Barry As President: What A State-Run Media Looks Like

RICHMOND -- President Barack Obama seemed to offer a ringing endorsement Wednesday for "Daily Show" host Jon Stewart's upcoming Rally to Restore Sanity – although he didn’t get the name quite right.

"I was amused -- Jon Stewart, you know, the host of The Daily Show, apparently he's going to host a rally called something like Americans in favor of a return to sanity, or something like that," Obama told a crowd gathered around a living room in a comfortable suburban home. "And his point was 70 percent of the people – it doesn’t matter what political affiliation –70 percent of folks are just like you. They go about their business. They work hard every day. They’re looking after their families. They don’t go around calling people names. They don’t make stuff up.”

The session was Obama’s final – and friendliest – small-group suburban discussion that took him through Ohio, New Mexico and Iowa. White House deputy press secretary Bill Burton told reporters on Air Force One the president will likely field a few more rounds of casual, unscripted lawn-chair gatherings in the coming months.

The goal of the gatherings is to give the president an intimate forum to discuss his policies, including education reform, the sweeping health care overhaul, and the economy. But the groups don’t always toss Obama softball questions: in New Mexico, one woman asked Obama to describe why he is a Christian, and in Iowa several members asked about government intrusion, challenged his plan to tax the rich and asked him how he intends to eliminate poverty.

In Richmond, the president discussed the rancorous political discourse in Washington: it must be fixed.

Both the right and left have used the president as a political punching bag: conservative TV host Glenn Beck once called Obama a racist who hates whites and accused him of embracing a "perversion of the gospel of Jesus Christ," while liberal MSNBC host Rachel Maddow repeatedly shreds the administration for its muddled stance on the "don't ask, don't tell" policy banning gays from serving openly in the armed forces.

But Obama takes particular issue with Fox News, home to some of his fiercest critics like Beck and Sean Hannity.

In a Rolling Stone interview this week, said Fox News is “part of a tradition” of a free American press with a “very clear, undeniable point of view.” But he said the right-leaning network has “a point of view that I think is ultimately destructive” for the nation. He also said in the interview that Rupert Murdoch, owner of Fox News, is more concerned with profit rather than journalistic standards or ethics: “I suspect that if you ask Mr. Murdoch what his number-one concern is, it’s that Fox is very successful.”

Obama told his living-room audience that pundits who say outrageous, provocative things – liberals as well as conservatives – are being rewarded with more TV time and book deals. But he noted that Republicans made a tactical decision to block his agenda no matter what, and "from just a raw, political point of view, it's been a pretty successful strategy."

Reflecting his 2004 DNC convention speech that launched him to the national stage, Obama reiterated that there aren't "red states" and "blue states."

"I believe that so profoundly," he said. (source)

Barry As President: When Lack Of Leadership Results In The Death Of Men Better Than Yourself

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN -- To the U.S. Army soldiers and Marines serving here, some things seem so obviously true that they are beyond debate. Among those perceived truths: Tthe restrictive rules of engagement that they have to fight under have made serving in combat far more dangerous for them, while allowing the Taliban to return to a position of strength.

"If they use rockets to hit the [forward operating base] we can't shoot back because they were within 500 meters of the village. If they shoot at us and drop their weapon in the process we can't shoot back," said Spc. Charles Brooks, 26, a U.S. Army medic with 1st Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment, in Zabul province.

Word had come down the morning Brooks spoke to this reporter that watch towers surrounding the base were going to be dismantled because Afghan village elders, some sympathetic to the Taliban, complained they were invading their village privacy. "We have to take down our towers because it offends them and now the Taliban can set up mortars and we can't see them," Brooks added, with disgust.

In June, Gen. David Petraeus, who took command here after the self-inflicted demise of Gen. Stanley McChrystal, told Congress that he was weighing a major change with rules for engaging enemy fighters in Afghanistan. That has not yet happened, troops say. Soldiers and Marines continue to be held back by what they believe to be strict rules imposed by the government of President Hamid Karzai designed with one objective: limit Afghan civilian casualties.

