PRESIDENT OBAMA'S REMARKS ON THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT

FROM:  THE WHITE HOUSE 

Remarks by the President and Governor Deval Patrick on the Affordable Care Act

Faneuil Hall
Boston, Massachusetts

3:50 P.M. EDT

GOVERNOR PATRICK:  How are you?  Good afternoon, everybody.  (Applause.)  How’s Red Sox Nation this afternoon?  (Applause.)

Ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, fellow citizens, I have the high honor of introducing to you the President of the United States.  (Applause.)  But, of course, you folks already know him.  (Laughter.)  So as the President is standing just offstage, I want to take my time here at the podium -- (laughter) -- to introduce all of you to him. 

In this storied hall today, Mr. President, are the architects and advocates for health care reform in Massachusetts. (Applause.)  This gathering right here is the broad coalition -- providers, payers, patients, consumers, policymakers, academics, business and labor, from both political parties, or no party at all -- who came together to invent health care reform in Massachusetts and then, importantly, stuck together to refine it as we moved forward.  (Applause.)

You are the leaders who, when we learned a hard lesson or hit a wall, stuck with it and with each other because of the shared value that health care is a public good and that every citizen deserves access to quality, affordable care.  (Applause.)

Quality, affordable care accessible to all improves lives, and in many cases, saves lives.  It gives peace of mind and economic security to working families.  It increases productivity for large and small employers alike.  It creates jobs and contributes to the strength of the Massachusetts economy.  It is a powerful statement of who we are as a commonwealth.  (Applause.)

And by every reasonable measure, it has been a success for us here in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.  (Applause.)  How do we know?  Virtually, every resident in the commonwealth is insured today.  (Applause.)  More private companies offer insurance to their employees than ever before.  Over 90 percent of our residents have a primary care physician.  Preventive care is up and health disparities are down.  (Applause.)  Most important of all, on a whole range of measures, we are healthier both physically and mentally.

Over all these years, expansion itself has added only about 1 percent of state spending to our budget.  And thanks to the collective, continued hard work of this coalition, premiums are finally easing up.  Premium base rates were increasing over 16 percent just a few years ago.  Today, increases average less than 2 percent.  (Applause.)

And thanks to the President, America can look forward to the successes that Massachusetts has experienced these last seven years.  (Applause.) 

The truth is policy only matters when and where it touches people.  I know this policy matters because I've met people all across the commonwealth, in every walk of life, whose lives have been improved or saved because of the care our reforms made possible.  A couple of them are here today. 

Laura Ferreira -- where are you, Laura?  There you are.  Owns her own hair salon and is responsible for providing health insurance to her family of five, including her son, Mason, who’s right here with her.  Mason has a rare genetic condition.  Laura is able to afford his medicine because they found coverage through our Connecter, our version of the ACA marketplace.  This policy matters.  (Applause.)

David Gilloran works as a waiter.  Where are you David?  There you are.  Thank you for being here.  Soon after getting coverage through the Connector, David was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma.  His treatment was covered, and he is back to his old life and swimming for exercise.  God bless you, David.  (Applause.) 

Brian Thurber left his law firm job to become an entrepreneur in Massachusetts.  Brian, where are you?  There he is.  Because he was able to access quality insurance directly through the Connector, he is chasing his entrepreneurial dreams and on his way to becoming a creator of jobs for others without  -- being exposed to a health emergency along the way.  Keep going.  Good luck to you.  (Applause.)

Hundreds of thousands of Massachusetts people don’t fear going bankrupt from medical bills, or being thrown off their insurance if they get really sick, or being declared ineligible for insurance because they were seriously ill sometime in the past. 

If policy matters where it touches people, Mr. President, this policy matters a lot.  Health care reform is working for the people of Massachusetts, and it will work for the people of America.  (Applause.)

My Republican predecessor signed the legislation to expand health care reform in Massachusetts right here in this room, on this very stage.  His chief legislative partner was the Democratic state senator, Robert Travaglini, who was here then and is here today.  Where are you, Trav?  Thank you.  (Applause.)

So was our beloved Ted Kennedy.  So were many of the members of the coalition who are here again today.  And they have worked right alongside my team and me these last seven years to refine and improve the means while staying true to the ends.  I am proud of what we and they have accomplished, and I think they’re proud, too, and ought to be.  (Applause.) 

 But our launch seven years ago was not flawless.  (Laughter.)  We asked an IT staffer who has been at our Connector since the beginning what the start of implementing reform was like.  And this is what he said, and I’m quoting:  “We didn’t have a complicated eligibility process back then, but we did have outages caused by traffic peaks.  We experienced some issues with data mapping of plan detail that carriers called us on.  Our provider searches were not good, and the website was a constant work in progress over the first few years.  But other than that, it was smooth.”  (Laughter.) 

Any of this sound familiar, Mr. President?

So we started out with a website that needed work.  We had a lot of people with a lot of reasonable questions and not a good enough way to get them the answers.  But people were patient, we had good leadership, and that same coalition stuck with it and with us to work through the fixes, tech surge and all.  Why?  Why?  Because health reform in Massachusetts, like the Affordable Care Act, is not a website.  It’s a values statement.  (Applause.)  It's about insuring people against a medical catastrophe.  It's about being our brothers' and our sisters' keeper by helping others help themselves. 

The website glitches are inconvenient and annoying.  They must be fixed and I am confident they will be.  But I hope you know, Mr. President, that the same folks who pretend to be outraged about the website not working didn’t want the ACA to work in the first place.  (Applause.)  The urgency of fixing what's not working is, as we all know, about the American people who need simple, reliable and convenient access to information about coverage -- not about silencing critics who will never be silenced.

You and the Congress looked to Massachusetts, Mr. President, as a model for how to insure working people, and through that, how to help them lead better, more productive lives.  As you turn to the vital work of making that federal IT system work, we also want to be a model for how to keep your eye on the prize, and how, working together, you put people first.  (Applause.)  The people here, all in this coalition, totally get that.

So, Mr. President, welcome to the capital of Red Sox Nation. (Applause.)  And welcome, also, to the future of affordable, accessible health care for everybody.  (Applause.)  

Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States.  (Applause.) 

THE PRESIDENT:  Hello, Boston!  (Applause.)  It's good to be back in Boston.  (Applause.)  It's good to be back in Boston because one of America's best governors introduced me -- Deval Patrick.  Give him a big round of applause.  (Applause.)  

It's good to see Congressman Bill Keating here.  Give Bill a big round of applause.  (Applause.)  I want to praise somebody who's not here -- I just left him -- but he wears his heart on his sleeve.  He loves this city so much, and it shows in what he's been doing for years now -- one of America's best mayors, Tom Menino.  (Applause.) 

And it's good to see all of you.  I was just at the airport -- Deval was kind enough to meet me, along with Mayor Menino.  And Mayor Menino went back to city hall to work so he could wrap up in time for the first pitch.  I understand that.  (Laughter.) I am well aware that a presidential visit is not the biggest thing going on today in Boston.  (Laughter and applause.)  I understand that.  I tried to grow a beard, but Michelle, she wasn't having it.  (Laughter.)  

I am also old enough to remember a time when the Red Sox were not in the World Series three times in 10 years.  (Laughter.)  But I know the chance to win one at home for the first time since 1918 is a pretty special thing.  (Applause.)  So I promise we will be done here in time -- (laughter) -- for everybody to head over to Fenway and maybe see Big Papi blast another homer.  (Applause.) 

And maybe the other Sox will do better next year.  (Laughter.)  You can hope.  You can dream.  (Laughter.)    

The reason I’m here, though, is because this is the hall where, seven years ago, Democrats and Republicans came together to make health reform a reality for the people of Massachusetts. It’s where then-Governor Mitt Romney, Democratic legislators, Senator Ted Kennedy, many of the folks who are here today joined forces to connect the progressive vision of health care for all with some ideas about markets and competition that had long been championed by conservatives.

And as Deval just said, it worked.  (Applause.)  It worked. Health reform --

PROTESTORS:  Mr. President -- don't punish me.  For our generation, stop the pipeline!  Mr. President --

THE PRESIDENT:  Okay.  We're talking about health care today, but we will --

PROTESTORS:  Mr. President --

AUDIENCE:  Booo --

THE PRESIDENT:  No, no, no, it’s okay.  That is the wrong rally.  (Laughter and applause.)  We had the climate change rally back in the summer.  (Laughter.)  This is the health care rally. (Applause.) 

So health care reform in this state was a success.  That doesn’t mean it was perfect right away.  There were early problems to solve.  There were changes that had to be made.  Anybody here who was involved in it can tell you that.  As Deval just said, enrollment was extremely slow.  Within a month, only about a hundred people had signed up -- a hundred.  But then 2,000 had signed up, and then a few more thousand after that.  And by the end of the year, 36,000 people had signed up. 

And the community all came together.  You even had the Red Sox help enlist people to get them covered.  And pretty soon, the number of young uninsured people had plummeted.  When recession struck, the financial security of health care sheltered families from deeper hardship.  And today, there is nearly universal coverage in Massachusetts, and the vast majority of its citizens are happy with their coverage.  (Applause.)

