evening all

People reach out to grasp hands with President Obama after he spoke at the University of Miami, February 23

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Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, Fla

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First Lady Michelle Obama views The Slave Pen exhibit while touring the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati, Ohio, Feb. 23. Pictured, from left, are: Dina Bailey, Associate Curator of the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center; Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory; Verna Williams; and Allison Singleton. (Official White House Photo by Sonya N. Hebert)

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Friday:

11:15 AM: PBO attends the Democratic Governors’ Association meeting.

3:00 PM: PBO holds a bilateral meeting with Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt of Denmark.

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More photos from Miami:

Denver Post

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ThinkProgress

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Greg Sargent: It’s becoming clearer and clearer that the auto bailout will be central to Campaign 2012’s argument over government and the economy, and Pew Research releases some striking numbers….

The latest national survey …finds that 56% say the loans the government made to GM and Chrysler were mostly good for the economy, while 38% say the loans to the automakers were mostly bad for the economy.

Opinion about the auto loans has reversed since October 2009. At that time, just 37% said the loans were mostly good for the economy while 54% expressed negative views…..

…. independents think the auto bailout was good for the economy by a wide margin, 54-40. Even moderate/liberal Republicans agree, 57-39. And Pew tells me that non-college-degree whites – a key swing constituency that will be pivotal in the Rust Belt states – also agree, 51-40.

More here

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Mother Jones

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ThinkProgress: Earlier this month, the nation was barraged with media coverage of the Catholic Bishops’ opposition to regulations promulgated under the Affordable Care Act protecting working women’s access to contraception. The loudness of the bishops’ complaints ….  easily could have conveyed the misimpression that churches and other religious groups are at odds with the Affordable Care Act.

On Friday, however, a broad coalition of religious organizations filed an amicus brief supporting the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion that should give the lie to any claim that the faith community opposes the ACA …. the brief’s signatories include a wide range of Catholic groups….

More here

Thanks Loriah

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ThinkProgress: As further proof that conservative efforts to paint President Obama as the enemy of religion are a red herring, nearly two dozen leading Catholic nuns filed a brief in the Supreme Court last week supporting the president’s signature legislative accomplishment. The Catholic sisters who joined the brief include the leaders of many prominent religious orders providing health care and other services to the needy…

More here

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Full interview here

Thanks CTGirl

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Thanks Edwina

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The Clowns:

Esquire

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Get your iPhone case – now!

pete souza & chuck kennedy? magic.

…. with St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Lance Berkman after welcoming the team to the White House to honor their 2011 World Series victory, Jan. 17

….. greeting neighbors outside the home of William and Endia Eason in Cleveland, Ohio, Jan. 4

….  during the flight on Marine One to Soldier Field in Chicago, Ill., Jan. 11

….. greeting Tuskeegee Airmen in the East Garden Room of the White House prior to a screening of the film “Red Tails” in the Family Theater, Jan. 13

….. watching a performance backstage with iCarly cast members prior to an iCarly screening at Hayfield Secondary School in Alexandria, Va., Jan. 13

Jan. 27

… boarding Marine One for departure from Cambridge-Dorchester Airport in Cambridge, Md., Jan. 27

First Lady Michelle Obama participates in a potato sack race with Jimmy Fallon in the East Room of the White House, Jan. 25

…. signing items for Make-A-Wish child Rafael Mullet during a visit in the Oval Office, Jan. 25

….. with students at Parklawn Elementary School in Alexandria, Va., Jan. 25

…. hugging Rep. Gabrielle Giffords before delivering the State of the Union address, Jan. 24

How did I miss these, they were posted on Flickr a week ago 😕

More photos here

university of miami (updated)

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The University of Miami, February 23

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Touring the Industrial Assessment Center at the University of Miami

miami heat …. fired up

florida flyer

An unidentified guest holds up a poster of President Barack Obama as Superman as they watch him depart on Marine One helicopter on the South Lawn at the White House as he travels to Florida.

rise and shine

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Steve Benen: The general trend on initial unemployment claims over the last few months has been largely encouraging, despite occasional setbacks, and most analysts expected this morning’s report to show a modest uptick in filings.