"I don't think the military leaders, president or anybody really cares about what we're going through," said Spc. Matthew "Silver" Fuhrken, 25, from Watertown, N.Y. "I'm sick of people trying to cover up what's really going on over here. They won't let us do our job. I don't care if they try to kick me out for what I'm saying -- war is war and this is no war. I don't know what this is."

To the soldiers and Marines risking their lives in Afghanistan, restrictions on their ability to aggressively attack the Taliban have led to another enormous frustration stalking morale: the fear that the Karzai government, with the prodding of the administration of President Obama, will negotiate a peace with the Taliban that wastes all the sacrifices by the U.S. here. Those fears intensified when news reached the enlisted ranks that the Karzai government, with the backing of senior Obama officials, was entering a new round of negotiations with the Taliban.

"If we walk away, cut a deal with the Taliban, desert the people who needed us most, then this war was pointless," said Pvt. Jeffrey Ward, with 1st Battalion, 4th Infantry Regiment, who is stationed at Forward Operating Base Bullard in southern Afghanistan.

"Everyone dies for their own reasons but it's sad to think that our friends, the troops, have given their lives for something we're not going to see through."

Other soldiers agreed. They said they feared few officials in the Pentagon understand the reality on the ground.

From the front lines, the U.S. backing of the Karzai government, widely seen as riddled with corruption by the Afghans living in local villages, has given the Taliban a position of power in villages while undercutting U.S. moral authority.

Corrupt government officials have made "it impossible for us to trust anyone," said elder Sha Barar, from the village of Sha Joy. The people of that village and many others profess fear of the Taliban, and recount tales of brutality and wanton killings by the Taliban and their sympathizers. But they don't see the Karzai government as a positive force in their lives.

Karzai said that talks need to continue with the Taliban "at a fixed address and with a more open agenda to tell us how to bring peace to Afghanistan and Pakistan."

But U.S. troops and Marines interviewed during the past month in Afghanistan question what negotiations would really mean, to both them and the Afghan people. And they almost universally believe that negotiating would be a mistake before achieving decisive gains they believe are attainable once oppressive rules of engagement are relaxed.

"What does it mean if we give in to the Taliban? They are the enemy," Brooks said. "This place is going to be a safe haven for terrorists again. The government doesn't care about the sacrifices already made. As far as the mission goes, I want to see these kids go to school and have a future but not at the expense of my friends -- not anymore." (source)

Hope And Change Diary: Making Things Better For Black People (Section 8 ranks swell to record sizes)

Thirty thousand people showed up to receive Section 8 housing applications in East Point Wednesday, suffering through hours in the hot sun, angry flare-ups in the crowd and lots of frustration and confusion for a chance to receive a government-subsidized apartment.

The massive event sometimes descended into a chaotic mob scene filled with anger and impatience. Some 62 people needed medical attention and 20 of them were transported to a hospital, authorities said. A baby went into a seizure in the heat and was stabilized at a hospital.

People were removed on stretchers and when a throng of people who had been waiting hours in a line were told to move to another line, people started pushing, shoving and cursing, witnesses said.

Still, officials of East Point declared the day a success. Nobody was arrested and nobody was seriously injured, they said. It was an assessment roundly challenged by many of the people who had to go through it.

The massive event sometimes descended into a chaotic mob scene filled with anger and impatience. Some 62 people needed medical attention and 20 of them were transported to a hospital, authorities said. A baby went into a seizure in the heat and was stabilized at a hospital.

People were removed on stretchers and when a throng of people who had been waiting hours in a line were told to move to another line, people started pushing, shoving and cursing, witnesses said.

Still, officials of East Point declared the day a success. Nobody was arrested and nobody was seriously injured, they said. It was an assessment roundly challenged by many of the people who had to go through it.


