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President Barack Obama is signing legislation to fund his troop surge in Afghanistan. Before Congress passed it on Tuesday, the bill was stripped of money for domestic stimulus programs. Obama was signing it in a low-ley Oval Office session Thursday.

President Barack Obama on Wednesday signed into law the most historic shake-up of the regulation of U.S. banks since the Great Depression, placing new fees and limits on the nation's biggest banks, imposing new restrictions on the $450-trillion derivatives market, and crafting a major new consumer-protection division for mortgage and credit-card products. "Financial reform is not just good for consumers, it is good for the economy," Obama said at a signing ceremony with dozens of Democratic lawmakers and consumer advocates in attendance. "Passing this bill was no easy task. To get there, we had to overcome the furious lobbying of...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama has signed a law intended to provide more protections for a free press around the world. The law, the Daniel Pearl Freedom of Press Act, expands efforts to identify countries where press freedom is being violated.

<p>From CNN White House Producer Xuan Thai Obama declined to answer questions at bill signing for the Freedom of Press Act.</p>

Obama signs bill restricting mail-order cigarette sales WASHINGTON — President Obama on Wednesday signed legislation that bans the U.S. Postal Service from shipping cigarettes — a measure that's expected to cripple the mail-order tobacco businesses run by members of the Seneca Nation of Indians. White House press secretary Robert L. Gibbs announced the signing in a brief statement that included no comment on the new law, which the Senecas fought furiously. In response, Seneca Nation President Barry E. Snyder Sr. accused the president of betraying the very Indian nations he wooed during his 2008 campaign and spoke to last fall....

Obama will be signing the Reconciliation Bill on Wednesday at Northern Virginia Community College. I am sure that there will be a protest/rally however, I don't have any confirmation. If you or your organization would like to organize a gathering, please post the information here.

Nancy Pelosi (D-ingbat): "Can you imagine a more important birthday privilege than to be signing health care for all Americans?"

Convicted felon Robert Creamer, who wrote the blueprint for the Democrats’ health care reform campaign, attended official health care signing celebrations in Washington, D.C. yesterday. He was joined by numerous activists and “community organizers” who have had their sights set on nationalizing health care and have finally achieved it. Creamer’s spouse, Rep. Jan Schakowsky, was one of the bill’s most vociferous proponents. Creamer’s attendance was leaked by a fellow partygoer who blogged: “I just got back from the post-signing ceremony celebration at the Interior Department. It was like a family reunion–young Obama staffers mixing with warriors from the ’93-’94 health...

Almost every sector of American society greeted yesterday's signing of a historic health care law as a major step toward guaranteeing affordable health insurance for all. Labor unions, health care professionals, small business owners, retirees, students, and ordinary people from throughout the country applauded President Obama and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi for having the tenacity to push through what's being called the most sweeping health care legislation since the establishment of Medicare in the 1960s. We join with those who hail this legislation both as a measure that will save lives now and begin curbing the insurance...

There was plenty of hoopla in the East Room of the White House on Tuesday when President Obama signed his health care bill into law. But when Mr. Obama signs an executive order that secured the votes of anti-abortion Democrats, he will do so in private. The White House announced Tuesday evening that Mr. Obama would sign the order — which it said reaffirms the health bill’s “consistency with longstanding restrictions on the use of federal funds for abortion” — in the Oval Office on Wednesday afternoon. The order, negotiated Sunday afternoon as the House was entering the final stages...

I didn't see anything posted, and didn't know if anyone wanted to discuss...

President Obama will sign the just-passed health care reform bill this morning, Democratic sources are saying.

President Obama signed the renewal of the Patriot Act in the quiet of a slow-news Saturday–the Act was set to expire Sunday, February 28–as reported by The Hill. Photo Credit: AP Photo The reauthorization did NOT include any reforms to the current Patriot Act–an odd display of agreement and submission to Bush-era policy–even though the Democrats had the numbers to reform the Act. The continuance of the current Patriot Act signals that Democrats are fearful of further controversary in light of American’s distrust and poor approval ratings of the Democrat-controlled Congress. From the Hill: The House approved the bill 315-97...

With virtually zero debate - or media attention - President Barack Obama has signed a one-year extension for what many considered the most crucial and controversial aspects of the USA PATRIOT Act. The provisions, set to expire Sunday without the signature of Obama, include extensions to allow: -1) "roving" wiretaps, permitting surveillance on multiple phones and e-mail addresses. -2) court-approved seizures of records and property in anti-terrorism operations.

