Gregory Korte: To Get Around Congress, Obama Turns To City Halls
President Obama has quietly racked up a series of legislative victories during the past few months as lawmakers have enthusiastically embraced his calls for a higher minimum wage, paid sick leave and universal pre-kindergarten. Instead of Capitol Hill, those victories happened in city halls, state houses and county buildings far from Washington. At least six major cities — Chicago, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Seattle, Tacoma, Wash., and Washington, D.C. — have passed paid sick leave laws in the four months since Obama called for state and local action in this year’s State of the Union Address. Since the 2013 address when Obama called for an increase in the minimum wage, 17 states and six major cities have taken action, including Los Angeles last week.
Obama’s state-and-local strategy may be unprecedented in its scope and ambition. Though previous administrations have appointed top advisers to listen to concerns of state and local officials, the Obama White House appears to be the first to aggressively use those same channels to encourage them to adopt Obama’s policies. The strategy has been more effective on some policies than others. Since last September, more than 200 mayors have signed on to the My Brother’s Keeper initiative, a commitment to help boys and young men of color. The state-and-local strategy effort has been particularly effective on paid leave policies, which Obama championed in his State of the Union Address this year. “Forty-three million workers have no paid sick leave — 43 million. Think about that,” Obama said. “So I’ll be taking new action to help states adopt paid leave laws of their own.” That pledge came with a $1 million budget from the Department of Labor to help fund feasibility studies for state and local governments, which will begin to be awarded this summer.
President Obama plays with Leo Chaudhary, son of White House Videographer Arun Chaudhary, right, and Chaudhary’s wife, Laura Moser, prior to a Seder with friends and staff in the State Dining Room of the White House, April 18, 2011 (Photo by Pete Souza)
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Today (All Times Eastern):
2:0 EST: The President presents the Commander-in-Chief Trophy to the United States Naval Academy football team
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In case anyone needs a Fox News-style interpretation of today's ACA enrollment statistics pic.twitter.com/dXOv9QsiM8
… I shouldn’t let the day pass without mentioning the latest big Obamacare news. Final enrollment for 2014, we now know, will be more than 8 million. The age mix has also improved, with more young people signing up at the end … Goodbye, death spiral.
… the benefits of Obamacare, for all its imperfections, are immense. Millions of people who lived extremely anxious lives now have far more security than before.
Sara Kliff: Obamacare Succeeded For One Simple Reason: It’s Horrible To Be Uninsured
There’s a very simple reason that Obamacare hit 8 million sign-ups: Being uninsured is horrible. But the political conversation over Obamacare was driven almost entirely by people who had, and knew they would be able to keep, their health insurance. It was filled with a lot of assumptions, theories, and speculations about what people who didn’t have good insurance, or any insurance, would do. Back in December, when the web site’s woes were fresh in everyone’s mind, I made a prediction that sounded strange even to me: Obamacare might still hit its 7 million enrollees. The reason I made that prediction was I’d been talking to the uninsured who’d been spending hours or days or weeks trying to get through the web site. They were frustrated and they were angry. But not one of them had given up. People did give it a serious try. And when the site failed them, they waited a few months and gave it another serious try.
In March and April, 3.7 million people signed up for coverage, three times as many as the White House had expected. “That’s not a new idea that people want health insurance,” Perry says. “But that they would stick through so much hassle still amazes us. “We know that people gaining coverage through Obamacare tend to be disproportionately young and minority. Urban Institute, for example, estimates that the uninsured rate for people between 18 and 30 has fallen 4.3 percent in the first quarter of 2014 — compared to a 2.3 percent drop among those between 50 and 64. The federal government has also released information on who is signing up for coverage on the exchange. That’s different from Urban’s data, which applies to the newly-insured gaining coverage from both Medicaid and the exchanges. The Obama administration estimates that 25 percent of the people signing up for insurance on the exchange are between 18 and 35. This demographic is watched particularly closely because younger people tend to have lower health care costs — and if more of them sign up, that could help keep premiums slightly lower.
