The Obama Diary

Cheerful Random Photo :D

****

Today (All Times Eastern):

10:0 Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano delivers her farewell remarks at the National Press Club (C-Span)

12:30: Jay Carney briefs the press

2:0: President Obama meets with mayors on reducing youth violence (closed press)

2:45: VP Biden delivers remarks at The American Legion National Convention in Houston

4:0: First Lady Michelle Obama delivers remarks at a screening of “The Powerbroker: Whitney Young’s Fight for Civil Rights”

7:30: President Obama and the First Lady host a reception for the March on Washington (closed press)

****

Add your name to tell Congress: no more nonsense, and no more threats to shut down the government over #Obamacare OFA.BO/GPJ5EE

—
Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 26, 2025

****

Eric Eichelberger: 25 Republicans Who Supported ObamaCare Before Obama

Republicans have pulled out all the stops to kill Obamacare, the president’s landmark health care law that requires every American to purchase health insurance by 2014. There have been lawsuits; there have been bills (40 in the House so far); there has been a Supreme Court case—all aimed at rolling back a law that that the GOP says is an assault on individual liberty. Now, with only a few more months to go until the individual mandate—the requirement that we all have coverage—kicks in, Republicans are frantic; some are eventhreatening to force the United States to default on its debts if Democrats don’t agree to delay the law.

This is odd because the individual mandate, the cornerstone of Obamacare, was originally a conservative idea. It was first proposed by the Heritage Foundation in 1989. And scores of Republicans—not just Mitt Romney—have backed the idea in the past couple of decades. Here are some of the GOPers who supported Obamacare before Obama

More here

****

Pres. Obama talks about Martin Luther King Jr's Legacy, Education, #ObamaCare, and The Butler with @TJMShow. blackamericaweb.com/160343/preside…

—
Nerdy Wonka (@NerdyWonka) August 27, 2025

****

****

CBS: Obama Orders Release Of Report Justifying Syria Strike

President Barack Obama called his national security team together Saturday to talk about the next move in Syria. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper led off the three-hour White House meeting with detailed analysis of the evidence about the chemical weapons attack, the disposition of victims and what the administration now believes is a near air-tight circumstantial case that the Syrian regime was behind it.

Obama ordered a declassified report be prepared for public release before any military strike commences. That report, top advisers tell CBS News, is due to be released in a day or two.

More here

****

****

ThinkProgress: What Are The United States’ Options In Syria?

The world’s focus is currently on Syria and how the United States will respond to last week’s reports of a massive chemical weapons attack against civilians … President Obama has been meeting with his top national security advisors to come to a conclusion on how to move forward in Syria. Just over a year ago, Obama called the use of chemical weapons a violation of a “red-line” that would change U.S. calculations. With that in mind, here are details of at least three of the options that Obama has before him:

Stay The Course: Contrary to at times heated rhetoric, the United States has not exactly been sitting on its hands over the past three years with regard to Syria. So far, the U.S. has provided more than one billion dollars worth of humanitarian aid …. sticking to the current strategy of limited direct engagement has the added benefit of not introducing U.S. forces and assets directly into an unknown theater…..

Limited Strikes: …. in the form of cruise missile strikes from naval ships or air strikes from one of the U.S. nearby military bases, aimed at taking out Syria’s remaining chemical weapons facilities and possibly other government targets….

The ‘Kosovo Model’ and No-Fly Zone: …. a lengthier air engagement, designed to break the Syrian government’s momentum and aiding in the eventual overthrow of Assad’s government….

More here

****

****

Chicago Tribune: First Lady To Pay Tribute To Whitney Young During Civil Rights Documentary

First lady Michelle Obama, an alumna of Whitney M. Young Magnet High School in Chicago, will pay tribute to the school’s namesake Tuesday at a screening of a documentary film depicting his crusade for civil rights.

Obama will make remarks at the screening of “The Powerbroker: Whitney Young’s Fight for Civil Rights” ….. The film chronicles Young’s civil rights battles during the 1960s and his journey from segregated Kentucky to the leadership of the National Urban League, aides to the first lady said. He lived from 1921-1971.