Behind closed doors and with no cameras present, President Obama signed into law Friday afternoon the bill raising the public debt limit from $12.394 trillion to $14.294 trillion. The current national debt is $12.3 trillion. Check out the National Debt Clock, which tells you your share of that -- roughly $40,000 per citizen, $113,000 per taxpayer.

Silence of the Lambs - - Part 5,432 Speak of Sin; Land in Jail Welcome to Post Christian America thelstcrusade.org A Christian evangelist who was once arrested, incarcerated, and charged under Pennsylvania's hate crimes law says the federal hate crimes bill that has been signed into law by President Obama is the most dangerous laws in the history of the United States. The Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which was signed into law yesterday, creates additional penalties for violent crimes motivated by the victim's "actual or perceived" gender, "gender identity," sexual orientation, or disability....

Photo credit Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Chad J. McNeeley WASHINGTON, Oct. 28, 2009 - President Barack Obama today signed the fiscal 2010 National Defense Authorization Act during a ceremony at the White House. Obama hailed the act, which contains $680.2 billion in military budget authority, as transformational legislation that targets wasteful defense spending. The president was accompanied by Vice President Joe Biden, congressional leaders and other senior officials, including Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "There's still more waste we need to cut; there's still more fights that...

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama on Wednesday signed the first major piece of federal gay rights legislation, a milestone that activists compared to the passage of 1960s civil rights legislation empowering blacks. The new law adds acts of violence against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people to the list of federal hate crimes. Gay rights activists voiced hope that the Obama administration would advance more issues, including legislation to bar workplace discrimination, allow military service and recognize same-sex marriages. Congress passed the hate crimes protections as an unlikely amendment to this year's Defense Authorization Act. Obama, speaking at an emotional...

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama on Wednesday signed and celebrated hate crime legislation that extends protection to people based on sexual orientation, sealing a long-fought victory to gay advocates. The president spoke of a nation becoming a place where "we're all free to live and love as we see fit." The new law expands federal hate crimes to include those committed against people because of gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability. It also loosens limits on when federal law enforcement can intervene and prosecute crimes, amounting to the biggest expansion of the civil-rights era law in decades. "No...

The "hate crimes" bill approved recently by Congress could be a problem for broadcasters -- most importantly, Christian broadcasters -- now that it has been signed into law. President Barack Obama has signed into law a measure that adds to the list of federal hate crimes attacks on people based on their sexual orientation. Congress approved the legislation last week as part of the $680-billion FY 2010 Defense Authorization bill. Appended to the hate crimes amendment was a statement ensuring that a religious leader or any other person cannot be prosecuted on the bases if his or her speech, beliefs,...

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- The White House said Tuesday that President Barack Obama would approve the Defense Department's $680 billion budget for fiscal 2010, which includes funding to increase military personnel and support the ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. The bill also includes the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, also known as the Matthew Shepard bill, a Wyoming teen murdered in 1998 because he was a homosexual. The act provides additional support for local law enforcement and prosecutors to try violent crimes that are motivated by the victim's religion, color, gender, or sexual orientation. Obama will sign the 2010 National...

*[EXCERPTED]* "...The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act allows the FDA to...control an industry ... Opponents from...N. Carolina argued that the FDA had proved through a series of food safety failures that it was not up to the job of regulation..."

During the presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised that once a bill was passed by Congress, the White House would post it online for five days before he signed it. The latest on President Obama, the new administration and other news from Washington and around the nation. “When there’s a bill that ends up on my desk as president, you the public will have five days to look online and find out what’s in it before I sign it, so that you know what your government’s doing,” Mr. Obama said as a candidate, telling voters he would make government more transparent...

WASHINGTON — Lamenting his first teenage cigarette, President Barack Obama ruefully admitted on Monday that he's spent his adult life fighting the habit. Then he signed the nation's toughest anti-smoking law, aiming to keep thousands of other teens from getting hooked. Obama praised the historic legislation, which gives the Food and Drug Administration unprecedented authority to regulate what goes into tobacco products, to make public the ingredients and to prohibit marketing campaigns geared toward children. But he didn't say how his own struggle was coming since he moved into the White House. And aides were no more forthcoming. As senator,...

President Obama signed landmark legislation Monday giving the Food and Drug Administration new power to regulate the manufacturing, marketing and sale of tobacco. President Obama says the new law "represents change that's been decades in the making." The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act gives the FDA power to ban candy-flavored and fruit-flavored cigarettes, widely considered appealing to first-time smokers, including youths. It also prohibits tobacco companies from using terms such as "low tar," "light" or "mild," requires larger warning labels on packages, and restricts advertising of tobacco products. It also requires tobacco companies to reduce levels of nicotine...

