According to The Wall Street Journal President Obama instructed an overview of Bush's signing statements. The administration is being attentive by checking with Attorney General Eric Holder. On Monday Pres. Obama announced a reverse in Mr. Bush's ban on federally funded embryonic stem cell research. This is one of the many items President Obama has overturned since he took office in January.
According to Pres. Obama, "As a person of faith I believe we are called to care or each other and work to ease human suffering. I believe we have been given the capacity and will to pursue this research and the humanity and conscious to do so responsibly." This is an attachment which will take you to the announcement Pres. Obama made with concerns to stem cell research. http://www.latimes.com/video/?slug=la-na-obama-stem-cells10-2009mar10-vid
I have personally argued for stem cell research in the past, and personally know how important it is to act responsibly when working with stem cells. Cloning is the most common fear amongst the population and portrays a negative out look on the research. I believe embryonic stem cell research will open doors to cure many diseases one of the mot important being cancer.
Stacie Ayala
Journalism 311 student
The Internet President
Photo Credit: Barackobama.com
I was watching the weekly Obama address on YouTube, and I decided to write my final post about the significance of the internet in spreading a message. Not since President Franklin D. Roosevelt's infamous "fireside chats" has a president presented himself in a more intimate setting than President Obama has. Obama has adapted to the internet era to recap key issues in our country and what is being done to combat those issues.
Now the majority of us weren't alive or old enough to understand Roosevelt's "fireside chats," and how influential it was to the country at the time. With Obama's weekly YouTube address, anyone can go onto the internet and get a face-to-face response from our nation's leader about what is going on. Obama's weekly address is something I look forward to and I never miss a post.
Not only does Obama's weekly address recap the week in Washington, but the president uses it to release upcoming information and events that are to take place in the following week. This week's address expectedly focused on the economy. Incredibly, over 4.4 million jobs have been lost, raising our unemployment rate to over 8 percent.
Despite these gloomy times, Obama charismatically provides a rebuttal of things that our country can look forward to. With the new stimulus bill being signed, Obama ensures that over 3.5 million jobs will be saved and created. In addition, Obama calmly says that over 95 percent of Americans will receive a "tax break" starting April 1. These are things that anyone can listen to from the leader of our country with a couple clicks of the mouse.
I strongly encourage everyone to watch Obama's weekly address. These things happening in our country affect us all, and it is crucial for every American to have a knowledge of what is going on and what is being done. Anyone can read the New York Times or the Orange County register for their news, but with Obama's internet address, you can receive news straight from the donkey's mouth. Maybe generations from now, Americans can look back and stress the relevance and intimacy our president gave us with his weekly internet address.
Obama Vows to Cure Health Care
As reported from the Huffington Post, President Obama has big plans to overhaul the United States Health Care system. Obama's goal is to provide health care coverage for every American citizen, regardless of income or status.
Obama has called together 120 people consisting of doctors, patients, business owners, insurers and drug industry representatives to provide wide-ranging perspectives on how to improve the United States health care system that currently leaves 48 million people uninsured. Obama expects this reform to be a bipartisan effort, although his goals are to have new legislation by the end of this year. In addition, the White House is planning to hold more health care events around the country to help in structuring the reform.
This seems like one of the first major issues where bipartisanship will play a factor, with both Democrats and Republicans looking to improve this effort. The GOP however, is still looking for the end result to be less government-run with balanced coverage expansions.
A move to a European-style health care system would greatly benefit the United States. As a country, the U.S. has struggled to provide affordable and reliable coverage. This simply needs to change. President Obama has made clear that he wants change and he wants it now.
This particular article had more of a feature story lead, but clearly indicated the issues throughout. The sufficient use of quotes from Obama, Democrats, and Republicans alike gave great perspective on this critical topic while the supplementing facts provided immediacy to what the current situation is.
Obama-Brown Aim for the World Economy
Photo Credit: Doug Mills/The New York Times
As reported from The New York Times, Prime Minister Gordon Brown met with President Obama at the White House for the first time since Obama took office to discuss the troubled world economy. Both men agreed that a "global New Deal" that would set common principles for regulating banks could ultimately ease resistance to increased oversight across borders.
During the meeting, Brown and Obama attempted to lay down the groundwork for a meeting with the Group of 20, the nations in the world with the 20 largest economies in an attempt to discuss ways to combat this world recession.