BBC: Obama Cautious Over Deal To Ease Ukraine Crisis
US President Barack Obama has cautiously welcomed a deal to calm tensions in Ukraine, reached at multi-party talks in Geneva. He said the US and its allies were ready to impose new sanctions on Russia if the situation failed to improve. At the Geneva talks, the sides agreed that illegal military groups in Ukraine must be dissolved, and that those occupying buildings must be disarmed and leave them. The foreign ministers also agreed that there would be an amnesty for all anti-government protesters. But speaking in Washington just hours later, President Obama expressed scepticism as to whether Russia would keep its side of the bargain. “My hope is that we actually do see follow-through over the next several days, but I don’t think, given past performance, that we can count on that,” he said.
“We have to be prepared that we can actually respond to what continue to be efforts of interference by the Russians in eastern and southern Ukraine,” he added. In a telephone call with UK Prime Minister David Cameron, the two leaders agreed that the United States and Europe are prepared to take further measures to impose a new round of sanctions if Russia failed to help restore order. “We have put in place additional consequences that we can impose on the Russians if we do not see actual improvement of the situation on the ground,” Mr Obama said. The UK is to provide an additional £1m to support the expansion of the OSCE special monitoring mission in Ukraine. Washington and the EU have already imposed sanctions on key Russian and Ukrainian political and business officials.
Jonathan Cohn: Obamacare Signups Hit 8 Million And Both Young And Old Are On Board
President Obama on Thursday announced the final numbers for the Affordable Care Act’s open enrollment period. Eight million people have signed up for private insurance plans through the new federal and state marketplaces. And within the federal marketplaces, 28 percent of enrollees are ages 18 to 34. This is good news—very, very good news. As for the age mix, you may have heard that about 40 percent of the population eligible for coverage in the marketplaces is between the ages of 18 and 34. That’s true and, obviously, 28 percent is a lot less than 40 percent. The worry has always been that older and sicker people would sign up in unusually high numbers, forcing insurers to raise their prices next year and beyond. But insurance companies didn’t expect young people to sign up in proportion to their numbers in the population. They knew participation would be a bit lower and they set premiums accordingly.
Only company officials know exactly what they were projecting—that’s proprietary information—but one good metric is the signup rate in Massachusetts, in 2007, when that state had open enrollment for its version of the same reforms. According to information provided by Jonathan Gruber, the MIT economist and reform architect, 28.3 percent of Massachusetts enrollees were ages 19 to 34, a comparable age group. Yes, that’s right: The overall age mix for the Affordable Care Act is virtually the same as the age mix was in Massachusetts. More important, it vindicates the predictions of experts like Gruber who said, all along, that young people would be among the last to sign up. “To get to 28 percent overall, there had to be a lot of young people among the late enrollees,” says Larry Levitt, senior vice president at the Kaiser Family Foundation. “That also bodes well for who is likely to sign up next year.” Thursday’s announcement is more proof of how many people are benefitting from the law—a reminder that affordable health care is within reach for millions that could never get it before.
Hiphopandpolitics: A Tale Of Two Mothers In America In A Post Racial Society
Catalina Clouser decided to get high and drove for 12 miles with her 2 month old baby on the roof of her car..By the time she realized her baby wasn’t in the car, it was too late.. The baby fell off and was found still in his car seat in the middle of busy freeway.. fortunately unharmed…Clouser was just sentenced and got probation. Shanesha Taylor was homeless and trying to get her life on better footing. She had a job interview and could not get anyone to watch her kids ages 2 yrs and 6 months , so she left them in the car, with window open and went inside to do her job interview.. This mom was arrested and charged w/ a felony, her kids were taken away.. Both women live in Arizona.
BBC: US Freeing Iran Funds As Tehran Cuts Uranium Stockpile
The United States is to release frozen Iranian funds, saying Tehran has kept commitments made under an interim deal over its nuclear programme. It said $450m (£270m) would be made available in light of a report by the world’s nuclear watchdog, the IAEA. On Thursday the agency said Iran had neutralised half of its higher-enriched uranium stockpile. The six-month deal saw Iran agree to scale back its nuclear programme in return for sanctions relief. World powers are concerned Iran is seeking the capability to build nuclear weapons, a charge Iran strongly denies. Talks have started on turning the temporary agreement, which came into effect in January, into a permanent one. The interim deal is due to expire on 20 July.