The law will force cigarette packs to carry graphic warnings and forbid the use of terms like "mild" and "low tar" in tobacco advertisements. By July 2011, the top half of the front and rear panels of cigarette boxes will consist of warnings. Government getting into social behaviour??? Reminds me of the SURGEON GENERAL'S WARNING the government put into effect with the cigarette law by the FTC in 1973. Doesn't work! A colleague of mine was an FTC attorney who was one of the people responsible for enforcing the law. He told me at the time, "Of course nicotine is...

President Barack Obama signed into law Monday an anti-smoking bill that will give the Food and Drug Administration unprecedented authority to regulate tobacco. Obama, who has struggled to quit smoking, signed the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act during an event Monday in the Rose Garden. "I know how difficult it can be to break this habit," Obama said.

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama is set to sign into law an anti-smoking bill that will give the Food and Drug Administration unprecedented authority to regulate tobacco. Obama is scheduled to sign the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act during an event Monday in the Rose Garden. The law allows the FDA to reduce nicotine in tobacco products, ban candy flavorings and block labels such "low tar" and "light." Tobacco companies also will be required to cover their cartons with large graphic warnings.

WASHINGTON (AP) - People who want to give back to their communities through service will get more opportunities to do so under a bill being signed Tuesday by President Barack Obama. The $5.7 billion bill triples the size of the AmeriCorps service program over the next eight years, and expands ways for students and seniors to earn money for college through their volunteer work. It aims to foster and fulfill people's desire to make a difference, such as by mentoring children, cleaning up parks or building and weatherizing homes for the poor. Bolstering voluntary public service programs has been a...

The nonprofit world will take a break from its economic woes and celebrate a big political victory on Tuesday when President Obama signs landmark legislation that boosts national service, volunteerism, and innovative social projects. The president, fulfilling a campaign pledge to greatly expand government programs to get Americans to serve their country by doing good, is set to sign the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act during his first 100 days in office — a timeline that pleases national-service advocates for its symbolic significance. The signing ceremony will take place at the SEED School of Washington, D.C., an inner-city charter...

# Obama signs bill designating 2 million additional acres of public wilderness areas # Designation provides highest level of government protection from commercial use # Law, pooling more than 160 legislative proposals, extends across nine states # Highlights: New heritage sites and water projects, expanded park boundaries

As President Barack Obama's pen touched paper today to make the federal stimulus bill law, hundreds of people rallied on the west side of the Colorado Capitol to decry the stimulus as irresponsible. Protesters chanted, "No more pork!" and a few wore costume pig noses. They waved giant $30,000 novelty checks, representing the amount they said the stimulus would cost individual taxpayers.

MARKETS Dow slips nearly 300 points By Jack Healy and Matthew Saltmarsh Published: February 17, 2009 Financial gloom was everywhere Tuesday. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average came within sight of its lowest levels in more than a decade. Financial shares were battered. And rattled investors clamored to buy rainy-day investments like gold and Treasury debt. Markets from Hong Kong to Stockholm to London also staggered lower. It was a global wave of selling spurred by rising worries about how banks, automakers - entire countries - would fare in a deepening recession. At the close, the Dow was...

From The Times February 18, 2009 Barack Obama gambles billions to save homes and jobs Tim Reid in Washington President Obama will reveal a plan today to stem the flood of home repossessions afflicting millions of American families after signing his $787 billion economic stimulus package into law last night. Amid persistent concerns among investors about the Obama Administration’s ability to turn around the US economy the global markets fell again. At close of trading the Dow Jones index had dropped almost 300 points, nearing its lowest level for a decade. The Bill – the biggest government intervention in the...

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama is poised to sign into law the most sweeping economic package in decades, a rescue plan designed to create millions of jobs, spur consumer spending and revive the nation's outlook. ... The setting, the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, is meant to underscore the investments the new law will make in "green" energy-related jobs. Ahead of Obama's arrival in Colorado, the White House went live with a Web site, http://www.recovery.gov,

At the signing. NS.

