30 | November | 2013 | The Obama Diary

Nov

Supporting The Community

Categories: All Photos, All Videos and Articles
Tags: Barack Obama, bookstore, Malia, Obama, Pete Souza, Political And Funny Tweets, Politics And Prose, President, Sasha, saturday, small business, Small Business Saturday, tweets

@PeteSouza

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President Barack Obama shops with daughters Sasha and Malia at Politics and Prose Bookstore and Coffeehouse in Washington

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AG Holder makes one more purchase @UnionMarketDC before heading home. Support local merchants on #SmallBizSat http://t.co/PZQOHCNcUl
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Justice Department (@TheJusticeDept) November 30, 2013

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WJLA: President Obama Visits Politics And Prose On Small Business Saturday

President Barack Obama is doing his part to support small businesses. Obama and daughters Malia and Sasha dropped in Saturday at Washington’s Politics and Prose bookstore and purchased what he said was a “long list” of books that included “The Kite Runner,” ”Harold and the Purple Crayon,” and “The Sports Gene”. The president said he bought a reader for every age, from 5 to 52 – his age. Obama sent a tweet earlier Saturday about the importance of supporting small businesses.

More here

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The wonderful Lene and Abeba Tsegaye, owners of Kefa Cafe and neighborhood stalwarts #SmallBusinessSaturday http://t.co/9l0E6eQeaV
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Cecilia Muñoz (@Cecilia44) November 30, 2013

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.@CommerceSec supporting small businesses by shopping on Small Business Saturday #SmallBizSat http://t.co/t8MjVvjOFZ
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U.S. Commerce Dept. (@CommerceGov) November 30, 2013

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When our small businesses do well, our communities do well. Join me and visit a small business near you today to celebrate #SmallBizSat. –bo
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The White House (@WhiteHouse) November 30, 2013

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Ashley Killough: Obama Does Some ‘Small Business Saturday’ Shopping

President Barack Obama continued what’s become an annual post-Thanksgiving tradition by stopping at a bookstore for Small Business Saturday. With his two daughters alongside, the President went to Politics and Prose in Washington to pick up a few books, telling reporters he bought a “long list” of titles for every age group, including his own. List of books purchased by Obama, according to the White House:

More here

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Keeping my spending local this #SmallBizSat http://t.co/MoMEAMVQh5
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Anthony Foxx (@SecretaryFoxx) November 30, 2013

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First Lady Michelle Obama walks with children past the official White House Christmas Tree in the Blue Room, Nov. 30, 2011. Mrs. Obama welcomed military families to the White House for for the first viewing of the 2011 holiday decorations. (Photo by Lawrence Jackson)

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The President has no public events scheduled this weekend

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.@BarackObama & @MichelleObama & the fasters today - "it's not a matter of if, but of when" #Fast4Families http://t.co/Isoz9TT2HV
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Fast4Families (@fast4families) November 29, 2013

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America’s Voice: President And First Lady Visit “Fast For Families” On The National Mall

On day 18, “Fast for Families” welcomed the visit of President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama. SEIU’s Eliseo Medina, NAKASEC’s Dae Joong Yoon, DREAMer and Mi Familia Vota’s Cristian Avila, FIRM‘s Rudy Lopez and Sojourner‘s Lisa Sharon Harper, along with 22 other advocates fasting in solidarity, met with the President and First Lady in a private session at the “Fast for Families” tent where both listened closely to the fasters’ personal stories.

The President said that this fast and their sacrifice are receiving immense attention. He expressed great concern over their health, urging them as well to continue to pray over their decision on the time they intend to fast. During their meeting, the President also held the shoe of an immigrant who perished in the desert trying to seek a better life, which the fasters hold in reverence as a symbol of why they are fasting to underscore the plight and suffering of immigrants.

More here

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@gop death panel. pic.twitter.com/9rr33iAMss

— amk4obama (@amk4obama) November 30, 2013

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Colbert King: Obamacare — A Question Of Morality

…. the Affordable Care Act is viewed more kindly by the congregation at First Baptist Church, located a few miles from the shadow of the Capitol, than by those within the governmental structure.

…. The Rev. Frank D. Tucker, who has been First Baptist’s pastor for nearly 38 years, used Sunday morning’s service to address Obamacare in terms its critics do not.

He announced that First Baptist, working with the city’s health-care exchange, DC Health Link, would host a health insurance enrollment fair on Saturday. He issued an emotional call to his congregation, young and old, to enroll in the program, resorting to language associated with the battle to win the right to vote.

Tucker noted the decades of unsuccessful efforts by several presidents to extend medical care to all Americans, including those living in dire circumstances beyond their control. Not sugar-coating the problems that President Obama has encountered in bringing about health-care reform, Tucker hammered at the obligation of the uninsured to enroll in the insurance program that Obama and other health-reform advocates have worked so hard to create. The Obama administration and its congressional supporters, Tucker observed, have been opposed every step of the way, taking a beating from people in Congress and around the country. Don’t let their sacrifices be in vain by sitting on your hands, he contended. Get enrolled, he declared.

More here

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You can find your local small businesses here

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When our small businesses do well, our communities do well. Join me and visit a small business near you today to celebrate #SmallBizSat. –bo
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The White House (@WhiteHouse) November 30, 2013

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SmartyPants: An Activist White House

I’ve been following Fast for Families on twitter since day one. Unlike a lot of “keyboard activists,” these folks are showing their courage and commitment by putting it all on the line. I watched as union, faith and civil rights leaders visited these fasters in a show of solidarity. And then something interesting started happening. Gawd, I LOVE this President!!!!! Think about the last time we saw a POTUS provide this kind of support for an activist movement. I’ll give you a hint…never.

