Army PR Push: Use ‘Average-Looking Women’

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Photo Credit: US ARMYThe Army should use photos of “average-looking women” when it needs to illustrate stories about female soldiers, a specialist recommends — images of women who are too pretty undermine the communications strategy about introducing them into combat roles.

That’s the gist of an internal Army e-mail an Army source shared with POLITICO.

“In general, ugly women are perceived as competent while pretty women are perceived as having used their looks to get ahead,” wrote Col. Lynette Arnhart, who is leading a team of analysts studying how best to integrate women into combat roles that have previously been closed off to them. She sent her message to give guidance to Army spokesmen and spokeswomen about how they should tell the press and public about the Army’s integration of women.

“There is a general tendency to select nice looking women when we select a photo to go with an article (where the article does not reference a specific person). It might behoove us to select more average looking women for our comms strategy. For example, the attached article shows a pretty woman, wearing make-up while on deployed duty. Such photos undermine the rest of the message (and may even make people ask if breaking a nail is considered hazardous duty),” Arnhart said.

She wrote that a photo of a female soldier with mud on her face that news agencies used last spring “sends a much different message—one of women willing to do the dirty work necessary in order to get the job done.”

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Second Massive Wave of Health Plan Cancellations Looms

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A new and independent analysis of ObamaCare warns of a ticking time bomb, predicting a second wave of 50 million to 100 million insurance policy cancellations next fall — right before the mid-term elections.

The next round of cancellations and premium hikes is expected to hit employees, particularly of small businesses. While the administration has tried to downplay the cancellation notices hitting policyholders on the individual market by noting they represent a relatively small fraction of the population, the swath of people who will be affected by the shakeup in employer-sponsored coverage will be much broader.

An analysis by the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, shows the administration anticipates half to two-thirds of small businesses would have policies canceled or be compelled to send workers onto the ObamaCare exchanges. They predict up to 100 million small and large business policies could be canceled next year.

“The impact I’m mostly worried about is on small young, entrepreneurial firms that will suddenly face much higher health insurance premiums if they want to offer health insurance to their employees,” said AEI resident scholar Stan Veuger. “I think for a lot of other businesses … they can just send their employees to the exchanges or offer them a fixed subsidy every month to buy health insurance themselves.”

Under the health care law, businesses with fewer than 50 workers do not have to provide health coverage. But if they do, the policies will still have to meet the benefit standards set by ObamaCare.

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White House Email Chain Shows Launch Fears

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Photo Credit: ReutersTop White House and health officials feared that HealthCare.gov would not work correctly and would set off a wave of bad publicity, according to emails shortly before the disastrous rollout of the Obamacare enrollment website.

The emails, released Wednesday evening by House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa, included a picture of an error message that has become emblematic of the launch debacle. They were dated Sept. 25 — less than a week before the enrollment portal opened and immediately created a crisis for the White House.

A White House spokesman said the emails — which use technical terms — focused on problems that could arise if there was high traffic to the site, not to a fear that the site wouldn’t work at all.

In the emails Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Deputy Chief Information Officer Henry Chao summed up concerns that he said White House Chief Technology Officer Todd Park had expressed.

“When Todd Park and Marilyn [Tavenner] was here yesterday one of the things Todd conveyed was this fear the WH has about hc.gov being unavailable,” Chao said, referring to CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner.

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Obama: ‘We’re Going to Have to…Re-market and Re-brand’ the Affordable Care Act (+video)

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Photo Credit: AP/ Evan VucciPresident Barack Obama told a gathering of corporate executives Tuesday he’s confident that his model of health care will work in the end, but he said he’s going to have to “re-brand” it to sell it to a skeptical public.

He didn’t use the word “Obamacare” once on Tuesday in talking about his health care law, but he mentioned the “Affordable Care Act” seven times.

“So, look, I am confident that the model that we built, which works off of the existing private insurance system, is one that will succeed,” Obama told the Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C.

“We are going to have to, (a) fix the website so everybody feels confident about that. We’re going to have to, obviously, re-market and re-brand, and that will be challenging in this political environment.”

During a campaign stop in Colorado last year, the president embraced the name that Republicans had given to his health insurance law: “The Affordable Care Act — also known as Obamacare,” Obama said in August 2012. “I actually like the name,” he added. “Because I do care — that’s why we fought so hard to make it happen.”

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CBS Poll: 43 Percent Want Obamacare Repealed, Obama Approval Plunges

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Photo Credit: Getty Images Forty-three percent of Americans believe the Affordable Care Act needs to be repealed, and opposition to the new healthcare law has driven President Barack Obama’s job approval rating to an all-time low, a new poll has found.

According to a CBS News Poll conducted Nov. 15-18, approval of the law has dropped to 31 percent, the lowest number ever recorded by the poll, a decline of 12 points since last month. Sixty-one percent of respondents disapprove of Obamacare, including 46 percent who say they disapprove strongly.

The survey of 1,010 adults also found that Republicans are nearly unanimous in their disapproval of the president’s signature healthcare law, and two-thirds of independents agree. Democrats continue to back the law, but their support has dropped by 16 points since last month, from 74 percent in October to 58 percent today.