The good news is, that didn’t happen. In fact, initial jobless claims reached a four-year low last week, and the new totals were unchanged this week.

More here

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Greg Sargent: At yesterday’s debate, Mitt Romney and the other candidates went all in on birth control – sorry, “religious liberty” – in blasting President Obama over the contraception controversy…. But some new polling out this morning from Quinnipiac illustrates the risk Republicans are taking with this latest reprise of the culture wars:

President Obama recently announced an adjustment to the administration’s health-care rule regarding religiously affiliated employers providing birth control coverage to female employees. Women will still be guaranteed coverage for birth control without any out-of-pocket cost, but will have to seek the coverage directly from their insurance companies if their employers object to birth control on religious grounds. Do you approve or disapprove of President Obama’s decision?

Approve: 54

Disapprove: 38

Independents approve 56-36; women 56-34.

More here

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Steve Benen: …… Romney added that Obama is “requiring the Catholic Church to provide for its employees and its various enterprises health care insurance that would include birth control, sterilization and the morning-after pill. Unbelievable.”

It is, in fact, literally “unbelievable,” since that’s not at all what the administration is doing.

It was painful enough to have so much of the debate focus on opposition to birth control, but Romney’s dishonesty managed to make a mind-numbing discussion even worse.

Full post here

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TPM (Thanks Desertflower)

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Washington Post

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Ronald Brownstein (National Journal): ….. Some of Romney’s answers could come back to haunt him, not in the primary but in a general election, if he gets that far.

At a time when some Republicans are already concerned that he has narrowed his potential support among Latinos with an unflinching embrace of conservative positions on immigration (like “self-deportation”), Romney doubled down by insisting that on “day one” as president he would drop the federal legal challenge to Arizona’s tough state statute against illegal immigration.

And on the same day that an NBC/Marist poll already showed Romney trailing President Obama by 18 percentage points in Michigan, a state Republicans once hoped to contest this fall, Romney likewise doubled down on his criticism of the auto rescue engineered by Bush and Obama – and sprinkled in some especially sharp rhetoric against the United Auto Workers union for good measure.

More here

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TPM

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ThinkProgress (Thanks Ladyhawke)

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E.J. Dionne: They say that President Obama is a Muslim, but if he isn’t, he’s a secularist who is waging war on religion. On some days he’s a Nazi, but on most others he’s merely a socialist….

Whatever our president is, he is never allowed to be a garden-variety American who plays basketball and golf, has a remarkably old-fashioned family life and, in the manner we regularly recommend to our kids, got ahead by getting a good education.

Please forgive this outburst. It’s simply astonishing that a man in his fourth year as our president continues to be the object of the most extraordinary paranoid fantasies … And now that the economy is improving, short-circuiting easy criticisms, Obama’s adversaries are reheating all the old tropes and cliches and slanders.

….. As for Obama as a socialist, ponder two numbers: 13,005, which the Dow Jones average hit this week, up from a low point of 6,547 in March 2009. Some socialist.

We are blessed with the freedom to say whatever we want about our president. But those who cast Obama as something other than one of us don’t understand him and don’t understand what it means to be American.

Full article here

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The Week

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Nick Anderson

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10:45: PBO departs the White House

1:25 Arrives in Miami, Florida.

1:45: Tours the Industrial Assessment Center at the University of Miami.

2:25: Delivers remarks to University of Miami students and faculty members.

4:20: Delivers remarks at a campaign event at the Biltmore Hotel, Coral Gables, Florida.

5:55: Delivers remarks at a campaign event.

7:00L Departs Miami, Florida en route Orlando, Florida.

8:15: Arrives in Orlando, Florida.

8:55: Delivers remarks at a campaign event.

10:30: Departs Orlando, Florida en route Joint Base Andrews.

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Morning everyone 😉