And by the way, all the parade of horribles, the worst predictions about health care reform in Massachusetts never came true.  They're the same arguments that you're hearing now.  Businesses didn’t stop covering workers; the share of employers who offered insurance increased.  People didn’t get left behind; racial disparities decreased.  Care didn’t become unaffordable; costs tracked what was happening in other places that wasn’t covering everybody.

Now, Mitt Romney and I ran a long and spirited campaign against one another, but I’ve always believed that when he was governor here in Massachusetts, he did the right thing on health care.  And then Deval did the right thing by picking up the torch and working to make the law work even better.  And it’s because you guys had a proven model that we built the Affordable Care Act on this template of proven, bipartisan success.  Your law was the model for the nation’s law.  (Applause.)

So let’s look at what’s happened.  Today, the Affordable Care Act requires insurance companies to abide by some of the strongest consumer protections this country has ever known -- a true Patient’s Bill of Rights.  (Applause.)  No more discriminating against kids with preexisting conditions.  (Applause.)  No more dropping your policy when you get sick and need it most.  (Applause.)  No more lifetime limits or restrictive annual limits.  (Applause.)  Most plans now have to cover free preventive care like mammograms and birth control.  (Applause.)  Young people can stay on their parents’ plans until they turn 26.  All of this is in place right now.  It is working right now.  (Applause.)

Now, the last element of this began on October 1st.  It’s when the Affordable Care Act created a new marketplace for quality, private insurance plans for the 15 percent or so of Americans who don’t have health care, and for the 5 percent of Americans who have to buy it on their own and they’re not part of a group, which means they don't get as good a deal. 

And this new marketplace was built on the Massachusetts model.  It allows these Americans who have been locked out to get a better deal from insurers -- they’re pooling their purchasing power as one big group.  And insurers want their business, which means they give them a better deal, and they compete for that business.  And as a result, insurers in the marketplace, they can't use your medical history to charge you more.  If you’ve been sick, you finally have the same chance to buy quality, affordable health care as everybody else. 

A lot of people will qualify for new tax credits under this law that will bring down costs even further, so that if you lose your job, or you start a new business, or you’re self-employed, or you're a young person trying several jobs until you find that one that sticks, you’re going to be able to be insured -- insurance that goes with you and gives you freedom to pursue whatever you want, without fear that accident or illness will derail your dreams.

Now, this marketplace is open now.  Insurance companies are competing for that business.  The deal is good; the prices are low.  But, let’s face it, we've had a problem.  The website hasn’t worked the way it’s supposed to over these last couple of weeks.  And as a consequence, a lot of people haven’t had a chance to see just how good the prices for quality health insurance through these marketplaces really are. 

Now, ultimately, this website, healthcare.gov, will be the easiest way to shop for and buy these new plans, because you can see all these plans right next to each other and compare prices and see what kind of coverage it provides.  But, look, there’s no denying it, right now, the website is too slow, too many people have gotten stuck.  And I am not happy about it.  And neither are a lot of Americans who need health care, and they’re trying to figure out how they can sign up as quickly as possible.  So there’s no excuse for it.  And I take full responsibility for making sure it gets fixed ASAP.  We are working overtime to improve it every day.  (Applause.)  Every day. 

And more people are successfully buying these new plans online than they were a couple of weeks ago, and I expect more people will be able to buy conveniently online every single day as we move forward.  We’re going to get these problems resolved. 

Now, in the meantime, you can still apply for coverage over the phone, or by mail, or in person, because those plans are waiting and you’re still able to get the kind of affordable, reliable health insurance that’s been out of reach for too many people for too long.

So I am old enough to remember when there was not such a thing as a website.  (Laughter.)  I know that’s shocking to people.  (Laughter.)  But the point is I’m confident these marketplaces will work, because Massachusetts has shown that the model works and we know what’s being offered by these insurers.  (Applause.)  We know it’s going to work. 

And so far, choice and competition in the new national marketplaces have helped keep costs lower than even we projected. In fact, nearly half of all single, uninsured 18-to-34-year-olds may be able to buy insurance for 50 bucks a month or less.  Less than your cellphone bill, less than your cable bill.  (Applause.) And one study shows that nearly 6 in 10 uninsured Americans may find coverage for 100 bucks a month or less, even if they’re older than 34. 

And, frankly, if every governor was working as hard as Deval, or Governor O’Malley in Maryland, or Governor Cuomo in New York, to make this law work for their citizens, as opposed to thinking politically, about 8 in 10 Americans would be getting health insurance for less than 100 bucks a month.  (Applause.)

And, by the way, it’s not just in Massachusetts.  Look at Kentucky.  Governor Steve Beshear, who’s a Democrat, is like a man possessed with helping more people get covered.  He thinks it’s the right thing to do.  Keep in mind I did not win in Kentucky.  (Laughter.)  But there are a lot of uninsured people in Kentucky, and they’re signing up. 

Oregon has covered 10 percent of its uninsured citizens already because of the Affordable Care Act.  Ten percent of the uninsured have already gotten coverage.  (Applause.) 

Arkansas -- I didn’t win that state either -- (laughter) -- has covered almost 14 percent of its uninsured already.  (Applause.)  That’s already happened. 

And you’ve got some Republican governors, like Governor Kasich of Ohio, who’ve put politics aside and they’re expanding Medicaid through this law to cover millions of people. 

Now, unfortunately, there are others that are so locked in to the politics of this thing that they won't lift a finger to help their own people, and that’s leaving millions of Americans uninsured unnecessarily.  That’s a shame.  Because if they put as much energy into making this law work as they do in attacking the law, Americans would be better off.  (Applause.)  Americans would be better off.   

So that’s the Affordable Care Act:  Better protections for Americans with insurance; a new marketplace for Americans without insurance; new tax credits to help folks afford it; more choice, more competition; real health care security not just for the uninsured or underinsured, but for all of us -- because we pay more in premiums and taxes when Americans without good insurance visit the emergency room.  (Applause.)  We get taxed.

And since we all benefit, there are parts of this law that also require everybody to contribute, that require everybody to take some measure of responsibility.  So, to help pay for the law, the wealthiest Americans –- families who make more than $250,000 a year –- they've got to pay a little bit more.  The most expensive employer health insurance plans no longer qualify for unlimited tax breaks.  Some folks aren't happy about that, but it's the right thing to do. 

Just like in Massachusetts, most people who can afford health insurance have to take responsibility to buy health insurance, or pay a penalty.  And employers with more than 50 employees are required to either provide health insurance to their workers or pay a penalty -- again, because they shouldn’t just dump off those costs onto the rest of us.  Everybody has got some responsibilities.   

Now, it is also true that some Americans who have health insurance plans that they bought on their own through the old individual market are getting notices from their insurance companies suggesting that somehow, because of the Affordable Care Act, they may be losing their existing health insurance plan.  This has been the latest flurry in the news.  Because there's been a lot of confusion and misinformation about this, I want to explain just what's going on. 

One of the things health reform was designed to do was to help not only the uninsured, but also the underinsured.  And there are a number of Americans –- fewer than 5 percent of Americans -– who've got cut-rate plans that don’t offer real financial protection in the event of a serious illness or an accident.  Remember, before the Affordable Care Act, these bad-apple insurers had free rein every single year to limit the care that you received, or use minor preexisting conditions to jack up your premiums or bill you into bankruptcy.  So a lot of people thought they were buying coverage, and it turned out not to be so good. 

Before the Affordable Care Act, the worst of these plans routinely dropped thousands of Americans every single year.  And on average, premiums for folks who stayed in their plans for more than a year shot up about 15 percent a year.  This wasn’t just bad for those folks who had these policies, it was bad for all of us -- because, again, when tragedy strikes and folks can’t pay their medical bills, everybody else picks up the tab. 

Now, if you had one of these substandard plans before the Affordable Care Act became law and you really liked that plan, you’re able to keep it.  That’s what I said when I was running for office.  That was part of the promise we made.  But ever since the law was passed, if insurers decided to downgrade or cancel these substandard plans, what we said under the law is you've got to replace them with quality, comprehensive coverage  -- because that, too, was a central premise of the Affordable Care Act from the very beginning.

And today, that promise means that every plan in the marketplace covers a core set of minimum benefits, like maternity care, and preventive care, and mental health care, and prescription drug benefits, and hospitalization.  And they can’t use allergies or pregnancy or a sports injury or the fact that you're a woman to charge you more.  They can't do that anymore.  (Applause.)  They can't do that anymore. 

If you couldn’t afford coverage because your child had asthma, well, he’s now covered.  If you’re one of the 45 million Americans with a mental illness, you’re now covered.  If you’re a young couple expecting a baby, you’re covered.  You’re safer.  The system is more secure for you and it’s more secure for everybody. 

So if you’re getting one of these letters, just shop around in the new marketplace.  That’s what it’s for.  Because of the tax credits we’re offering, and the competition --

PROTESTOR:  Mr. President, ban the Keystone Pipeline!  For our generation, you need to do this!

THE PRESIDENT:  Because of the tax credits that we’re offering and the competition between insurers, most people are going to be able to get better, comprehensive health care plans for the same price or even cheaper than projected.  You’re going to get a better deal.

