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10:20AM: President Obama departs the White House
3:30PM: President Obama arrives in Lake Tahoe, Nevada
5PM: President Obama delivers remarks at the 20th Annual Lake Tahoe Summit
6:30PM: President Obama departs Lake Tahoe en route to Honolulu, Hawaii
11:50PM: President Obama arrives in Honolulu, Hawaii
12:30AM: President Obama delivers remarks at the 2016 Pacific Islands Conference of Leaders
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A little over a year ago, we started tossing around ideas about how we could collaborate with Mrs. Obama. At the time, having her serve as the first-ever guest editor of More seemed like a crazy dream, but it was at the top of my list. We knew that partnering on an issue would be a lot of work—I’m not sure the White House understood exactly how much!—but we were thrilled when they said yes.
This is truly the First Lady’s issue. From the beginning, she said she didn’t want the whole magazine to be about her. It was hard to take off my editor’s hat and not focus all of my attention on the person on the cover. Instead, we shifted our focus to the people, causes and opportunities she cares about.The First Lady always asks how her initiatives—Let’s Move, Joining Forces, Reach Higher and Let Girls Learn—are moving the needle and having more impact on the world. We hope this issue will empower readers to create positive change, whether by supporting one of the First Lady’s programs or another cause.
More here
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She’s a wife, mother and lawyer, an advocate for children and military families, and first lady of the United States. Now Michelle Obama has added a new gig: magazine editor. The first lady is “guest editor” of the July-August issue of More, which bills itself as the magazine for “women of style and substance.” It was a first for both the White House and the magazine industry, said Lesley Jane Seymour, More’s editor-in-chief. “There’s never been a first lady who’s ever guest-edited a magazine and certainly not a sitting first lady,” Seymour told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. “She’s really the editor,” Seymour said. She said the edition focuses on Mrs. Obama’s “point of view on the world and it’s from her eyes.” “Guest editor” wasn’t just a fancy title. The first lady had to pitch story ideas and write and approve copy for the 148-page issue, Seymour said.
She “was reading every page and asking for changes up until the last minute,” Seymour said. “She had to approve absolutely everything. She had to suggest various things, too.” Staff handled stories about fashion and beauty, along with basic functions of the magazine. The theme of the issue is having “More Impact.” Mrs. Obama said she welcomed the opportunity to share some of her White House experiences with like-minded readers. “What I want readers to understand is that impact comes in all forms, shapes and sizes. And hopefully through this issue, what people will see is that you can have impact as a military mom changing careers, or you can be a young person starting a business or you can be the first lady and start a whole initiative,” Mrs. Obama said in a written statement released by More. The issue highlights the first lady’s four priorities: helping children live healthier lives, supporting military families, encouraging young people to pursue education past high school and helping girls around the world attend and stay in school. It also includes pieces on her long-serving chief of staff and senior adviser, two women who have influenced the first lady’s work.
More here
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When Barack was first running for President back in 2008, I made what I thought was an innocuous comment about how, if he were elected, my most important job would be “mom-in-chief.” The response was swift and passionate. Some people thought this was great, a sign that I had my priorities in order and was doing what was right for my family. Some were less positive, concerned that I was devaluing my professional achievements and ambitions.
As for me, I was just confused. The way I saw it, embracing my role as mom-in-chief didn’t mean dismissing what I’d accomplished in my career or shortchanging the important work of being First Lady—on the contrary, I planned to pour myself into the job and do everything I could to have a real impact on people’s lives. I was just stating a simple truth: The most important thing in my life is raising my two daughters.
More here
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Written by our very own Judith Fardig
Letters to the editor, The Oregonian
R.E. front-page article, Obama bends on health cancellations 11/15/13
If you received a cancellation letter from your insurance company, don’t try to hang on to your sub-standard policy without calling Cover Oregon first at 1-855-268-3767 to find out if you could get a better deal. Individuals making up to $45,960 and families of 4 up to $92,400 may be eligible for federal subsidies which you won’t get if you keep your old policy.
The Affordable Care Act grandfathered all the individual policies that were in place at the time the law was enacted, hence President Obama’s statement that you could keep your plan if you liked it. There were limits on the amount of increase in premiums or deductibles to keep this grandfathered status. The plans being cancelled because they don’t meet the minimal standards were introduced by private insurers after passage of the ACA, knowing they wouldn’t be in compliance by 1/1/14. The insurers should have disclosed this when they issued the policy. Now they are trying to blame their lack of transparency on the President.
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A great way to be proactive about ObamaCare, is to write to your local paper if there is an avenue for that. Thanks Judith, for the inspiration and for doing your part to spread facts about the wonderful law that is the Affordable Care Act.
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President Barack Obama works on his inaugural address with Jon Favreau, Director of Speechwriting, not pictured, in the Oval Office, Jan. 16, 2013 (Photo by Pete Souza)
See The Atlantic
10:05: President Obama honors 2012 National Teacher of the Year and finalists at the W.H.
10:35: Departs the W.H. for Andrews Joint Air Force Base.
10:50: Departs Andrews Air Force Base for Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
11:50: Arrives in North Carolina.
1:00: Michelle Obama delivers the keynote address at Girls Inc. of Omaha’s 12th annual lunch.
1:15: PBO delivers remarks on student loans at the University of North Carolina.
2:20: PBO is interviewed for “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.”
2:45: Michelle Obama delivers remarks at a campaign event in Omaha covered by a print pooler.
3:40: PBO departs North Carolina for Colorado.
6:00: Michelle Obama meets with Obama campaign volunteers from the Des Moines area.
7:10: PBO arrives in Colorado.
8:45: Delivers remarks at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
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If anyone has a link to the full interview could you leave it in the comments?
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Charles Pierce: Has The New York Times taken to hiring its “Public Editors” from the people waiting on hold for Mark Levin?
Readers deserve to know: Who is the real Barack Obama?
No kidding, that appeared in an actual column in the actual New York Times.
…. Barack Obama has been on the national scene for eight years. He was a candidate for the better part of two years and has been the president of the United States for the better part of three. We know about things his preacher said. We know about his uncle’s unfortunate driving history and his aunt’s time on the dole. A good portion of the Republican base — the portion that Mr. Brisbane here is begging not to write him anything hurtful anymore — believes that it knows the president is a Kenyan-born Muslim Indonesian socialist who is just waiting until his second term to round them all up, take away their guns, and give them all retroactive late-term abortions, and only Brisbanish “vetting” can stand in the way of all that.
We are so very screwed.
More here
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ThinkProgress: Former State Treasurer Sarah Steelman, a Republican now hoping to unseat Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), said recently that she was unfamiliar with the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), the landmark anti-domestic violence legislation whose re-authorization is now stalled in the Senate.
Senate Republicans are objecting to re-upping the 1994 law, which has already been extended several times, because of amendments that would extend protections for Native American women, gay victims, and others.
A video released today by the Missouri Democratic Party shows a man asking Steelman about VAWA at a campaign event. Steelman replies, “I’m not sure what that is because I’m not serving right now.” He asks again, “you haven’t really heard about it?” And she confirms, “no, not really.”
Caitlin Legacki, a spokeswoman for the Missouri Democratic Party, told Inside Missouri Politics that the exchange “underscores how ill-equipped she is to serve in public office.”
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Morning everyone 😉
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