Kim Lemish, executive director of the East Point Housing Authority, said the event marked the first time the city has offered Section 8 housing applications since 2002. The waiting list that lasted eight years had depleted, she said, and the agency was beginning a new one. So people braved all the physical difficulties just to get on a waiting list that could keep them waiting for years.

Lemish said the agency had expected about 10,000 people but three times as many showed up. Many were just accompanying those looking for an application. Some 13,000 applications were handed out.

Concern is rising that a similar scene could occur Thursday when the housing authority of this small city begins accepting the completed applications. Wednesday's event was only to hand out the paperwork. The housing authority will begin accepting applications at 9 a.m.

Some of the crowd waited for two days at the Tri-Cities Plaza shopping center. As the temperature rose Wednesday, people fell ill.

Sgt. Cliff Chandler, spokesman for the East Point Police Department, said a toddler was treated earlier in the morning for "some type of seizure," Chandler said.

"A lot of it was heat and some was health-related issues" such people not taking their medications, Chandler said.


By the time everyone had left around 2 p.m., the temperature had climbed into the low 90s.

East Point police, some wearing riot helmets, were patrolling the area. Firefighters and EMTs were attending to people who were overheating in the sun. Police from College Park, Hapeville, Fulton County and MARTA assisted in crowd control.

Chandler said there were no arrests.

Felecia McGhee told the AJC she arrived around 6:30 a.m. Wednesday. She said the major problem began when people started breaking into the line and then officials handing out applications started moving those areas and those line breakers. She said she saw at least two small children trampled when the crowd rushed the building where the applications were to be handed out.

"It's a real mess out here," she said.

Channel 2 Action News reporter Mike Petchenik said fights were breaking out and police had to stop people who were storming the door.

Channel 2 reporter Tom Jones said, “There are thousands, I mean, thousands of people here. I’ve seen people fall out from the heat.”

By late morning the crowd had thinned considerably and people were walking up and getting their applications without delay. But just before the 1 p.m. deadline, a line of about 200 people had formed. Shortly after 1 p.m., several people ran across the parking lot to get in line but were told by police that the line was closed.

Emergency personnel brought in a pickup truck full of bottled water and were handing it out to the crowd.

A sign on the door of the office explained that only applications were being handed out.

"The housing authority will be issuing applications Wednesday, August 11, starting at 9 a.m. Everyone in line by 1 p.m. on the 11th will receive an application. ... No Section 8 vouchers are available at this time. There are no public housing units available at this time. You're applying for the waiting list only."

The Housing Choice Voucher Program, called Section 8, subsidized the rents of low-income families living in apartments and houses that are privately owned. The federal program makes up the difference in rent that the poor can afford and the fair market value for each area.

The federal government has specific standards for its subsidized properties but at the same time landlords are assured an income.

Only families with incomes no more than half the median income for the area qualify. The median income for the East Point area is less than $32,000, according to Census data. It is up to the renter to find a place that meets HUD standards, which includes being 90 percent to 110 percent of the “local fair market rent.” [source]

Barry As President: Color Your Hair Gray To Appear Experienced While Complaining About The President From 2 Years Ago

President Barack Obama attacked the economic policies of his Republican predecessor George W. Bush in Bush's home state on Monday as evidence of the way Republicans would operate if given power in Nov. 2 U.S. congressional elections.

At a fund-raising event for Democrats in Dallas, where Bush now lives, Obama said the former president's "disastrous" policies had driven the U.S. economy into the ground and turned budget surpluses into deficits.

Obama defended his repeated references to Bush's policies, saying they were necessary to remind Americans of the weak economy he inherited from Bush in January 2009.

"The policies that crashed the economy, that undercut the middle class, that mortgaged our future, do we really want to go back to that, or do we keep moving our country forward?" Obama said at another fund-raising event in Austin, referring to Bush's eight years as president.

In reminding voters about the policies of the unpopular Bush, Obama is trying to protect his fellow Democrats' majorities in Congress and limit anticipated Republican gains.

On Nov. 2, voters will choose all 435 members of the House of Representatives and 37 members of the 100-seat Senate.