Now, there’s a fraction of Americans with higher incomes who will pay more on the front end for better insurance with better benefits and protections like the Patient’s Bill of Rights.  And that will actually save them from financial ruin if they get sick.  But nobody is losing their right to health care coverage. And no insurance company will ever be able to deny you coverage, or drop you as a customer altogether.  Those days are over.  And that’s the truth.  (Applause.)  That is the truth.  

So for people without health insurance, they’re finally going to be able to get it.  For the vast majority of people who have health insurance that works, you can keep it.  For the fewer than 5 percent of Americans who buy insurance on your own, you will be getting a better deal.

So anyone peddling the notion that insurers are cancelling people’s plan without mentioning that almost all the insurers are encouraging people to join better plans with the same carrier, and stronger benefits and stronger protections, while others will be able to get better plans with new carriers through the marketplace, and that many will get new help to pay for these better plans and make them actually cheaper -- if you leave that stuff out, you’re being grossly misleading, to say the least.  (Applause.)  

But, frankly, look, you saw this in Massachusetts -- this is one of the challenges of health care form.  Health care is complicated and it’s very personal, and it’s easy to scare folks. And it’s no surprise that some of the same folks trying to scare people now are the same folks who’ve been trying to sink the Affordable Care Act from the beginning.  (Applause.)  And frankly, I don’t understand it.  Providing people with health care, that should be a no-brainer.  (Applause.)  Giving people a chance to get health care should be a no-brainer.  (Applause.) 

And I’ve said before, if folks had actually good ideas, better ideas than what’s happening in Massachusetts or what we’ve proposed for providing people with health insurance, I’d be happy to listen.  But that’s not what’s happening.  And anyone defending the remnants of the old, broken system as if it was working for people, anybody who thinks we shouldn’t finish the job of making the health care system work for everybody -– especially when these folks offer no plan for the uninsured or the underinsured, or folks who lose their insurance each year -- those folks should have to explain themselves.  (Applause.) 

Because I don’t think we should go back to discriminating against kids with preexisting conditions.  (Applause.)  I don’t think we should go back to dropping coverage for people when they get sick, or because they make a mistake on their application.  (Applause.)  I don’t think we should go back to the daily cruelties and indignities and constant insecurity of a broken health care system.  And I’m confident most Americans agree with me.  (Applause.) 

So, yes, this is hard, because the health care system is a big system, and it’s complicated.  And if it was hard doing it just in one state, it's harder to do it in all 50 states -- especially when the governors of a bunch of states and half of the Congress aren't trying to help.  Yes, it's hard.  But it's worth it.  (Applause.)  It is the right thing to do, and we're going to keep moving forward.  (Applause.)  We are going to keep working to improve the law, just like you did here in Massachusetts.  (Applause.) 

We are just going to keep on working at it.  We're going to grind it out, just like you did here in Massachusetts -- and, by the way, just like we did when the prescription drug program for seniors known as Medicare Part D was passed by a Republican President a decade ago.  That health care law had some early challenges as well.  There were even problems with the website.  (Laughter.)  And Democrats weren’t happy with a lot of the aspects of the law because, in part, it added hundreds of billions of dollars to the deficit, it wasn't paid for -- unlike the Affordable Care Act, which will actually help lower the deficit.  (Applause.) 

But, you know what, once it was the law, everybody pitched in to try to make it work.  Democrats weren’t about to punish millions of seniors just to try to make a point or settle a score.  So Democrats worked with Republicans to make it work.  And I'm proud of Democrats for having done that.  It was the right thing to do.  (Applause.)  Because now, about 90 percent of seniors like what they have.  They've gotten a better deal. 

Both parties working together to get the job done –- that’s what we need in Washington right now.  (Applause.)  That's what we need in Washington right now. 

You know, if Republicans in Congress were as eager to help Americans get covered as some Republican governors have shown themselves to be, we'd make a lot of progress.  I'm not asking them to agree with me on everything, but if they’d work with us like Mitt Romney did, working with Democrats in Massachusetts, or like Ted Kennedy often did with Republicans in Congress, including on the prescription drug bill, we’d be a lot further along.  (Applause.) 

So the point is, we may have political disagreements -- we do, deep ones.  In some cases, we've got fundamentally different visions about where we should take the country.  But the people who elect us to serve, they shouldn’t pay the price for those disagreements.  Most Americans don’t see things through a political lens or an ideological lens.  This debate has never been about right or left.  It’s been about the helplessness that a parent feels when she can’t cover a sick child, or the impossible choices a small business faces between covering his employees or keeping his doors open. 

I want to give you just -- I want to close with an example. A person named Alan Schaeffer, from Prattsburgh, New York, and he's got a story to tell about sacrifice, about giving up his own health care to save the woman he loves.  So Alan wrote to me last week, and he told me his story.

Four years ago, his wife, Jan, who happens to be a nurse, was struck with cancer, and she had to stop working.  And then halfway through her chemo, her employer dropped coverage for both of them.  And Alan is self-employed; he's got an antique business.  So he had to make sure his wife had coverage, obviously, in the middle of cancer treatments, so he went without insurance. 

Now, the great news is, today, Jan is cancer-free.  She's on Medicare, but Alan’s been uninsured ever since.  Until last week -- (applause) -- when he sat down at a computer and -- I'm sure after multiple tries -- (laughter) -- signed up for a new plan under the Affordable Care Act, coverage that can never be taken away if he gets sick.  (Applause.) 

So I just want to read you what he said in this letter.  He says, “I’ve got to tell you I’ve never been so happy to pay a bill in my entire life."  (Laughter.)  "When you don’t have insurance at my age, [it can] really feel like a time bomb waiting to go off.  The sense of relief from knowing I can live out my days longer and healthier, that’s just a tremendous weight off my shoulders.” 

So two days later, Alan goes over to his buddy Bill’s house. He sits Bill down, and his wife, Diana, at their computer.  And after several tries -- (laughter) -- Alan helped lift that weight from their shoulders by helping them to sign up for a new plan also.  And compared to their current plan, it costs less than half as much and covers more. 

See, that's why we committed ourselves to this cause -- for Alan, and Jan; for Bill, Diana. 

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  Annie.

THE PRESIDENT:  For Annie.  For anyone who wrote letters, and shared stories, and knocked on doors because they believed what could happen here in Massachusetts could happen all across the country.  (Applause.)  And for them, and for you, we are going to see this through.  (Applause.)  We’re going to see this through.  (Applause.)  We are going to see this through.  (Applause.)  

This hall is home to some of the earliest debates over the nature of our government, the appropriate size, the appropriate role of government.  And those debates continue today, and that’s healthy.  They’re debates about the role of the individual and society, and our rugged individualism, and our sense of self-reliance, our devotion to the kind of freedoms whose first shot rang out not far from here.  But they are also debates tempered by a recognition that we’re all in this together, and that when hardship strikes -- and it could strike any of us at any moment  -- we’re there for one another; and that as a country, we can accomplish great things that we can't accomplish alone.  (Applause.)  We believe that.  We believe that.  (Applause.)         

And those sentiments are expressed in a painting right here in this very hall:  “Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable.”  That’s the value statement Deval was talking about.  That’s what health care reform is about.  That’s what America is about.  We are in this together, and we are going to see it through.  (Applause.)

Thank you.  God bless you.  God bless the United States of America.  (Applause.) 

CONTINUATION OF NATIONAL EMERGENCY REGARDING SUDAN

FROM:  THE WHITE HOUSE 
Message to the Congress -- Continuation of the National Emergency with Respect to Sudan
TO THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES:

Section 202(d) of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1622(d)) provides for the automatic termination of a national emergency unless, within the 90-day period prior to the anniversary date of its declaration, the President publishes in the Federal Register and transmits to the Congress a notice stating that the emergency is to continue in effect beyond the anniversary date. In accordance with this provision, I have sent to the Federal Register for publication the enclosed notice stating that the Sudan emergency is to continue in effect beyond November 3, 2013.

The crisis constituted by the actions and policies of the Government of Sudan that led to the declaration of a national emergency in Executive Order 13067 of November 3, 1997, and the expansion of that emergency in Executive Order 13400 of April 26, 2006, and with respect to which additional steps were taken in Executive Order 13412 of October 13, 2006, has not been resolved. These actions and policies are hostile to U.S. interests and continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States. Therefore, I have determined that it is necessary to continue the national emergency declared with respect to Sudan and maintain in force the sanctions against Sudan to respond to this threat.

READOUT: VICE PRESIDENT'S MEETING WITH IRAQI PRIME MINISTER NOURI al-MALIKI

FROM:  THE WHITE HOUSE 
Readout of Vice President Biden's Meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki

This morning, Vice President Biden hosted Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his delegation for breakfast at the Naval Observatory.  The Vice President and Prime Minister had a friendly, constructive exchange.  They spoke about the security challenges facing Iraq and the entire region.  Vice President Biden reiterated the U.S. commitment to equip Iraqis to fight Al Qaeda, and Prime Minister Maliki made clear that he views the United States as Iraq’s security partner of choice.  The two leaders discussed the importance of taking a comprehensive approach to Iraq’s security challenges, to include political outreach to local leaders, as well as targeted security efforts.  They also discussed regional issues and agreed to work to continue the progress Iraq has made in strengthening its relations with Kuwait, Jordan, Turkey, and other states in the region.