Iran has diluted half of its higher-grade enriched uranium stockpile, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in a confidential report. Under the agreement, Iran agreed to limit its enrichment of uranium to no more than “low-level” 5%, stop enriching uranium to 20% and eliminate its stockpile of 20% enriched uranium. The IAEA report said Iran had so far either diluted or converted nearly three-quarters of its highly-enriched stockpile. The US state department said Washington was releasing the instalment of funds – previously frozen as punishment for Iran’s nuclear programme – because “all sides have kept the commitments” they signed up to.
National Journal: You May Be Surprised By The States That Support Pre-K
When President Obama called for universal access to pre-K programs in his 2014 State of the Union address, viewers could have been forgiven for thinking this was just another big government initiative that only a liberal could love. But in fact, a look at investments in pre-K education at the state level shows that funding is up around the country–and that some crimson red states like South Carolina and Mississippi are leading the way. The Education Commission of the States analyzed state data on pre-K funding for the 2013-2014 fiscal year and found that of the 40 states that provide state-supported programs for 4-year-olds, 30 of them (plus the District of Columbia) increased their funding for these programs.
And contrary to what you might expect, those increases don’t follow a particular partisan pattern. And there’s another practical reason for conservatives to embrace pre-K education. Advocates of early childhood interventions have always made the moral argument that it’s the just thing to do in order to allow children of all backgrounds to enter school on a level playing field. But now they also lay out the cost-benefit analysis: Spend money now or spend a lot more money later.
Just five weeks ago, the Associated Press ran an article on the pace of Affordable Care Act enrollments. The White House, the piece said, “needs something close to a miracle to meet its goal of enrolling 6 million people by the end of this month.” Congressional Republicans eagerly passed the AP’s item around. As of April 1, we already knew that miracle had arrived: the initial estimate pointed to 7.1 million Americans enrolling through exchange marketplaces. By last week, that total was revised to 7.5 million. Today, there’s a new number: 8 million consumers signed up for private coverage through exchanges.
As the president want on to explain at a press conference this afternoon, that’s 8 million enrolled through exchanges, another 3 million young adults who’ve gained coverage through family plans, and another 3 million who’ve taken advantage of Medicaid expansion. That’s 14 million American consumers – a number that would be more than 19 million if several Republican officials weren’t deliberately blocking Medicaid expansion out of political spite. In October, the first month of the open-enrollment period, just 106,185 consumers signed up for insurance through an exchange – causing Republicans to not only celebrate, but to openly mock the system by noting a variety of sports venues that hold more than 106,185 attendees. It was obviously proof, we were told at the time, that the Affordable Care Act itself was “hurtling toward failure.” Hmm. Who’s laughing now?
Christopher Palmeri: Disney Offers Obama Minimum Wage To Florida Theme Park Staff
Walt Disney Co. has offered to raise starting pay at its Florida theme parks by 25 percent to $10 an hour over two years, almost matching the federal minimum wage sought by President Barack Obama. Disney presented the proposal Wednesday to the Service Trades Council, a consortium of six labor groups, the company and union representatives said. They are scheduled to resume bargaining over a contract on May 28. The unions, which represent more than 30,000 employees at Walt Disney World near Orlando, asked for at least $10.10 an hour, the amount congressional Democrats and Obama propose as a new U.S. minimum. Starting pay at the Florida parks is now $8.03 an hour, according to Burbank, Calif.-based Disney.
That would reach the rate Disney is offering by July 2016. “I’m very pleased,” Ed Chambers, president of the council, said in a telephone interview. “We’re well on our way to getting a deal done.” The contract being negotiated covers full-time hourly employees at the world’s most-popular theme-park complex. Disney reported record profit of $6.6 billion on revenue of $45 billion last year from its TV networks, parks, studios and consumer products.
NYT: Enrollments Exceed Obama’s Target For Health Care Act
President Obama announced Thursday that eight million people have signed up for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, including what the White House said were a sufficient number of young, healthy adults, a critical milestone that might counter election-year attacks by Republicans on the law’s success and viability. The total number of enrollees exceeds by a million the target set by the administration for people to buy insurance through government-run health care exchanges. In particular, the number of young people signing up appears to have surged during the final weeks of enrollment. “This thing is working,” Mr. Obama told reporters in the White House briefing room, in what amounted to a second victory lap after he announced two weeks ago that 7.1 million people had signed up for insurance during an initial enrollment period. “The Affordable Care Act is covering more people at less cost than most people would have predicted a few months ago.”