Republicans say they doubt Obama's effort to cite Bush as a reason to vote against them in November will work because Americans are more concerned about getting or keeping a job.

"When we talk about this 'going back' thing, I notice that some Republicans say, 'Well, he just wants to bash the previous administration, he's looking backwards.' ... No, no, no. The reason we're focused on it is because the other side isn't offering anything new," Obama said in Austin.

He said later in Dallas that Republicans were simply offering "retreads" of economic policies that "got us into this mess in the first place" and had no new ideas to offer voters.

One part of Bush's legacy remains a subject of intense debate in Washington -- the tax cuts for all Americans he steered through Congress in 2001 and 2003.

These expire at the end of this year, and a pitched battle has begun over whether to extend all or part of them.

Obama and the Democrats say tax cuts for those making more than $250,000 a year should be ended to help close the U.S. budget deficit. Republicans argue that no taxes should rise in a time of economic peril.

Obama, grappling with the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s, 9.5 percent unemployment, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, soaring budget deficits and an impatient electorate, said all that Republicans have done is try to obstruct him at every turn.

'LACK OF SERIOUSNESS'

He said he has made tough decisions such as bailouts for the U.S. auto industry because he was not elected "to do what was politically expedient at the moment."

"There's been a fundamental lack of seriousness on the other side," Obama said.

Between political events, Obama gave a speech about the need to improve the U.S. education system.

The White House shrugged off a decision by Bill White, the Democratic nominee for Texas governor, not to attend Obama's events on Monday in Texas, a heavily Republican state.

"He definitely does not take that as an insult," White House spokesman Bill Burton said, referring to Obama.

The state's current governor, Rick Perry, a Republican running for re-election and said to be pondering a 2012 presidential run, made his presence known shortly after Air Force One landed in Austin.

Perry handed Obama aide Valerie Jarrett a letter from him asking for more federal assistance to tighten up security along the U.S.-Mexican border.

"Drug cartels and related forces are waging war in Northern Mexico, their tactics including death threats, torture, car bombings, kidnappings, assassinations and beheadings," Perry wrote.

Last week, the U.S. Senate approved a bill adding $600 million to border security efforts, a measure that the House of Representatives might also pass this week. [source]

Only The Brainwashed Say Global Warming Is Settled Science or How Obama Forced Cap And Trade On A Beleagured Nation

Republican lawmakers, coming off a loss Friday in their attempt to block passage of a massive climate bill, have seized on a global warming memo they say was suppressed by the Obama administration.

The memo, drafted by two environmental economists, is highly critical of the science behind an Environmental Protection Agency memo that found carbon dioxide to be a greenhouse gas.

Sen. James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, the ranking Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, and Sen. John Barrasso, Wyoming Republican, said the memo shows that the EPA did not have accurate information when it completed its finding.

"Over the last few days, however, we have learned that a senior EPA official suppressed a detailed, rigorous account of the most up-to-date science of climate change," Mr. Inhofe and Mr. Barrasso wrote in a letter to EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson on Tuesday. "This account, written by two agency employees, raises serious questions about the process behind, and the substance of, the Agency's proposed finding that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare."

An EPA spokeswoman noted that the memo's author, Alan Carlin, is an economist, not a climate scientist, and denied the claims of suppression.

"Claims that this individual's opinions were not considered or studied are entirely false," EPA spokeswoman Adora Andy said Tuesday.

"The document he submitted was reviewed by his peers and agency scientists, and information from that report was submitted by his manager to those responsible for developing the proposed endangerment finding. In fact, some ideas from that document are included and addressed in the endangerment finding," Ms. Andy said.

The EPA found in its so-called "endangerment finding" determined that carbon dioxide is one of six gases that contribute to global warming. The move, spurred by a 2007 Supreme Court decision, was lauded by liberals and chastened broadly by conservative groups.

Mr. Carlin, according to his Web site, has worked for close to four decades as an economist at the EPA.

