs really have the time to work with all these companies when they don’t know which will be the winner? No.

Click here to read the full interview at PE Hub.

The increasingly hostile Inbev bid for Anheuser-Busch starts the week on the front burner with news InBev has filed SEC documents aimed at tossing Bud’s board. Analysts have warned InBev that a great patriotic (think Bud Light, apple pie and Chevrolet) defense could emerge if InBev ratchets up the pressure too quickly. But hostile bids are nasty by definition, so it’s hard to see why InBev should wait to take off the gloves. The Dutch brewer says it filed suit last month in Delaware to confirm that shareholders can remove all 13 members of the board. The proposed board would include Adolphus Busch IV, an uncle of the current chief executive of Anheuser-Busch and a supporter of the InBev bid. A spokeswoman said InBev had sought board members who would exercise independent judgment and act in the best interest of Anheuser-Busch shareholders, presumably so long as they support the InBev bid.

NBC Universal and private equity firms Bain Capital and Blackstone Group agreed to buy The Weather Channel from Landmark Communications. Terms of the widely expected deal were not disclosed, but sources familiar with the transaction said the price tag was just under $3.5 billion. Privately held Landmark, which put The Weather Channel up for sale along with other businesses, originally had sought $5 billion for the unit. The $3.5 billion price tag on Weather Channel marked one of the biggest private equity deals in the past year. In May, Carlyle Group agreed to buy a majority stake in a unit of consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton for $2.5 billion, and Blackstone Group last month said it would buy Apria Healthcare Group for $1.6 billion.

German dialysis-to-hospitals group Fresenius unveiled a $3.7 billion deal to buy U.S. firm APP Pharmaceuticals to enter the world’s biggest drug market, but its investors balked at the plan. The agreed takeover, one of the biggest in the healthcare group’s history, sent Fresenius shares tumbling as traders cited investor concern over possible capital-raising measures and the price. APP shareholders will receive $23 a share in cash, a 29 percent premium to the stock’s last closing price and could get a further $6 a share in the second quarter of 2011 if APP beats a core profit target. Fresenius stock dropped as much as 11 percent. APP focuses on injectable generic drugs for hospital use and distributes its products in the United States and Canada. It has about 1,400 staff.

China’s largest offshore oil services group agreed to buy Norwegian peer Awilco Offshore for around $2.5 billion to increase its drilling capacity and tap overseas markets. China Oilfield Services, an arm of China’s top offshore oil and gas producer CNOOC, will pay 85 crowns per share for the Oslo-based company in what will be the fourth-largest cross-border acquisition by a Chinese company in the oil and gas sector, according to Thomson Reuters. The price is an 18.7 percent premium over Awilco Offshore’s July 4 closing price and 42 percent above where it traded before May 30, when Awilco said a third party had expressed an interest.

Other deals of the day:

* Norway’s Norske Skog agreed to sell its Steti mill in the Czech Republic to paper producer Mondi at book value to cut costs.

* Oman kicked off its planned sale of 25 percent in Oman Telecommunications, inviting investor interest in a deal it hopes will boost the state-controlled firm’s competitive position.

* Norwegian driller Awilco Offshore said it agreed to be taken over by China Oilfield Services, an arm of the CNOOC group, for 85 crowns per share and a total of about $2.5 billion.

* Abu Dhabi National Energy said it had bought northern North Sea equity interests from Shell and ExxonMobil.

* German media group Bertelsmann is drawing up plans for the sale of its DirectGroup France division for an amount that could exceed 300 million euros ($470.9 million), French newspaper Le Figaro said on Monday.

* Inmet Mining said it would make an all-cash offer to acquire Petaquilla Copper, its partner in the Petaquilla copper project in Panama, for $2 per share.

* Chinese metals trader Sinosteel’s stake in Australian takeover target Midwest Corp has risen to 45 percent, according to a regulatory filing, as it battles for control of the iron ore prospector. Sinosteel held 45.58 percent of Midwest as of July 4, up from 43.62 percent at the time of its last filing on June 13.

* Murchison Metals has dropped its plans to merge with fellow Australian iron ore explorer Midwest, saying it did not have the support of Midwest’s major shareholder, Sinosteel.

* Challenger Financial Group said it would buy back up to 10 percent of its share capital.