Although getting the majority of those 20 countries to give billions of dollars to the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, it seems clear that something needs to be done in order to find a way out of this rut.
In addition, the two men discussed the ongoing peace between the United States and Britain, ensuring that the bond between these two countries would continue.
Obama has really shown his eagerness to uphold peace between countries. Obama made it clear in his campaign that he seeks peace with countries like Iran, and I believe that a man with his character can ultimately negotiate peace even between the most hostile of countries. This is a new era filled with new opportunities to expand global peace, and I believe that President Obama will use his position to move the U.S. in the right direction.
Obama Plays "Let's Make a Deal"
Photo Credit: abcnews.com
As reported from The New York Times, President Obama has written a letter to the President of Russia negotiating a deal to cease deploying a new missile defense system in Eastern Europe if Moscow would assist in preventing Iran from developing long-range weapons.
A spokeswoman in the Russian administration said that Obama's letter was a reply to a letter President Dmitri A. Medvedev wrote shortly after Obama took office. Obama and Medvedev will meet for the first time on April 2 in London, where they hope to further develop Russian-American relations.
There were no details in Obama's letter sent, but a Russian press-secretary for Medvedev stated that there were no "specific proposals or mutualy bonding initiatives."
How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb
Photo Credit: Associated Press
As reported from The New York Times, a chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff declared that Iran has accumulated enough uranium that with further purification could be used to build an atomic bomb.
Now what does this mean for President Obama and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates?
It's time to speed up the peace talks with Iran.
Obama came into the presidency looking to negotiate peaceful talks with Iran. It appears that although Iran claims that its nuclear program is strictly meant for peaceful pursuit of energy supplies, no one would like to anger the country with the potential to build a weapon of mass destruction. Plain and simple; a happy Iran is a peaceful Iran.
Although I do find it very curious that if Iran is seriously building its nuclear weapons program based on providing energy supplies, then why did Iran understate by a third, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, the amount of Uranium it had enriched?
This entire fiasco seems to have a steady resolution, but as history has showed us, countries in an arms race never fall back. It appear to be a quasi-love-triangle from Iran, Russian, and the United States. Let me try to break it down for you.
Since Iran has begun implementing their nuclear weapons development, the United States has planned to build missile sites in Poland and the Czech Republic in order to stabilize a potential Iranian attack. On the other end, Russia seemingly believes that the United States is planning to build those sites in order to limit Russia's expanding nuclear proliferation. This results in Russia bolstering their arsenal, leaving all three countries amounting unnecessary artillery.
This is where it gets interesting. Russia has a stronger bond with Iran than the United States does, so here is where President Obama and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates come into play. Using simple bargaining strategies, Obama is proposing to cease their European missile ventures under the condition that Russia talks with Iran and persuades them to cut their nuclear research. As a result, Russia would stop their nuclear development, resulting in three happy countries and one less stressed world.
It is critical that President Obama uses his position as the leader of the free world and initiate bonds with countries historically seen as enemies. Maybe if Obama could negotiate friendly interaction, we could live in a world without nuclear bombs. No one needs another Hiroshima or Pearl Harbor, let's keep it clean and safe.
"Yes We Can" I Hope He Does
Photo Credit: Lisagoldman.net
President Obama has set his sights high, proposing to cut the federal budget deficit in half by the time his four year term is up. Obama will attempt this by notably raising taxes on businesses and the wealthy, and by cutting spending on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
In order to slash into this $1.3 trillion deficit, President Obama, along with members of congress, advocacy groups, independent experts and unions will discuss what must be done to remedy this daunting situation.
The Los Angeles Times reported that there are a couple key factors preventing criticizing President Obama from implementing this budget cut, with one being the overly optimistic assumptions.
As stated in his weekly video address, President Obama said that he will have a budget that is "sober in its assessments, honest in its accounting, and lays out in detail my strategy for investing in what we need, cutting what we don't, and restoring fiscal discipline."
Is this too difficult to achieve? I believe in everything Obama says, but it seems extremely difficult to halve our budget in four years to $533 billion from $1.3 trillion. Another con to Obama's promise is that if for some reason he doesn't meet this summit of a goal, the he ultimately could cost him the reelection in 2012.
In addition to embracing the recently signed $787 billion American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Obama plans on following through with
the domestic agenda he advocated throughout his presidential campaign.
This agenda focuses on changing major environmental policies and a significant
restructuring of health care coverage.
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