Today, President Barack Obama will be at Camp David - he will return to the White House late this afternoon. Camp David is the presidential retreat located in the Catoctin mountains near Thurmont, Maryland.
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Proposed 39% rate increase by California Health Insurer comes under fire - Anthem Blue Cross's proposed rate increase has provided more support for health care reform. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius expressed her concern when she noticed the company reported 2.7 billion in profits in the 4th quarter alone. Congressional hearings have been scheduled and Anthem Blue Cross has agreed to delay the increases until May. TPM.com has more here.
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Republicans lead in defending open seats in the House races - while Democratic retirements have gained a lot of media attention, it is the Republicans who now have 18 open seats to defend and the Democrats have 13. CNN.com has more here.
Republicans will need to win a plus 40 seats in the House in the Fall Elections to gain a majority. Early indications are all of the incumbents may feel the voters wrath as their dissatisfaction with Congress is at a very high level.
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Attorney General Eric Holder and White House have a "meeting of the minds" - Holder has been under pressure after the decision to use the public courts to try Khalid Shaikh Mohammed.
Holder has agreed to work more closely with White House staff and Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel has agreed to give more media exposure to Holder.
Let's see how this arrangement works as the White House now has indicated the location of the KSM trial will be released within weeks. The NY Times has more here.
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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton fears Iran is heading toward a "military dictatorship" - she made the remarks while speaking to students at the Carnegie Mellon's Doha campus in Qatar. Earlier, she had expressed her concern of Iran's lack of respect of Human Rights. Politico.com has more here.
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The frustrations many Americans are feeling today as they suffer through a major recession while watching a dysfunctional Congress; mainly caused by the "Republican Party of No", is totally understandable.
Voters want to see their elected officials in Washington working together to build consensus for the solutions to the problems they are faced with today.
However, a movement that is based on on a premise of less cost in government is hard to support when they charged $600 to attend their recent conference in Nashville and have headline speakers who blemish their movement.
At the Nashville tea party convention; former Congressman Tom Tancredo (R-Co.) spoke of how President Obama would have never been elected if there had been a literacy test for voters. Tancredo went on with his incendiary statements saying the ones who elected Obama could not even spell the word vote and that they had put a socialist ideologue in the White House.
These statements hearken us back to a unfortunate time in American history when racism led to literacy tests, polls taxes, and other methods to deny African Americans the right to vote. Actions which were unacceptable then and now.
Meghan McCain, the daughter of Senator John McCain (R-Az.) was quick to denounce the tea party movement and Tom Tancredo's speech at their convention. You can watch her denounce the tea party movement while appearing on "The View" here.
Spending a third of the proceeds from the recent Nashville convention to pay former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin to be their keynote speaker also flies in the face of the movement's premise of fiscal restraint.
A recent Washington Post/ABC News poll conducted February 4 - 8 showed two-thirds of the respondents were unhappy with the way the federal government was working yet two-thirds of the respondents knew little of what the tea party movement stands for.
Unfortunately, for the tea party movement who just shelled out $100,000 for her to speak at their convention, 71% of the respondents of the poll felt Sarah Palin was unqualified to be President.
Thankfully, outside of the 500-600 who attended the recent tea party convention, voters see Ms. Palin for what she is, a former politician hoping to cash in from the heightened public exposure afforded her by Senator John McCain (R-Az.) when he picked her to be his running mate in the 2008 presidential election.
A year ago when Barrack Obama took office, leading Republican and Democratic economists pushed for the federal government to spend big to avoid a catastrophic financial meltdown in the United States.
This advise coming on the heels of the federal bailout of financial firms on the precipice of collapse that occurred at the end of the George W. Bush administration.
This action followed eight years of the laizze faire practice by the George W. Bush administration and Congress when it came to reasonable controls on financial institutions.
Thankfully, even though some argued it was not big enough, the passage of the 800 billion Stimulus bill under the Obama administration averted a huge U.S. economic collapse. While unemployment exceeded the original 8% goal of the Stimulus bill, it has been kept at, or below ten per cent.
Interestingly, the tea party movement was silent as President George W. Bush doubled the national debt from the 5.4 trillion level when he took office to the 11.3 trillion when he left office. Bush also let lapse the "pay-as-you-go" legislation passed under the Bill Clinton administration which led to a 200 billion budget surplus.
Similar "pay-as-you-go" legislation was just signed into law by President Obama and he also just ordered a three year freeze on many Domestic programs as he realizes the importance of paying down the national debt.
Inheriting a national financial disaster and avoiding a complete economic meltdown is a difficult task for any incoming President.
What is needed now is people and political parties working together to develop solutions to move our country forward while reducing the budget and national debt.
Fortunately, a NY Times/CBS News poll conducted February 5-10 showed only 18% of the respondents were supportive of the tea party movement. A movement that uses former politicians who spew racial epithets and who use the frustration facing many Americans today to cash in for their own reward, is not for me.
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Invitations sent for health care summit scheduled for February 25 - 9 Senators and 12 Representativeshave been invited, who comprise the Democratic and Republican leadership in Congress. 12 are Democrats and 9 are Republicans - Time.com has the list here.
President Obama has posted the full plan for health care reform online and has asked the Republicans to do the same prior to the summit. WhiteHouse.gov has the full planhere. It is also available to be downloaded and printed.
In addition, President Obama has a short four minute video which covers the basics of the proposed health care reform you can watch below.
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House Minority John Boehner (R-Ohio) responds yesterday with health care summit "is political theater" - he wants to start from scratch and toss the passed Senate and House health care bills out. TheHill.com has more here.
Doubtful, that will happen. He should instead be appreciative of the invitation for bipartisan talks and publish the Republican proposals on health care reform so discussions in the light of day can move forward.
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Continued filibuster action by Republicans to lead to more use of executive authority by President Obama - The NY Times has a good read today of how Presidents in the past often used their authority to move forward agenda items stalled in Congress. You can read it here.
They report President Obama and his staff are making plans to use such authority if the Republicans continue to stall legislation. Just this past week, it took the threat by Obama to use the upcoming recess to appoint agency directors to get the Senate to approve 27 of 63 appointments held up by the party of "no".
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Vice President Joe Biden appeared on NBC "Meet The Press" this morning and challenges former Vice President Dick Cheney's repeated statements that the Obama administration has been soft on terror - You can watch below, the segment taped yesterday from Vancouver where Biden was attending the opening of the winter Olympics. Biden says Cheney "is entitled to his own opinion. However,he is not entitled to rewrite history".
Two Democrats are quick to announce they are running for the U.S. House seat to be vacated by Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) - within days of Kennedy's announcement he would not be seeking reelection, David Cicillino who is mayor of Providence and former state Democratic Party chair Bill Lynch have announced their intentions to run for the seat. MSNBC.com has more here.
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