CFTC COMMISSIONER CHILTON'S STATEMENT SUPPORTING THE PROTECTION OF CUSTOMER FUNDS

FROM:  U.S. COMMODITY FUTURES TRADING COMMISSION 
“The Law”

Statement of Commissioner Bart Chilton Regarding Customer Protections

October 30, 2013

Each of us took an oath to uphold the law. Sometimes that’s pretty easy, other times, not so much. As rule writers, many times the law allows us a bit of discretion, some latitude. Other times, it’s pretty clear what we are supposed to do. On these customer protections, I think the key components are straightforward. We are supposed to ensure that customers’ money is protected. Our law mandates this: full protection, complete protection, 100% of customer money, 100% of the time.

For too long, we haven’t had the kind of clear guidelines we’re putting in place today to ensure against improper comingling of funds at Futures Commission Merchants (FCMs) and Designated Clearing Organizations (DCOs). This rule will provide greater protection of these customer funds by eliminating some tolerated methodologies for computing the amount of funds held and how funds are treated. It prescribes new modes of calculation, especially for excess funds.  These include: prescribing when foreign funds can be included in the calculation; restricting the amount of customer funds that an FCM may hold in depositories outside of the United States to the amount of margin required by a foreign clearing organization or broker, plus a 20% cushion; and requiring each FCM to compute a targeted amount of excess funds (i.e., proprietary funds or “residual interest”) that the FCM seeks to maintain in customer segregated or secured accounts as a cushion to help ensure that the FCM does not become undersegregated or undersecured.

The rule also imposes some risk management requirements for FCMs, including written policies and procedures reasonably designed to ensure that customer funds are separately accounted for and segregated or secured as belonging to customers as required by the Act and Commission regulations.  The rule requires FCMs to provide the CFTC with notices to provide an early warning system on seg violations; amends FCM capital requirements to require that FCMs demonstrate, upon CFTC request, access to sufficient liquidity; and requires FCMs to file daily seg and secured amount schedules and other reporting.

Section 4d of the CEA is a cornerstone of our law, fundamental to the protection of customers and markets. It requires that an FCM may not use the funds of one customer to margin or guarantee the trades or contracts, or to secure or extend the credit, of another customer.  That is the law. We aren’t Congress. We don’t have the latitude to do something other than what Congress has specifically and clearly required of us. There are some that suggest perhaps Congress didn’t mean what the law says. Fine, if so Congress can change the law. We can’t.

And I disagree with the contention of some that this rule will have the perverse effect of funding customer protections on the back of America’s farmers and ranchers—nothing could be further from the truth. Indeed, quite the opposite is the case: this rule will ensure that, in the event of another MFG, another Peregrine, the U.S. agricultural sector will not find itself funding those kinds of tragic losses. That’s the kind of protection I’m talking about today.

This is a good rule, and I commend the staff for their work. It provides plenty of time for compliance. And it provides for a study to gain more information and a full five years for the commission to act if what we have done needs alteration. And, as always, if there are issues brought before us relating to technological or practical challenges with good faith compliance, I am open to provision of appropriately tailored relief as needed. And again, if Congress has concerns, they can change the law.

It is a good rule and I support it.

GSA CLOSES 37 DATA CENTERS TO CUT COSTS AND IMPROVE SERVICES

FROM:  GENERAL SERVICES ADMINISTRATION 
GSA Closes Data Centers and Streamlines IT Organization to Boost Cost Savings, Improve Services
October 29, 2013

Washington, DC – The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) today announced that it has closed 37 data centers this fiscal year as part of the national Federal Data Center Consolidation Initiative (FDCCI), allowing the agency to avoid real estate costs and reduce energy consumption. Additionally, as part of Administrator Dan Tangherlini’s effort to cut costs, reduce redundancies and increase efficiencies at GSA, IT operations have been consolidated. This will also help eliminate redundancies and lead to improved services to our  federal agencies and the American people.

KEY FACTS

Data Center Consolidation

-Consolidating government data centers eliminates waste, increases sustainability by making more efficient use of energy and drives operational improvements.

-GSA planned and successfully accomplished an aggressive goal of closing 37 (32%) of its non-core data centers in FY13.
CIO Consolidation

-All IT offices and staff within GSA are now consolidated under the leadership of GSA CIO Casey Coleman. For example, instead of having several CIOs serving each individual Business Line, or having IT staff reporting into a different program office, those resources will now be located in a new GSA IT office under the GSA CIO. Having a centralized GSA IT office will improve access to technology services

-This consolidation will lead to service improvements and cost savings and enable GSA to realize business improvements by providing technology that helps simplify the user experience.

-IT contracts will also be under the GSA IT office, eliminating redundancies.

SUPPORTING QUOTE

Casey Coleman, Chief Information Officer, General Services Administration
“Closing data centers are an important part of GSA’s efforts to shrink the federal footprint. GSA is driving efficiency and effectiveness by using practical solutions. Coupled with the agency’s new coordinated and more streamlined IT operations, using technology to do more with less when it comes to data centers, will make us a model of how to provide the kind of efficient, effective, and transparent service that the American people expect from their government.”

FIVE CHARTER FISHING CAPTAINS SENTENCED FOR ILLEGAL HARVESTING OF STRIPED BASS

FROM:  U.S. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT 
Monday, October 28, 2013

Five Virginia Charter Fishing Boat Captains Sentenced for Lacey Act Violations
Nolan L. Agner, the last of five Virginia Beach charter fishing boat captains convicted of poaching Atlantic striped bass was sentenced today in federal court in Norfolk, Va.  All five captains – including Agner, Jeffery S. Adams, Raymond Carroll Webb, David Dwayne Scott, and William W. “Duby” Lowery IV – were sentenced for violating the Lacey Act by selling illegally-harvested striped bass, the Justice Department announced.

“As charter boat captains, these men had an obligation to know and follow the laws that protect this natural resource from overharvesting,” said Robert G. Dreher, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division. “Their illegal poaching of striped bass gave them an unfair economic advantage over law abiding fisherman and irresponsibly posed a threat to this food supply.  “With these sentences, they will pay the price by serving jail time or receiving probation, as well as paying fines, surrendering their captain’s license, or having their operations closely monitored or curtailed.”

In 1984, Congress passed the Atlantic Striped Bass Conservation Act, recognizing that “Atlantic striped bass are of historic commercial and recreational importance and economic benefit to Atlantic coastal States and to the Nation,” and that it “is in the national interest to implement effective procedures and measures to provide for effective inter-jurisdictional conservation and management of this species.”  Since 1990, the Secretary of Commerce has imposed a moratorium on fishing for striped bass within the exclusive economic zone (EEZ), the zone where the U.S. and other coastal nations have jurisdiction over economic and resource management.  The moratorium makes it unlawful to fish for or harvest striped bass in the EEZ.  The moratorium also makes it unlawful to retain any striped bass that were taken in or from the EEZ.

The Lacey Act makes it unlawful for any person to import, export, transport, sell, receive, acquire or purchase any fish or wildlife taken, possessed, transported or sold in violation of any law or regulation of the United States, or to attempt to do so.  Such conduct constitutes a felony crime if the market value of the fish or wildlife is in excess of $350.  Under the Lacey Act, it is a “sale” of fish or wildlife for any person, for money or other consideration, to offer or provide guiding, outfitting, or other services.

Each of the captains, all of whom operated charters out of Rudee Inlet in Virginia Beach, was charged separately on Nov. 8, 2012, with violating the Lacey Act by selling charter fishing trips to harvest striped bass illegally from the EEZ, among other charges.

Today, Agner, captain of the Flat Line, having previously pleaded guilty to violating the Lacey Act, was sentenced to pay a $3,500 fine.  He and his corporation, Agner, Inc., were also placed on three years’ probation with special conditions requiring them to purchase and maintain a Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) device on any vessel that they own or operate for fishing purposes during the term of probation.
 
The other four defendants all previously pleaded guilty to violating the Lacey Act and have been sentenced:

On, April 25, 2013, Scott, captain of the Stoney’s Kingfisher, was sentenced to a $5,600 fine and $1,900 in restitution to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).  Scott was also sentenced to three years’ probation with special conditions prohibiting Scott from engaging in either the charter or commercial fishing industries, anywhere in the world, in any capacity, during the term of his probation.  Scott is prohibited not only from captaining a vessel, but also rendering any assistance, support, or other services, with or without compensation, for other charter or commercial fishermen.

Also on April 25, 2013, Adams, captain of the Providence II, and his corporation Adams Fishing Adventures, were sentenced to three years’ probation with special conditions requiring them to apply for and receive a Federal Fisheries permit, and to purchase and install a VMS device on any vessel that they own or operate during the term of probation.

On May 30, 2013, Lowery, captain of the Anna Lynn, was sentenced to 30 days’ in jail, followed by 12 months of supervised release with the special conditions that Lowery surrender his captain’s license to the U.S. Coast Guard and that he not be eligible for reinstatement of that license.  Lowery is also prohibited from engaging in the charter fishing industry in any capacity during the term of his supervised release.