Associated Press. Link only

Obama signing huge stimulus, readying other steps LIZ SIDOTI and TOM RAUM Feb. 17, 2009. DENVER -- President Barack Obama put his own indelible imprint on the nation's distressed economy Tuesday, signing the huge recovery package into law, readying a $50 billion proposal to help homeowners fend off foreclosure and awaiting emergency restructuring plans from flailing automakers. Obama said the sprawling legislation, which congressional Democrats pushed to passage last week over near-unanimous opposition from Republicans, would "set our economy on a firmer foundation." Obama's first major piece of legislation, it's a $787 billion mix of tax cuts and one of...

DENVER — President Obama has not ruled out a second stimulus package, his press secretary, Robert Gibbs, said on Tuesday, just before Mr. Obama signed his $787 billion recovery package into law with a statement that it would “set our economy on a firmer foundation.” The president said he would not pretend “that today marks the end of our economic problems.” “Nor does it constitute all of what we have to do to turn our economy around,” Mr. Obama said at the signing ceremony in the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. “But today does mark the beginning of the...

President Barack Obama is ready to sign into law the most sweeping economic package in decades, a rescue plan meant to reinvigorate job creation, consumer spending and public optimism. Add the bill to an ever-growing deficit. Capping the biggest victory of his month-old administration, Obama will sign the economic legislation Tuesday in Denver. The setting, the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, is meant to underscore the investments the new law will make in "green" energy-related jobs. It also allows Obama to get away from Washington, where the bill's passage was a mostly partisan affair, and be among people who...

Did President Bush ever leave town to sign a bill? Maybe he did, I can't remember. Any other presidents doing this come to mind? The expense of this flying around and security is enormous. I don't get the purpose and why Denver again?

"Colorado Americans for Prosperity is organizing a protest countering President Obama’s visit to the city to sign the porkulus legislation at an exclusive, invitation-only event at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science in City Park. Protesters will gather at the west steps of the Capitol (Lincoln Street, between 14th and Colfax) from 11:00 a.m. to 2 p.m. Mountain time." "I am making good on my promise to deliver a roasted pig to the event."

WASHINGTON, USA (AP) - President Barack Obama headed to the American West yesterday to sign the $787-billion economic stimulus package and to tackle the home mortgage foreclosure crisis, signalling his determination to sidestep the partisan fires still raging in the capital. The president will sign the stimulus bill into law in Denver today suggesting that he will continue taking his economic message to the American people, who are giving him high marks for handling the crisis. The symbolism is obvious for Colorado, where a growing green-energy industry will draw major benefits from the stimulus. Passage of the stimulus - unprecedented...

President Barack Obama kept one campaign pledge Wednesday afternoon and at the same time violated another when he signed into law the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, which extends health care coverage to 11 million low-income children. The White House views the SCHIP legislation as a down payment on Obama’s pledge to provide universal health care by the end of his first term. The bill ran into some partisan resistance because it allows states for the first time to use federal money to cover children and pregnant women who are legal immigrants. But Obama’s 5 p.m. signing came barely three...

To reduce bills rushed through Congress and to the president before the public has the opportunity to review them, Obama "will not sign any non-emergency bill without giving the American public an opportunity to review and comment on the White House website for five days." One of President Obama's major campaign planks was making government more open and accountable. It's a reaction to a habit in Congress of rushing bills through the House and Senate without giving people much opportunity to know what the bills would do. Indeed, sometimes members of Congress don't even know what's in the bills. So...

Barack Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act on Jan. 29, 2009, keeping a longstanding promise to counter a Supreme Court decision that limited workers' ability to sue for pay discrimination. We moved the Obameter and gave him a Promise Kept. But we also had to give him his first Promise Broken for the same signing. As part of his agenda to bring more transparency to government, Obama said he would institute "sunlight before signing" -- posting laws to the White House Web site for five days of public comment before he signed off on them. The Ledbetter Act...

President Obama signed his first bill on Thursday, an equal-pay measure that makes it easier for workers to sue for discrimination on the job. The Lilly Ledbetter bill extends the period an employee can file a claim of discrimination for making less money than another worker doing the same job. "That there are no second class citizens in our workplaces, and that it's not just unfair and illegal -- but bad for business-- to pay someone less because of their gender, age, race, ethnicity, religion or disability," he said before a packed East Room audience.

U.S. President Barack Obama gestures after signing his first bill into law as President with the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act in the East Room of the White House in Washington January 29, 2009. Ledbetter, after 19 years on the job, sued her employer when she discovered she was the lowest-paid supervisor at the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company plant where she worked, despite having more experience than several male co-workers. First lady Michelle Obama speaks as Lilly Ledbetter looks on in the State Dining Room of the White House after President Barack Obama, not pictured, signed the Lilly Ledbetter...