More here

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Paul Krugman: Obamacare’s Secret Success

The law establishing Obamacare was officially titled the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. And the “affordable” bit wasn’t just about subsidizing premiums. It was also supposed to be about “bending the curve” — slowing the seemingly inexorable rise in health costs. Much of the Beltway establishment scoffed at the promise of cost savings.

So, how’s it going? The health exchanges are off to a famously rocky start, but many, though by no means all, of the cost-control measures have already kicked in. Has the curve been bent? The answer, amazingly, is yes. In fact, the slowdown in health costs has been dramatic.

Since 2010, when the act was passed, real health spending per capita — that is, total spending adjusted for overall inflation and population growth — has risen less than a third as rapidly as its long-term average. Real spending per Medicare recipient hasn’t risen at all; real spending per Medicaid beneficiary has actually fallen slightly.

More here

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Nothing says "I love you" like helping someone #GetCovered: OFA.BO/mdWDFG
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Barack Obama (@BarackObama) November 29, 2013

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CBS Denver: Judge: Sheriffs Can’t Sue Colorado Over Gun Laws

A federal judge ruled Wednesday that Colorado sheriffs suing the state over new firearm restrictions don’t have standing to proceed with the case as a group, but the legal battle is far from over. The ruling from U.S. District Judge Marcia Krieger in Denver doesn’t stop the lawsuit because 21 other plaintiffs who are suing do have standing. The court will still consider whether universal background checks and a ban on ammunition magazines that hold more than 15 rounds are constitutional, the judge said.

“If individual sheriffs wish to protect individual rights or interests they may do so … however, the sheriffs have confused their individual rights and interests with those of the county sheriff’s office,” Krieger said. The remaining plaintiffs include individuals and various gun groups. The laws that took effect July 1 were among a package of gun control legislation passed in response to mass shootings last year at a suburban Denver movie theater and a Connecticut elementary school.

More here

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Nicole Winfield: Pope Ramps Up Charity Office To Be Near Poor, Sick

Pope Francis has ramped up the Vatican’s charity work, sending his chief alms-giver and a contingent of Swiss guards onto the streets of Rome at night to do what he usually can’t do: comfort the poor and the homeless. A few times a week, Archbishop Konrad Krajewski takes a few off-duty guards with him in his modest white Fiat to make the rounds at Rome’s train stations, where charities offer makeshift soup kitchens that feed 400-500 people a night. Often they bring the leftovers from the Vatican mess halls to share.

“Aside from their vitality, they know at least four languages,” Krajewski said of the guards in an interview Friday with The Associated Press. “Above all, poor people need to be listened to.” He can’t do that so easily now that he’s pope, so he has tapped Krajewski to be his envoy, doling out small morsels of charity every day: sending a 200 euro ($260) check to a woman whose wallet was stolen, visiting a family whose child is dying.

More here

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Henry Blodget: Sorry, Folks, Rich People Actually Don’t ‘Create The Jobs’

“Rich people create the jobs.” Specifically, by starting and directing America’s companies, rich entrepreneurs and investors create the jobs that sustain everyone else. This statement is usually invoked to justify cutting taxes on entrepreneurs and investors. This argument ignores the fact that taxes on entrepreneurs and investors are already historically low.

Entrepreneurs and investors like me actually don’t create the jobs — not sustainable ones, anyway. What creates a company’s jobs, Hanauer explains, is a healthy economic ecosystem surrounding the company, which starts with the company’s customers. The customers of most companies are ultimately American’s gigantic middle class — the hundreds of millions of Americans who currently take home a much smaller share of the national income than they did 30 years ago

If that $9+ million had gone to 9,000 families instead of Hanauer, it would almost certainly have been pumped right back into the economy via consumption (i.e., demand). And, in so doing, it would have created more jobs. Hanauer estimates that, if most American families were taking home the same share of the national income that they were taking home 30 years ago, every family would have another $10,000 of disposable income to spend. So, if nothing else, it’s time we stopped perpetuating the fiction that “rich people create the jobs.” Rich people don’t create the jobs. Our economy creates jobs.

More here

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Washington Post: Obama To Issue A New Statement Of U.S. National Security Strategy

President Obama will formally present a new national security strategy early next year, identifying his foreign policy priorities for the remainder of his time in office, the White House said Friday. The new policy document will be the second of Obama’s administration and will likely update the previous one, released in May 2010, in several important areas. Those include policies for fighting the next phase of the war against al-Qaeda, the shift of national security resources to Asia and a plan to manage declining defense budgets amid fiscal strain.

The National Security Strategy document falls under a 1986 law requiring the president to present Congress with an annual strategic statement. Most administrations have been inconsistent in meeting that obligation. George W. Bush, for example, issued only two during his eight years in office. Obama’s first National Security Strategy ran 52 pages and set out a course for ending the U.S. military involvement in Iraq. Although the strategy asserted America’s central role in the world, it also warned that “when we overuse our military might, or fail to invest in or deploy complementary tools, or act without partners, then our military is overstretched.”

More here

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On This Day:

Rep. Emanuel Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo., gestures to President Obama and a U.S. Secret Service agent after the President dropped by a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, Nov. 30, 2010. The Congressman knows the agent (Photo by Pete Souza)

President Obama talks with former President Jimmy Carter who was attending a meeting in National Security Advisor Tom Donilon’s office in the White House, Nov. 30, 2010 (Photo by Pete Souza)

President Obama steps off Air Force One upon arrival at Wilkes Barre/Scranton International Airport, November 30, 2011 in Avoca, Pennsylvania

First Lady Michelle Obama meets with members of the board of Partnership for a Healthier America, an organization working to end childhood obesity, at the Omni Hotel in Washington, D.C., Nov. 30, 2011 (Photo by Lawrence Jackson)