 On July 2, 2013, Webb, captain of the Spider Webb, and his corporation Peake Enterprises were sentenced to pay a $3,000 fine and $1,000 restitution to NOAA.  Webb and Peake Enterprises were also sentenced to three years’ probation with special conditions requiring them to apply for and receive a Federal Fisheries permit, and to purchase and install a VMS device on any vessel that they own or operate during the term of probation.

This case was investigated by NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement and the Virginia Marine Police with assistance from the Federal Communications Commission Enforcement Bureau, Norfolk Office.  Assistant U.S. Attorney Stephen W. Haynie of the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia and Trial Attorney James B. Nelson of the Department of Justice’s Environmental Crimes Section of the Environment and Natural Resources Division prosecuted the case on behalf of the United States.

SECRETARY OF STATE KERRY'S REMARKS AT PLOUGHSHARES FUND GALA

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT 
Remarks at the Ploughshares Fund Gala
Remarks
John Kerry
Secretary of State
U.S. Institute of Peace
Washington, DC
October 28, 2013

Well, good evening, everybody. And Michael, thank you so much for a very, very generous introduction. I think everybody here wants to join me in thanking you for your remarkable efforts through all the years. You said a moment ago that you’ve been doing this for 40 years. You’ve really not only been involved in these humanitarian causes for a long time and the effort to make our world safer, but I think everybody here would agree that your groundbreaking film, China Syndrome, created a new consciousness about all of this, and you’ve been at it ever since. Thank you. God bless you for it. Appreciate it. (Applause.)

Doesn’t he look great? He looks absolutely spectacular. He is the comeback kid. And as everybody here knows, he has stashed away two Oscars. A month ago he added an Emmy to his mantle. And I’d asked him previously at another event we were at some time ago with friends here in Washington, I said, “What’s it like to win all these awards?” And he said, “You know, it was just an honor to be nominated.” And I said, “Yeah, that’s what they tried to tell me in 2004.” (Laughter.)

He has done amazingly, obviously, and we are really happy that you are gracing the screen, whether it’s television or the big screen, still with your talent.

Let me say how much I appreciate the leadership of Mary Estrin and Joe Cirincione. Thank you for all that you do. Thank you for your generous comments, Joe. And I want to thank everybody on the team of Ploughshares for your extraordinary work in pursuit of a difficult, obviously, reaching goal. But that’s what goals are supposed to be about, especially the big ones. Realizing a world that is free from the threat of weapons too terrible for any of us to comprehend is really hard for some people to grab onto. It’s a big concept. But I’ll say more about why I think it’s so essential that we do grab onto it in a few minutes.

I want to thank this guy sitting right in front of me. I don’t know why you’re sort of singled out there, Dick, but it’s great to see you again and to be with you here. He was my former Chairman, and for nearly 30 years we worked together on the Senate Foreign Relations together, which is a long time. And as every one of you knows – and I think you’re going to hear from Dick shortly – there is no nobody who’s spent more energy in more worthy ways to try to make the world safer than Dick Lugar. And I’m glad to call him a friend across the aisle. (Applause.) Good to be with you.

Needless to say, we need a lot more of Dick’s brand of common sense as well as his courage in reaching across the aisle at a time where we know how difficult that is, and his commitment to finding serious foreign policy answers to very, very challenging issues. We’re living in a time of much greater conflict in many ways, but far fewer people – despite the fact that it doesn’t’ seem that way – far fewer people dying in wars than did in the last century. And as asymmetrical as these challenges are, the reality is that we still face the great challenge that has been with us since 1945 and which so many people have expended their energy to try to control. I will always appreciate Dick Lugar’s partnership and persistence as we worked together on the New START Treaty. And without a doubt, we would not have made it through the Senate without Dick’s bipartisan efforts and without his common sense and courage.

I also want to thank all of you. It is heartening to see a lot of people here who are so committed to ensuring that one day, our children and grandchildren might actually be able to live in a world that is free from nuclear weapons, and that nuclear weaponry is a subject to be read about in a history book and not dealt with on the front pages of the newspapers on a daily basis.

In order for that to happen, above all we need two things. One, we need leadership that is willing to try to embrace this vision and give it life and make the world safer from the proliferation of nuclear weapons; and we also need – and I think you will agree that President Obama has actually stood up and provided that kind of leadership, in Prague, which was mentioned a few minutes ago, but also in Moscow, in Berlin, and across our own country. And I am convinced with all of the conversations we’ve had over the course of the last months, as I begin my tenure as Secretary of State, that is deeply committed, passionate and moved by this cause.

The second thing we need is you. We need organizations like Ploughshares and people who are willing to work the grassroots and people who are willing to educate. Educate – let me tell you about that for a minute. Dick will remember when I came to the United States Senate when we were there in the 1980s and Ronald Reagan was engaged in efforts then, before he became engaged in Reykjavik with Gorbachev, in what was then called Star Wars, as well as satellite weaponry, other discussion, the MX missiles. It was a time of enormous discussion in the United States Senate about these issues. We actually had an arms control observer group, and I worked for years to get onto that group. Ted Kennedy was on it, Sam Nunn, John Warner – a group of people who really cared about these issues and understood them and worked at them.

And then over time, as the Cold War ended and as we began both Dick and Sam Nunn’s work and other work to destroy nuclear weapons, the United States Senate changed. I’m willing to bet that maybe 10 senators, if that, have actually debated deeply and voted on issues of arms control in the United States Senate today.

So when I say educate, it’s not just the American public at large that has to be educated about these issues, about Comprehensive Test Ban, about computer testing, about all the mechanisms that are available today and all of the things we know about this weaponry. We need the United States Congress to spend more time and pay more attention and to be more importuned by all of you with respect to this challenge. None of this goal that we are trying to achieve here can be realized without your help – every single one of you here.

And those of us who lived through the Cuban Missile Crisis – and I look around the room, I see some of you here qualify with me for that – we remember firsthand the palpable fear of duck-and-cover drills at the height of the Cold War. I remember as a kid in middle school, I guess it was, getting under my desk in the daytime and covering our heads and being told what we had to do in the event of a nuclear war. Those of us who have experienced that are obviously too quickly becoming the minority today.

So it’s our responsibility to educate the public about the challenges and the opportunities that we face. I learned some of it firsthand when I was in the United States Navy, the first school they sent me to – to was Damage Control, and then in conjunction with it Nuclear, Chemical, Biological Warfare School, Treasure Island, San Francisco. Now, Treasure Island, San Francisco back then was pretty damn good. We used to go hear the Grateful Dead and Rolling Stones and Fillmore West and it was a pretty good time, although our daytime activities with nuclear weaponry was somewhat of a contradiction to all of that.

But I will tell you that I learned enough about throw weights and circles of damage and radiation and the consequences to say to myself, “This is insanity.” And back then we had about 50,000 warheads deployed on both sides staring at each other, until Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev brought people to their senses with a notion that was inconceivable back then that you might actually try to move to a world of no weapons.

So we have moved through START 2. We are moving down to a level where we’ll have 1,500 or so nuclear warheads. And it is a very good thing that our children don’t know what the threat of nuclear war really feels like, and we need to work to ensure that they never do, that their future is not going to be defined in the same way that ours was.

So I want to just say that I’m the first to acknowledge that getting there is a very, very challenging effort. I’ve listened to Henry Kissinger and I’ve listened to George Shultz, after whom this room is called, and I’ve listened to Bill Perry and people I have enormous respect for talk about this.

When President Kennedy so eloquently outlined his strategy of peace at American University over half a century ago, he called the goal of a complete ban on nuclear explosive testing “so near, yet so far.” And for better or worse, that diagnosis still applies today to the total elimination of nuclear weapons. And as President Obama has said, this goal is going to be the work of generations. But I’ve got news for you: Every step you take towards it, rather than in the opposite direction, is a step that will make this planet safer. And it may take those generations. But because every step means you are learning how to resolve conflicts in a different way, you are learning how to deal with international conflict far differently from the way we do today, that you don’t rely on the same kind of deterrence, to imagine that, to conjure up a vision of what that might be like, is not such a far reach, I believe.

Now, we have made important progress even towards that, and it shouldn’t be overlooked, from the Limited Test Ban Treaty that went into effect, what, 50 years ago this month, to the total moratorium on nuclear testing that President George H.W. Bush first proposed in 1992. And it’s only been breached by one country in this century: North Korea. We have made great progress in bringing leaders together to secure materials around the globe, especially through the establishment of a nuclear security summit, and we have voluntarily assumed a much greater role in the role in the international nonproliferation regime.

And of course, as I mentioned, there’s the New START Treaty, which will leave the world with the fewest deployed nuclear weapons since Dwight Eisenhower presided over the earliest standoffs with the Soviet Union, and Michael’s father was filming standoffs at the O.K. Corral. New START was a hard-fought – and because of the difficulties of bringing people along in this climate, a very significant agreement that does far more than reduce the number of weapons. It institutes a new and an effective verification regime, and it brings more of what was happening behind the scenes out into the open. It increases transparency, and it gives us much greater visibility into Russia’s nuclear activities, and they to us, which helps build confidence and actually reduces risk. It ensures that a strong nuclear deterrent remains the cornerstone of U.S. national security and that of our allies and our partners.