More here

****

****

****

****

Jared Bernstein: Sequester Watch, #19

This week, as many students head back to school, the sequester’s Head Start cuts mean that 57,000 low-income kids will not. Wahpeton, ND illustrated Head Start spots that fell victim to the sequester with empty seats and a sign that reads “these 12 chairs represent the 12 children who will not be able to attend Head Start due to budget cuts from Sequestration.”

‘Do you see the harm in sequestration?’

Head Start programs aren’t the only area where the sequester’s impact continues to sink in — see stories on scientific research, overburdened justice systems, low-income housing, economic growth and more below. As policymakers move into a fall season laden with budget battles, they’d do well to remember what’s at stake and consider replacing sequestration with a backloaded deficit-reduction plan balancing cuts with new revenues.

Remember what we say here at OTE — those who forget the sequester are doomed to repeat it.

More here

****

****

TPM: Napolitano To Deliver Farewell Address Today

Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano is scheduled to deliver her farewell address Tuesday to reflect on the past four-and-a-half years in the Obama administration before she begins her next chapter as head of the University of California system.

The speech is expected to begin at 10 a.m. ET at the National Press Club in Washington (C-Span)

More here

****

****

Texas Tribune: Documents Still Show No Evidence of Excrement at Abortion Debate

Documents released Monday by the Texas Department of Public Safety’s provided no new evidence that officers found one jar of urine and 18 containers of feces at the Capitol before a July 12 debate on a controversial abortion bill.

DPS released a press statement the day of the debate that said officers had discovered one jar suspected of containing urine and 18 jars suspected to contain feces. After initially resisting requests for additional information about the reported discoveries, DPS on Monday released 144 pages of documents about the alleged incident. But the documents contain no official reports of the findings, and several DPS officers said they had not seen any of the suspected items.

More here

****

Well, well, what a surprise - it turns out Obama's birth certificate is real and Trump University diplomas are fake.

—
Frank Conniff (@FrankConniff) August 26, 2025

****

Mother Jones: Talib Kweli: “We Send Young White Boys To The Army. We’re Sending Young Black Boys To The Prisons.”

MJ: What are your thoughts on the recent court ruling that New York City’s stop-and-frisk policies are tantamount to racial profiling—and the fact that Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the city would appeal?

TK: He also said that if it was is his son, he might feel different. Bloomberg is a sensible guy. He’s just privileged. He’s a goddamn billionaire, and he or his family members have never had to deal with anything as remotely degrading as stop and frisk. So he has no point of reference.

MJ: New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said people in minority communities want more stop and frisk.

TK: That’s all propaganda and it’s bullshit. No one likes to be treated like that. For him to make that statement is ignorant. What it’s saying is that because you’re poor, because you live in a neighborhood that deals with oppressed conditions, you deserve to be treated like a criminal. In our Constitution it says you have the right to live without illegal search and seizure. What else is stop and frisk? These neighborhoods are unsafe not because there’s not enough cops illegally frisking people. They’re not safe because of economic conditions. They’re not safe because of all types of things in the government that people like Bloomberg and Ray Kelly should be looking to fix instead of randomly searching kids in the hood. If you go to a college campus and you do stop and frisk, you’re going to find a lot of drugs there, too.

MJ: Do you see any connection between this debate and the one over the NSA snooping?

TK: Well, I think the biggest problem in our country is mass incarceration and the prison-industrial complex. From the Rockefeller drug laws to stand your ground to stop and frisk, all these are pointing people, especially and disproportionately black and brown people, towards the criminal-justice system. It’s depleting whole generations of people. We send young white boys to the Army, we’re sending young black boys to the prisons. And you have people at the top who don’t have to deal with any of that degradation getting rich off of this.

More of this MUST READ here

****

On This Day:

President Barack Obama and family tour the Gay Head lighthouse in Aquinnah, Mass., while on vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, Aug. 27, 2009 (Photo by Pete Souza)

****