White House Done Addressing Mosque Issue

A spokesman for President Barack Obama told reporters today that the White House is ready to move beyond the controversy surrounding the President’s statement last Friday about the planned ‘Ground Zero’ Mosque.

During a brief speech, Obama told guests who had been invited by the White House to celebrate the start of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan that, “As a citizen, and as President, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country. And that includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in Lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances.”

One day later, during a visit to the Gulf coast, the President clarified his remarks, telling reporters, “My intention was simply to let people know what I thought, which was that In this country we treat everybody equally and in accordance with the law, regardless of race, regardless of religion. I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there.”

The President’s spokesman during the trip, White House deputy press secretary Bill Burton, also chimed in on Saturday, informing members of the press that Obama was not “backing off in any way from the comments he made last night.

“It is not his role as President to pass judgment on every local project. But it is his responsibility to stand up for the Constitutional principle of religious freedom and equal treatment for all Americans,” Burton said.

Today aboard Air Force One, Burton fielded several more questions regarding Obama’s comments, and attempted to put the issue to bed.

“I think we’ve had a pretty fulsome conversation about it,” Burton said. “I assume that people will continue to talk about it, but I think that we’ve addressed this to a pretty full extent.”

U.S. Pledges To Help Russia Fight Fires

President Barack Obama has promised to supply Russia with technical aid as the country struggles to contain a series of wildfires, according to a statement put out Friday by the White House.

During a phone call with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev Thursday, Obama said that the USAID, the Defense Department, the U.S. Forest Service and the California state government will work to supply the European federation with firefighting equipment and airlift assistance.

“The American People stand with the people of Russia in this difficult time,” the White House statement reads.

The wildfires began late last month and have killed over 50 Russians.

Obama Signs Improper Payments Legislation

President Barack Obama today signed into law the Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Act, proving that he is determined to not only talk the talk, but to walk the walk when it comes to reigning in excessive government spending.

The legislation, sponsored by Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-Pa.), will force the federal government to look for ways to eliminate overpayments involving benefit checks, as well as Medicare and Medicaid outlays. According to the White House, it will help achieve the President’s new goal of lowering wasteful, improper payments by $50 billion between now and 2012.

“This goal is fully achieveable,” said the President.

Today’s event could demonstrate to Americans that less than 24 hours after Obama signed a bill aimed at holding Wall Street more accountable, he is committed to doing the same within his own government. In fiscal year 2009, the federal government misspent almost $110 billion. In addition to wasting tons of money on entitlement programs, the government sent millions of dollars worth of checks to dead people, and frequently overpaid contractors.

With the nation’s debt level slowly approaching $14 trillion, the President pledged earlier this year to take serious steps to crack down. Obama issued executive orders and memos establishing “do not pay” lists for fraudulent contractors, forcing departments to spend less on construction costs and reforming the federal hiring process. Signing Carper-Murphy marks yet another effort by the administration to combat waste and abuse.

“I think we’re headed in the right direction,” said Obama.

White House Apologizes to Sherrod

Today, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs apologized to former USDA official Shirley Sherrod “on behalf of the administration,” and said USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack would also apologize. Sherrod had been ousted based on an edited video clip that portrayed her as being racist. Gibbs refused to speculate on whether or not Sherrod would get her job back.

A lot of people were involved in this situation and acted without having all the facts, Gibbs said. He offered Sherrod an apology on behalf of the administration.  “A disservice was done,” for which we apologize.

Sherrod has stated that the someone from the White House urged her to resign, but Gibbs said that he knows of no conversations from the White House. “The White House was informed but not consulted,” Gibbs said.

The President was briefed yesterday mid-morning and has been getting updates about it throughout the day. According to Gibbs, this was a decision solely made by the Department of Agriculture. When asked about Secretary Vilsak and whether his job is safe, Gibbs said
that he is doing a terrific job at the USDA.

Gibbs also talked about living in a culture where you want fast responses. The rapid advancement of technology has also created the world that we are living in today, and this ties in with politics, race and media events, he added, calling the situation a “teachable moment.”

Additional reporting by Philip Bunnell

Demonstrators Protest Arizona Law Outside White House

By Linn Grubbstrom - Talk Radio News Service

Religious and immigrant rights activists gathered outside the White House Wednesday to urge the Obama administration to approach immigration reform and voice support for the Justice Department’s recent challenge of Arizona’s hardline immigration policy.

“The people here are gathered, in prayer, in peaceful protest, to urge the Obama administration and the federal government, one, to stop S.B.1070, the harsh discriminatory law in Arizona and two, to take responsibility for the mess that is the immigration system, to stop this chaos of 50 different states trying to pass 50 different immigration laws,” said Shuya Ohno, the Assistant Communications Director with the National Immigration Forum

Arizona’s immigration bill was signed into law on April 23rd. It allows law enforcement officials to request identification from those who they believe are in the country illegally. There has been six different lawsuits that have argued that the law is unconstitutional. The latest was filed Tuesday July 6th by the Department of Justice.