Just 7 percent of Americans think the Affordable Care Act is working well and should be kept in place as it is.

The problems plaguing the launch of Obamacare are taking a toll on the president’s job approval rating. Just 37 percent now approve of the job Obama is doing, according to the poll, and disapproval is at an all-time high of 57 percent.

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Obama Gushes Over Bill Clinton at Awards Ceremony

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Photo Credit: Getty ImagesPresident Obama heaped praise on President Bill Clinton at the White House Wednesday — after reports of lingering friction between the two men.

“Lifting up families like his own became the story of Bill Clinton’s life,” Obama said, lauding Clinton before eventually placing a Medal of Freedom around his neck. “He made life better and easier for so many people across the country.”

“Thank you so much, President Clinton,” Obama gushed – expressing appreciation for advice Clinton gave him “on and off the golf course” and for putting up with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s travel schedule.

The homage to Bubba and his record in office came just weeks after a new book, “Double Down,” described a 2011 golf game between the two men, where Obama reportedly told an aide, in reference to Clinton: “I like him … in doses.”

Clinton, according to the same book, referred to Obama as “luckier than a dog with two d—-” during his reelection campaign.

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Ryan: No Need to Worry About Another Shutdown (+video)

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Photo Credit: Gage SkidmoreHouse Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said Tuesday that the country doesn’t need to worry about another government shutdown in January when the current stopgap spending bill runs out.

The government shutdown lasted for 16 days in October, after Republicans demanded that President Obama defund his signature healthcare law.

To avoid another shutdown, Ryan said either he and Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-Wash.) would strike a budget deal or Congress would pass a stopgap keeping existing spending levels.

“Either of those two scenarios will prevail, and we will not have a government shutdown,” he said at the Wall Street Journal annual CEO Council. “We will keep the government funding at the current level if need be.”

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Senator Takes Aim at Sick Video Game Based on Sandy Hook Massacre

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Photo Credit: FOXNEWS.COMA sick online video game that has players re-enacting last year’s horrific murders of school children in Sandy Hook, Conn., has an outraged Sen. Richard Blumenthal calling for a ban.

“The Slaying of Sandy Hook Elementary,” allows a player to simulate the massacre that left 20 first-graders and seven adults dead. Purportedly created by Ryan Jake Lambournan, an American-born gaming geek who lives in Australia, the crude game allows a player to collect a loaded gun and shoot his mother before going on a rampage at a school. Several websites have taken the game down, but Blumenthal, the Democratic senator who was previously Connecticut’s attorney general, wants it off the web altogether.

“This abhorrent video game should be taken down from all websites immediately. This vile video game shocks our conscience and mocks common decency,” Blumenthal said in a statement. “Shamefully, as we approach the one-year anniversary of the Sandy Hook shooting, some still exploit this horrific tragedy. It’s appalling and salacious, and it must stop.”

Incredibly, a “message from the creator” embedded in the video tries to rationalize the game as a commentary on American gun culture.

“Back in 2007 I created a game called ‘Vtech Rampage’ about the Virginia Tech shootings. In the years since, I’ve been routinely asked by fans of ‘Vtech’ to make more games of just about every mass shooting that’s gotten media coverage,” a voice says.

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Socialist Seattle City Councilmember-Elect Shares Radical Idea with Boeing Workers

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Photo Credit: kirotvSeattle City Councilmember-elect Kshama Sawant told Boeing machinists her idea of a radical option, should their jobs be moved out of state.

“The workers should take over the factories, and shut down Boeing’s profit-making machine,” Sawant announced to a cheering crowd of union supporters in Seattle’s Westlake Park Monday night.

This week, Sawant became Seattle’s first elected Socialist council member. She ran on a platform of anti-capitalism, workers’ rights, and a $15 per-hour minimum wage for Seattle workers.

On Monday night, she spoke to supporters of Boeing Machinists, six days after they rejected a contract guaranteeing jobs in Everett building the new 777X airliner for eight years, in exchange for new workers giving up their guaranteed company pensions.

Now Boeing is threatening to take those jobs to other states. “That will be nothing short of economic terrorism because it’s going to devastate the state’s economy,” she said.

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Obama Blames Republicans for ObamaCare’s Rollout Woes

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President Obama on Tuesday sought to redirect some of the political blame for the botched rollout of the federal health insurance exchange to Republicans, characterizing GOP lawmakers as rooting for the law’s failure.

Addressing a gathering of business executives, Obama acknowledged that the health-care rollout “has been rough, to say the least,” and he lamented the government’s archaic information-technology procurement system.

Obama said that fixes to the HealthCare.gov Web portal are underway and that the exchange will function for a majority of people by the end of November. But the president said staunch opposition from congressional Republicans is inhibiting the law’s implementation.

“One of the problems we’ve had is one side of Capitol Hill is invested in failure,” Obama said at the Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council meeting in Washington. “We obviously are going to have to remarket and rebrand, and that will be challenging in this political environment.”

The president also voiced frustration with the toxic political atmosphere endangering his signature legislative achievement. He said Washington needs to “break through the stubborn cycle of crisis politics and start working together.”

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