New START is a hallmark of the practical, commonsense approach that is needed to address the nuclear weapons threat. It’s not ideological. It’s not radical. And that’s why the satisfaction that Dick Lugar and I shared at its passage was tempered by the fact that the treaty passed the United States Senate with only four votes to spare. Now I don’t know about you, but I know that I do not want to accept as the new normal a standard of just 71 votes to be able to ratify the kind of treaty that used to pass the United States Senate near unanimously, a treaty that is so absolutely on its face prima facie without any doubt whatsoever in our common interests as inhabitants of this Earth. And none of you should be satisfied either. There is nothing the slightest bit partisan about our shared survival. And even at the height of gridlock, we ought to all be able to agree on the goal of eliminating the risk of annihilation.

So I’m encouraged by the representation here, and by the bipartisan capacity that is represented in Ploughshares and the spectrum of elected citizens – elected leaders and everyday citizens alike who consider solutions and ask one basic question above all else: What will make the world safer? Devising solutions and answering that question is no longer just the responsibility of the superpowers, as it was during the Cold War. It isn’t just the responsibility of the United States alone. All states can and must contribute to the conditions for disarmament and nonproliferation, and those two goals are actually the flips sides of the same coin. Peace will be, as President Kennedy said, the product of many nations, the sum of many acts. And we have to commit to doing our part. That’s what Joe said about George Shultz, about we’ve got to get into the field, you’ve got to get into the action, you’ve got to take the lead. Offense, not defense. As the sole surviving nation that ushered in the nuclear age, and accelerated it, we have, I think, a special burden to help usher it out. President Obama believes that. And if we see a future for big-ticket accomplishments like the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty – and President Obama and I do see that – we need more nonpartisanship, more education, and more advocacy from everybody here and from a lot of people who need to be brought here.

We need you out there to make the case, because the case, frankly, is stronger than ever. I was still in the United States Senate in 1999, on the losing side of a vote to ratify the CTBT. I thought it was a good idea then. I think it’s an even better idea now. And in a way that we could never have imagined 14 years ago, today we can maintain a safe and secure and effective arsenal without resorting to explosive testing. In a way we that we couldn’t 14 years ago – we didn’t know how – today we have a much more advanced monitoring capacity that will ensure that the treaty is, in fact, verifiable and reliable.

And don’t get me wrong. I’m realistic about the timeframe to try to begin to lower these numbers. Not going to happen tomorrow or the next day. But it’s time to re-start the conversation, to have the open debate, the full airing of every single argument and the chance to ask every question, just as we did on the START Treaty. And in the meantime, none of us here can dare to underestimate the message that we would send to the world if we began to rein in the most dangerous weapons.

Let me just say I know there are some who question the twin strategies of disarmament and nonproliferation. They think it’s somehow inconsistent. They think it makes us weak. But the simple truth remains that while our ability to deter our adversaries and protect our allies will never be compromised, as President Obama has made clear, we have more nuclear weapons today than we need to meet that standard. (Applause.)

And I might add, for all those budget-conscious folks up on the Hill, in an era of difficult budgeting, it’s very important to remember these weapons and their maintenance do not come cheap. Now, I’m not suggesting that you balance that against your security, but when you know your security is well met, and completely and totally spoken for, there’s no reason to fear reducing to lower levels and reducing the capacity for other nations to feel that they have to join the crowd.

Obviously, we are now facing a test of that – two tests – in North Korea and in Iran. And we are engaged, as the President has charged me to be and has welcomed, an opportunity to try to put to test whether or not Iran really desires to pursue only a peaceful program, and will submit to the standards of the international community in the effort to prove that to the world. Some have suggested that somehow there’s something wrong with even putting that to the test. I suggest that the idea that the United States of America is a responsible nation to all of humankind would not explore that possibility would be the height of irresponsibility and dangerous in itself, and we will not succumb to those fear tactics and forces that suggest otherwise. (Applause.)

Nor will be stampeded into some notion that this is easy, or that somehow just the mere statement you’re willing to do something means you have done it. Our eyes are wide open. The actions must be real. They must be fully verifiable. They must get the job done. And no words can replace those actions. And we have made it crystal clear, and I will repeat again, no deal is better than a bad deal, because a bad deal could actually wind up creating greater danger.

So we will do what is necessary here, but it is important for everybody to remember that in a world with fewer nuclear weapons, every nation can actually be stronger, not weaker. Everybody can actually be safer and more secure because of the regimen that you set up in order to guarantee that. These are principles that guide us as we work to keep these weapons out of the hands of terrorists who seek to buy a nuclear bomb or get one off the black market, people who are nihilists with little interest in diplomacy, with no economy to sanction, no desire to join the international community, no concern for the next generation growing up on this earth.

The principles that guide us are the same principles as we work with our international partners to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons that Michael talked about a few minutes ago. Who would have imagined a few months ago that we would be removing weapons that hadn’t even been acknowledged to exist? We have to seize these opportunities. We have to explore this in the name of humankind and in keeping with our responsibilities as stewards of this planet.

And I will say that it is not words alone, as we call on North Korea to comply with its international obligations. We need to move forward. We need to see how North Korea will respond. How can you excuse a state, a rogue state, that spends its scarce resources on missiles designed to kill rather than investments that makes its citizens lives better? We are reminded through that contradiction of the very foundation of the Ploughshares Fund. Ploughshares, as all of you know all too well, echoes the biblical responsibility, the call of the scriptures to turn weapons of war into the tools that till the earth. It is a noble calling.

And you recognize that our responsibility does not stop with eliminating the weapons. It is not enough just to take them out and retire them. We have to redirect our resources and our energy into creating jobs and opportunity, encouraging advancement and growth, helping our neighbors, helping the needy, fulfilling the rest of the requirements of the scriptures. President Obama and I believe that this needs to be an age of construction, not destruction, one that will be defined by innovation, interactivity, and greater integration of ideas and cultures, more so than at any other time in human history.

So while weapons that were created to destroy have no place in our future, it is not enough just to melt the swords into silver. We have to make them into those ploughshares if we stand any chance of fulfilling the vision promoted by the prophets and presidents alike that one day we might be able to no longer know war. President Kennedy’s peace strategy was a courageous one. Think about it, at the height of the Cold War. President Obama’s agenda is equally bold, especially at a time when non-state actors have changed the way that we think about the nuclear threat.

These are not just high-minded dreams of leaders, my friends. These are the concerns of parents all across this planet, people who will never forget our responsibility to the next generation. And if we care about our children and what they will inherit – not just the kinds of weapons but what kind of world – then we have to act with courage today. Believe me, we’re not naive. Brent Scowcroft is not naive. Henry Kissinger is not naive. Bill Perry, Jim Schlesinger -- none of them – they’re not naive. We know that our goal of a world free of nuclear threat is a lofty one, but it is worth fighting for. We can’t just wish this world into a different reality. We have to fight for it, and that’s what I know every single one of you have come here committed to do. It’s a privilege to be with you. Let’s keep fighting and making it happen. God bless. Thank you. (Applause.)

FORMER CHEMICAL COMPANY PRESIDENT SENTENCED FOR CRIMES THAT CONTRIBUTED TO EMPLOYEE DEATHS

FROM:  U.S. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT 
Monday, October 28, 2013
Former President of Port Arthur, Texas, Chemical Company Sentenced for Federal Crimes Related to Employee Deaths

The former president of Port Arthur Chemical and Environmental Services LLC (PACES) has been sentenced for occupational safety crimes which resulted in the death of an employee, announced Robert G. Dreher, Acting Assistant Attorney General of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division and John M. Bales, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Texas.

Matthew Lawrence Bowman, 41, of Houston, pleaded guilty on May 9, 2013, to violating the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSH Act) and making a false statement and was sentenced to serve 12 months in federal prison today by U.S. District Judge Marcia Crone.  Bowman was also ordered to pay fines in the amount of $5,000.  

Bowman admitted to not properly protecting PACES employees from exposure to hydrogen sulfide, a poisonous gas resulting in the death of truck driver Joey Sutter on Dec. 18, 2008.  In addition, Bowman admitted to directing employees to falsify transportation documents to conceal that the wastewater was coming from PACES after a disposal facility put a moratorium on all shipments from PACES after it received loads containing hydrogen sulfide.

“Today’s sentence is a just punishment for Bowman’s actions, which placed workers at unacceptable risk and had fatal consequences,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Dreher. “The Justice Department and the U.S. Attorney’s Offices will continue to work with our law enforcement partners to vigorously investigate and prosecute those who violate the laws enacted to ensure the safety of workers handling hazardous materials and to prevent the kind of tragedies that occurred in this case.”

“The government’s prosecution of Matthew Bowman is now complete.  While Mr. Bowman is being held accountable for his criminal conduct, and that is appropriate, there is no amount of time in prison; no amount of criminal fine that can be levied that will compensate for the loss of life at PACES.  We extend our deepest condolences and well wishes to the friends and family of Mr. Sutter, who died pitilessly and needlessly because of the criminally negligent actions of Matthew Bowman,” said U.S. Attorney Bales.  “The agents and prosecutors conducted an outstanding investigation and prosecution.”