In the early months of signups, the number of young people between the ages of 18 and 34 — who tend to be healthier — hovered around 25 percent. But as White House officials predicted, many young people appear to have waited until close to the March 31 deadline to enroll, increasing their participation. The overall percentage of young people enrolled is not a guarantee that all of the insurance marketplaces across the country will work perfectly. Individual insurance companies will make decisions about what their premiums are based on the makeup of their own client list. But the higher proportion of young enrollees is a rebuke to the critics of the Affordable Care Act, who had predicted that it would fail to attract younger, healthier customers to buy insurance.
For the past eight years, you have given me the privilege of serving as your Attorney General. Thanks to a group of extraordinary professionals at the Department of Justice and their tireless work–from protecting our children and getting criminals off the streets, to holding more accountable those responsible for the housing crisis–I believe we have made Delaware a better place to live and to raise a family. I’m proud of the work we’ve accomplished. As your Attorney General I have done my best to remain true to the core values I believe define public service–honesty, integrity, and doing right by the people I serve. Part of doing right by you is being straight with you about my future plans.
Over the past few months, as I’ve been planning to run for reelection, I have also been giving a great deal of thought to running for Governor in 2016. What started as a thought–a very persistent thought–has now become a course of action that I wish to pursue. After careful consideration, I have concluded that it is not right to ask for your support in 2014, knowing that my focus would be divided between doing my job as Attorney General while at the same time running as a candidate for Governor. Therefore, I am announcing today that I will not seek reelection as your Attorney General this November.
President Obama announced on Thursday that 8 million people have signed up for plans through Obamacare’s new insurance exchanges. Although March 31 was originally the final deadline to enroll in Obamacare, administration officials extended the open enrollment period until April 15 to accommodate the people who may have struggled to complete their applications due to technological issues. Just over two weeks ago, the administration announced that Obamacare enrollment had reached 7.1 million — surpassing expectations after HealthCare.gov’s rocky rollout in October. Polling from Gallup released this week found that Obamacare may be having an even bigger impact on the uninsurance rate than initially expected, suggesting that about 12 million previously uninsured Americans have gained coverage since the fall.
That places the uninsurance rate at its lowest point since 2008. According to Gallup’s estimations, about half of the Americans who have gained insurance for the first time this year say they got their coverage through Obamacare’s marketplaces. Other people gaining coverage could have gotten it through the expansion of the Medicaid program, or by signing up directly with an insurer. And despite concerns that Obamacare wouldn’t be able to recover from HealthCare.gov’s disastrous rollout, several major insurers say they’re optimistic about the law, and eager to continue offering plans on the new marketplaces during the next open enrollment period. Insurance companies like UnitedHealth Group, Kaiser Permanente, Molina Healthcare, and Wellmark are interested in maintaining their presences on the state-level exchanges, and some are considering expanding
President Obama arrives at the South Lawn of the White House after a day trip to Ohio and Michigan, April 18, 2010
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President Obama arrives to presents the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy to the Air Force Academy football team in the Rose Garden at the White House, April 18, 2011
President Obama receives a football from Air Force’s running back Jared Tew after presenting the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy to the Air Force Academy football team
President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama mark the beginning of Passover with a Seder in the Old Family Dining Room of the White House, April 18, 2011 (Photo by Pete Souza)
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President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama arrive to board Air Force One at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland on April 18. 2013
President Obama talks with Tom Grilk, head of the Boston Athletic Association, as he greets first responders and marathon volunteers at Cathedral High School in Boston, Mass., April 18, 2013. The President and First Lady Michelle Obama traveled to Boston to attend an interfaith prayer service dedicated to the victims of the Boston Marathon bombings (Photo by Pete Souza)
President Obama Speaks to Volunteers and First Responders in Boston. April 18, 2013
President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama attend an interfaith prayer service dedicated to the victims of the Boston Marathon bombings, at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston, Mass., April 18, 2013. Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick is seated at right (Photo by Pete Souza)
President Barack Obama participates in a literacy lesson with children while visiting a pre-kindergarten classroom at Moravia Elementary School in Baltimore, Md., May 17, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
The Obama Diary 
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