WASHINGTON (AP) — If businesses get an extra year to meet a new health care mandate, why not everybody else? Republicans, seizing on the White House delay for employers, are demanding that the Obama administration give individual Americans an equal break. But the White House says that’s just a thinly disguised gambit for dismantling the […]
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Business groups applaud delay in key health care rule
Business groups are cheering the Obama administration’s decision to delay for one year a requirement that employers provide health insurance to employees, even as some warn that the move only pushes inevitable problems with the mandate into the future. Since the 2010 enactment of the health-care overhaul, employers have railed against many of its provisions, […]
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Health care snag raises questions
WASHINGTON — Nothing’s ever easy with President Barack Obama’s health care law. The latest hitch gives employers an additional year before they must offer medical coverage to their workers or pay a fine. What does the delay mean for workers? And struggling businesses? And is it a significant setback for a law already beset by […]
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Rowhani, Obama sound positive, but progress likely to take time
President Barack Obama and the newly elected president of Iran signaled willingness to improve ties between their nations Monday, but both leaders made clear that a positive tone may not easily translate into progress in resolving the dispute over Iran’s nuclear program. In his first news conference since being elected president of Iran on Friday, […]
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Obama: Government records sweep not targeting Americans
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama declared Friday that America is “going to have to make some choices” balancing privacy and security, launching a vigorous defense of formerly secret programs that sweep up an estimated 3 billion phone calls a day and amass Internet data from U.S. providers in an attempt to thwart terror attacks. He […]
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Obama refocuses terror threat to pre-9/11 level
WASHINGTON — Some call it wishful thinking, but President Barack Obama has all but declared an end to the global war on terror. Obama is not claiming final victory over extremists who still seek to kill Americans and other Westerners. Instead, he is refocusing the long struggle against terrorism that lies ahead, steering the United […]
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President shifts focus on national security
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama sought Thursday to advance the U.S. beyond the unrelenting war effort of the past dozen years, defining a narrower terror threat from smaller networks and homegrown extremists rather than the grandiose plots of Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida. In a lengthy address at the National Defense University, Obama defended his controversial […]
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Obama budget cuts deficits $1.1T by 2023
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s budget would trim projected federal deficits by $1.1 trillion over the coming decade, using nearly $6 in higher revenues for every $1 in reduced spending to achieve it, Congress’ nonpartisan budget analyst said Friday. After four straight years of annual shortfalls exceeding $1 trillion, the Congressional Budget Office report said […]
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Snowe presses for bipartisanship in new book
PORTLAND — U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe describes a scene out of a Rockwell painting: With Washington crippled by a blizzard, President Barack Obama worked the week before Christmas with a fire roaring in the fireplace in the Oval Office. Outside the window, his daughters played in the snow with their dog. Inside, Snowe writes in […]
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Susan Collins slams Obama over IRS
WASHINGTON — Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, on Sunday called the Internal Revenue Service’s singling out of conservative groups for extra scrutiny “absolutely chilling” and called on President Obama to condemn the effort. “This is truly outrageous and it contributes to the profound distrust that the American people have in government,” Collins, a moderate Republican, said […]