"The sentencing today is a clear signal of the U.S. Department of Transportation’s (USDOT), and its Office of Inspector General’s (OIG) commitment to protecting the public from illegally transported hazardous materials,” said Max Smith, regional Special Agent-in-Charge, USDOT OIG.  “Working with our law enforcement and prosecutorial colleagues we will continue our vigorous efforts to prosecute to the fullest extent of the law those who would seek to disregard the Nation’s transportation laws and endanger the public.”

“Environmental violations are serious crimes, and in a worst-case scenario, they can kill people,” said Ivan Vikin, special Agent in Charge of EPA’s criminal enforcement program in Texas.  “In this case, a senior manger’s actions led directly to the death of one of his employees.  This is why we have laws regarding the safe and legal handling of hazardous materials.  Enforcement of these laws must be consistent and uncompromising.”

“When a worker loses his or her life on the job, it has a ripple effect on their families, friends, community and the workplace. Matt Bowman and PACES knowingly violated workplace safety standards that led to Joey Sutter's death,” said OSHA's Deputy Regional Administrator Eric Harbin in Dallas. “OSHA standards are in place to protect workers and employers will be held accountable when they fail to follow these standards.”
According to information presented in court, Bowman was president and owner of PACES, located in Port Arthur, Texas, and CES Environmental Services (CES) located in Houston.  PACES was in operation from November 2008 to November 2010, and was in the business of producing and selling caustic materials to paper mills.  The production of caustic materials involved hydrogen sulfide, a poisonous gas.  According to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, hydrogen sulfide is an acute toxic substance that is the leading cause of sudden death in the workplace.  Employers are required by OSHA to implement engineering and safety controls to prevent employees from exposure above harmful limits of hydrogen sulfide.
 
Bowman was responsible for approving and directing PACES production operations, the disposal of hydrogen sulfide wastewater, and ensuring implementation of employee safety precautions. In some cases, Bowman personally handled the investigation of work-related employee injuries, directed the transportation of PACES wastewater, and determined what safety equipment could be purchased or maintained.  In the cases at issue, hazardous materials were transported illegally with false documents and without the required placards.  Most importantly, the workers were not properly protected from exposure to hazardous gases.  The exposure resulted in the deaths of two employees, Joey Sutter and Charles Sittig, who were truck drivers, at the PACES facility on Dec. 18, 2008 and Apr. 14, 2009.  Placarding is critical to ensure the safety of first responders in the event of an accident or other highway incident.  Bowman and PACES were indicted by a federal grand jury on July 18, 2012.

This case was investigated by EPA Criminal Investigation Division; the U.S. Department of Transportation Office of Inspector General; the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality - Environmental Crimes Unit, part of the Texas Environmental Enforcement Task Force; the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department - Environmental Crimes Unit; the Houston Police Department - Major Offenders, Environmental Investigations Unit; the Travis County, Texas - District Attorney’s Office; the Harris County, Texas, District Attorney’s Office - Environmental Crimes Division; the Houston Fire Department; OSHA; the U.S. Coast Guard; the Port Arthur Police Department; and the Port Arthur Fire Department.

The case was prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Texas and the Environmental Crimes Section of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division.

PRESIDENT OBAMA'S REMARKS AT MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER TOM FOLEY

FROM:  THE WHITE HOUSE 
Remarks by the President at Memorial Service for Former Speaker Tom Foley
U.S. Capitol
Washington, D.C.

4:11 P.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT:  To Heather, and the Foley family; to Tom’s colleagues and friends; President Clinton; Vice President Mondale; former speakers, and those who preceded me, I am honored to join you today to remember a man who embodied the virtues of devotion and respect -- for the institution that he led, for the colleagues that he served alongside, and, most importantly, for the citizens that he had the honor to represent.

Unlike so many of you, I did not have the privilege of knowing Tom personally; I admired him from afar.  But like millions of Americans, I benefit from his legacy.  Thanks to Tom, more children get a head start on success in school and in life.  More seniors receive better health care.  More families breathe easier because they know their country will be there for them in times of need.  And all of them -- all of us -- are indebted to that towering man from Spokane.

I think, in listening to the wonderful memories that have been shared, we get a sense of this man, and we recognize his humility.  He often attributed much of his success to good luck -- and he may have had a point.  Leader McConnell told the story about his first race; there were a couple of details that got left out.  On the way to Olympia to file the paperwork for his first congressional campaign, apparently Tom blew out a tire.  (Laughter.)  So he and some friends hitchhiked to a service station to get it fixed.  And then, as they approached the outskirts of the city, they ran out of gas.  So they pushed the car up the hill, coasting into town just before the deadline.  And Tom went on to win that race by a resounding 54 votes.

So there’s no question that there may have been some luck of the Irish operating when it came to Tom Foley, as well as incredible stamina.  But what led him to make history as the first Speaker of the House from west of the Rockies was not luck.  It was his hard work, his deep integrity, his powerful intellect, and, as Bob Michel so eloquently and movingly stated, his ability to find common ground with his colleagues across the aisle.  And it was his personal decency that helped him bring civility and order to a Congress that demanded both -- and still does.

Which brings me to a final point:  At a time when our political system can seem more polarized and more divided than ever before, it can be tempting to see the possibility of bipartisan progress as a thing of the past -- old school, as Bob said.  It can be tempting to wonder if we still have room for leaders like Tom; whether the environment, the media, the way that districts are drawn and the pressures that those of us in elected office are under somehow preclude the possibility of that brand of leadership.  Well, I believe we have to find our way back there.

Now more than ever, America needs public servants who are willing to place problem-solving ahead of politics, as the letter that President Clinton held up indicates, as the history of the crime bill shows.  We are sent here to do what's right, and sometimes doing what's right is hard.  And it's not free.  And yet, that’s the measure of leadership.

It's important for us who feel a responsibility to fight for a cause to recognize that our cause is not advanced if we can't also try to achieve compromise, the same way our Founders saw it -- as a vital part of our democracy, the very thing that makes our system of self-government possible.  That’s what Tom Foley believed.  That’s what he embodied.  That’s the legacy that shines brightly today.

On the last day that he presided as Speaker, Tom described what it should feel like to serve the American people in this city.  He spoke about coming to work in the morning and catching a glimpse of the Capitol.  And he said that it ought to give anyone a thrill, a sense not only of personal satisfaction, "but very deep gratitude to our constituents for the honor of letting us represent them.”  And Tom never lost that sense of wonder.

It's interesting -- as I read that passage, what he wrote, the first time I visited Capitol Hill, Tom Foley was Speaker.  I was a very young man and I was doing community work, and I remember seeing that Capitol and having that same sense of wonder.  And I think now about Tom Foley being here doing that work, and inspiring what might have ultimately led me to be interested in public service as well.

When we're standing outside these magnificent buildings, we have that sense of wonder and that sense of hope.  And sometimes, the longer you're here, the harder it is to hang on to that.  And yet, Tom Foley never lost it -- never lost that sense of wonder, never lost the sense of gratitude.  What a privilege, he felt it was, to serve.  And he never forgot why he came here -- on behalf of this nation and his state and the citizens that he loved and respected so much.

And so, as a country, we have to be grateful to him.  And to Heather, and to the people of the great state of Washington, thank you so much for sharing Tom with us.

God bless Tom Foley.  God bless the United States of America.  (Applause.)

END

RABOBANK AGREES TO PAY $325 MILLION CRIMINAL PENALTY IN LIBOR/EURIBOR INTEREST RATE MANIPULATION SCHEME

FROM:  U.S. JUSTICE DEPARTMENT 
Tuesday, October 29, 2013
Rabobank Admits Wrongdoing in Libor Investigation, Agrees to Pay $325 Million Criminal Penalty

Coöperatieve Centrale Raiffeisen-Boerenleenbank B.A. (Rabobank)   has entered into an agreement with the Department of Justice to pay a $325 million penalty to resolve violations arising from Rabobank’s submissions for the London InterBank Offered Rate (LIBOR) and the Euro Interbank Offered Rate (Euribor), which are leading benchmark interest rates around the world, the Justice Department announced today.

A criminal information will be filed today in U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut that charges Rabobank as part of a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA).  The information charges Rabobank with wire fraud for its role in manipulating the benchmark interest rates LIBOR and Euribor.  In addition to the $325 million penalty, the DPA requires the bank to admit and accept responsibility for its misconduct as described in an extensive statement of facts.  Rabobank has agreed to continue cooperating with the Justice Department in its ongoing investigation of the manipulation of benchmark interest rates by other financial institutions and individuals.

“For years, employees at Rabobank, often working with traders at other banks around the globe, illegally manipulated four different interest rates – Euribor and LIBOR for the U.S. dollar, the yen, and the pound sterling – in the hopes of fraudulently moving the market to generate profits for their traders at the expense of the bank’s counterparties,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Mythili Raman of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division.  “Today’s criminal resolution – which represents the second-largest penalty in the Criminal Division’s active, ongoing investigation of the manipulation of global benchmark interest rates by some of the largest banks in the world – comes fast on the heels of charges brought against three former ICAP brokers just last month.  Rabobank is the fourth major financial institution that has admitted its misconduct in this wide-ranging criminal investigation, and other banks should pay attention: our investigation is far from over.”

“Rabobank rigged multiple benchmark rates, allowing its traders to reap higher profits at the expense of their unsuspecting counterparties,” said Deputy Assistant Attorney General Leslie C. Overton of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.  “Not only was this conduct fraudulent, it compromised the integrity of globally-used interest rate benchmarks – undermining financial markets worldwide.”

“Rabobank admitted to manipulating LIBOR and Euribor submissions which directly affected the rates referenced by financial products held by and on behalf of companies and investors around the world,” said Assistant Director in Charge Valerie Parlave of the FBI’s Washington Field Office.  “Rabobank’s actions resulted in the deliberate harm to counterparties holding products referencing the manipulated rates.  Today’s announcement is yet another example of the tireless efforts of the FBI special agents and forensic accountants who are dedicated to investigating complex fraud schemes and, together with prosecutors, bringing to justice those who participate in such schemes.”

Together with approximately $740 million in criminal and regulatory penalties imposed by other agencies in actions arising out of the same conduct – $475 million by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) action, $170 million by the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) action and approximately $96 million by the Openbaar Ministerie (the Dutch Public Prosecution Service) – the Justice Department’s $325 million criminal penalty brings the total amount to be paid by Rabobank to more than $1 billion.

According to signed documents, LIBOR is an average interest rate, calculated based upon submissions from leading banks around the world and reflecting the rates those banks believe they would be charged if borrowing from other banks.  LIBOR serves as the primary benchmark for short-term interest rates globally and is used as a reference rate for many interest rate contracts, mortgages, credit cards, student loans and other consumer lending products.  The Bank of International Settlements estimated that as of the second half of 2009, outstanding interest rate contracts were valued at approximately $450 trillion.

LIBOR is published by the British Bankers’ Association (BBA), a trade association based in London.  At the time relevant to the conduct in the criminal information, LIBOR was calculated for 10 currencies at 15 borrowing periods, known as maturities, ranging from overnight to one year.  The LIBOR for a given currency at a specific maturity is the result of a calculation based upon submissions from a panel of banks for that currency (the Contributor Panel) selected by the BBA.  From at least 2005 through 2011, Rabobank was a member of the Contributor Panel for a number of currencies, including United States dollar (dollar) LIBOR, pound sterling LIBOR, and yen LIBOR.

The Euro Interbank Offered Rate (Euribor) is published by the European Banking Federation (EBF), which is based in Brussels, Belgium, and is calculated at 15 maturities, ranging from overnight to one year.  Euribor is the rate at which Euro interbank term deposits within the Euro zone are expected to be offered by one prime bank to another at 11:00 a.m. Brussels time.  The Euribor at a given maturity is the result of a calculation based upon submissions from Euribor Contributor Panel banks.  From at least 2005 through 2011, Rabobank was also a member of the Contributor Panel for Euribor.

According to the statement of facts accompanying the agreement, from as early as 2005 through at least November 2010, certain Rabobank derivatives traders requested that certain Rabobank dollar LIBOR, yen LIBOR, pound sterling LIBOR, and Euribor submitters submit LIBOR and Euribor contributions that would benefit the traders’ trading positions, rather than rates that complied with the definitions of LIBOR and Euribor.

In addition, according to the statement of facts accompanying the agreement, from as early as January 2006 through October 2008, a Rabobank yen LIBOR submitter and a Rabobank Euribor submitter had two separate agreements with traders at other banks to make yen LIBOR and Euribor submissions that benefitted trading positions, rather than submissions that complied with the definitions of LIBOR and Euribor.

The Rabobank LIBOR and Euribor submitters accommodated traders’ requests on numerous occasions, and on various occasions, Rabobank’s submissions affected the fixed rates.

According to the statement of facts, Rabobank employees engaged in this conduct through electronic communications, which included both emails and electronic chats.  For example, on Sept. 21, 2007, a Rabobank Yen derivatives trader emailed the Rabobank Yen LIBOR submitter at the time with the subject line “libors,” writing: “Wehre do you think today’s libors are?  If you can, I would like 1mth libors higher today.”  The submitter replied: “Bookies reckon 1m sets at .85.”  The trader wrote back: “I have some fixings in 1 mth so would appreciate if you can put it higher mate.”  The submitter replied: “No prob mate let me know your level.”  The trader responded: “Wud be nice if you could put 0.90% for 1mth cheers.”  The submitter wrote back: “Sure no prob. I’ll probably get a few phone calls but no worries mate!”  The trader replied: “If you may get a few phone calls then put 0.88% then.”  The submitter responded: “Don’t worry mate – there’s bigger crooks in the market than us guys!”  That day, as requested, Rabobank’s 1-month Yen LIBOR submission was 0.90, an increase of seven basis points from its previous submission, whereas the other panel banks’ submissions decreased by approximately a half of a basis point on average.  Rabobank’s submission went from being tied as the tenth highest submission on the Contributor Panel on the previous day to being the highest submission on the Contributor Panel.

On Nov. 29, 2006, a Rabobank dollar derivatives trader wrote to Rabobank’s Global Head of Liquidity and Finance and the head of Rabobank’s money markets desk in London, who supervised rate submitters: “Hi mate, low 1s high 3s LIBOR pls !!! Dont tell [another Rabobank U.S. Dollar derivatives trader] haa haaaaaaa.  Sold the market today doooooohhhh!”  The money markets desk head replied: “ok mate , will do my best …speak later.”  After the LIBOR submissions that day, Rabobank’s ranking compared to other panel banks dropped as to 1-month dollar LIBOR and rose as to 3-month dollar LIBOR. Two days later, on Dec. 1, 2006, the trader again wrote to the money markets desk head: “Appreciate 3s go down, but a high 3s today would be nice… cheers chief.”  The money markets desk head wrote back: “I am fast turning into your LIBOR bitch!!!!”  The trader replied: “Just friendly encouragement that’s all , appreciate the help.”  The money markets desk head wrote back: “No worries mate , glad to help ….We just stuffed ourselves with good ol pie , mash n licker !!”

In an example of an agreement with traders at other banks, on July 28, 2006, a Rabobank rate submitter and Rabobank trader discussed their mutual desires for a high fixing.  The submitter stated to the trader: “setting a high 1m again today - I need it!” to which the trader responded: “yes pls mate…I need a higher 1m libor too.”  Within approximately 20 minutes, the submitter contacted a trader at another Contributor Panel bank and wrote: “morning skipper.....will be setting an obscenely high 1m again today...poss 38 just fyi.”  The other bank’s trader responded, “(K)...oh dear..my poor customers....hehehe!! manual input libors again today then!!!!”  Both banks’ submissions on July 28 moved up one basis point, from 0.37 to 0.38, a move which placed their submissions as the second highest submissions on the Contributor Panel that day.

As another example, on July 7, 2009, a Rabobank trader wrote to a former Rabobank yen LIBOR submitter: “looks like some ppl are talking with each other when they put libors down. . . quite surprised that 3m libors came down a lot.”  The former submitter replied: “yes deffinite manipulation – always is tho to be honest mate. . . i always used to ask if anyone needed a favour and vise versa. . . . a little unethical but always helps to have friends in mrkt.”

By entering into a DPA with Rabobank, the Justice Department took several factors into consideration, including that Rabobank has no history of similar misconduct and has not been the subject of any criminal enforcement actions or any significant regulatory enforcement actions by any authority in the United States, the Netherlands, or elsewhere.  In addition, Rabobank has significantly expanded and enhanced its legal and regulatory compliance program and has taken extensive steps to remediate the misconduct.  Significant remedies and sanctions are also being imposed on Rabobank by several regulators and an additional criminal law enforcement agency (the Dutch Public Prosecution Service).

This ongoing investigation is being conducted by special agents, forensic accountants, and intelligence analysts of the FBI’s Washington Field Office.  The prosecution of Rabobank is being handled by Assistant Chief Glenn S. Leon and Trial Attorney Alexander H. Berlin of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and Trial Attorneys Ludovic C. Ghesquiere, Michael T. Koenig and Eric L. Schleef of the Antitrust Division.  Deputy Chiefs Daniel Braun and William Stellmach of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section, Criminal Division Senior Counsel Rebecca Rohr, Assistant Chief Elizabeth B. Prewitt and Trial Attorney Richard A. Powers of the Antitrust Division’s New York Office, and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Eric Glover and Liam Brennan of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Connecticut, along with Criminal Division’s Office of International Affairs, have provided valuable assistance in this matter.

The investigation leading to these cases has required, and has greatly benefited from, a diligent and wide-ranging cooperative effort among various enforcement agencies both in the United States and abroad.  The Justice Department acknowledges and expresses its deep appreciation for this assistance.  In particular, the CFTC’s Division of Enforcement referred this matter to the department and, along with the FCA, has played a major role in the investigation.  The department has also worked closely with the Dutch Public Prosecution Service and De Nederlandsche Bank (the Dutch Central Bank) in the investigation of Rabobank.  Various agencies and enforcement authorities from other nations are also participating in different aspects of the broader investigation relating to LIBOR and other benchmark rates, and the department is grateful for their cooperation and assistance.  In particular, the Securities and Exchange Commission has played a significant role in the LIBOR investigation, and the department expresses its appreciation to the United Kingdom’s Serious Fraud Office for its assistance and ongoing cooperation.