Mr. Carlin's boss, Al McGartland, director of the National Center for Environmental Economics, wrote in a series of e-mails between March 12 and March 17 that he would not forward the critique to the EPA office in charge of writing the final endangerment finding.

"I don't want you to spend any additional EPA time on climate change. No papers, no research etc., at least until we see what EPA is going to do with Climate," Mr. McGartland wrote in a May 17 e-mail.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), a conservative think tank, pushed the memo and the e-mails this week and, on Tuesday, sent the EPA a formal request that it release the report.

"EPA sits on this report for over three months, and then only allows it to be made public on the author's personal Web site," CEI General Counsel Sam Kazman said. "The fact that we have to formally re-file it with the agency indicates how unreal this situation is."

Global warming skeptics publicizing the memo this week have said the Obama administration is guilty the same thing that it had accused the Bush White House of: placing ideology ahead of science.

But liberal watchdog groups have said the memo repeats false claims made by global warming skeptic Patrick Michaels and have noted that much of the report was drawn from blogs and reports that had not been peer-reviewed.

House lawmakers narrowly passed a contentious climate change bill Friday, after heavy lobbying from the Obama White House and Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat. The bill, which supporters say will help curb global warming, now moves to the Senate. [source]

Why I Asked Pam To Marry Me

I am a very lucky man. I asked the best woman I have ever met to marry me, and she said yes.

Pam and I are so much alike that it sometimes stuns me. We are both introspective, sensitive people who seek harmony with others, and are all too happy to stand alone if no one understands that. In fact, we have both been loners most of our lives. However, she hasn't let the world crush her and turn her bitter. She has a quick laugh, and I'm forever blessed that she sees humor in the same things I do.

She has just finished working at Sally's here in Ft Myers for the past year and a half. She took the job when 99% of the women out there with her college degree and experience wouldn't have even considered a point-of-sale retail job. The job is for women who are knowledgeable in hair care, preferably former hairdressers.

She had many fears about answering all of the customers' myriad of hair treatment questions when she first started. The women she worked with were a mixed bag. They were mostly cool to her, and her manager has been less than professional the entire time she has worked there. Pam is the only dependable person on the staff (only one with a car, who doesn't steal from the register, and doesn't leave the store early or call in sick), and that means even more resentment from her co-workers.

But she has smiled to every customer who walks in Sally's door, listened intently as they described what they wanted to do to their hair, nails, etc, then thoughtfully offered them appropriate product choices. She read up on all things hair coloring, and has turned into the one person on the staff who customers enjoy and trust.

But Sally's has only given her one raise in 18 months, a measely 50-cent bump from a minimum-wage start after working for ten years making twice that as a graphic artist. Sally's management is so unprofessional that they don't even know how to treat someone like Pam when they are lucky enough to find her.

So we are finally leaving Ft Myers.

Don't get me wrong-I am motivated to leave for my own reasons as well, but what this town has to offer professional, caring people like Pam has left me cold.

We are leaving in ten days to Omaha, NE, after many months of diligent research. It is a midwestern state with the best economy in the nation right now. Omaha is a hub city, where many large companies seek to build because shipping and distribution is more cost-effective. Besides being the home of the world's most wealthy man, Warren Buffet, it is home to five Fortune 500 companies' headquarters, and many more solid, time-tested businesses have called it home for a long time.

Florida has suffered from a climate of here-today-gone-tomorrow type of businesses, which attracts the kind of scurilous merchants she and I both are tired of. I am anxious to take her to a better place, and she is more than ready for the change.

And that is the kind of thing that makes me realize just how lucky I am to have her: she and I have the same kind of value system. It is why I asked her to marry me on Stone Mountain, Georgia a few months ago: I didn't want to let her get away. My life has been spent with too many women who didn't share my worldview, my sensibilities, and I honestly began to think that I was the one who was wrong to feel the way I did.

Finding Pam was like finding myself. After being with her, I began to feel more acceptance in myself, the way I view things, and how I feel about people, events, and life. Needless to say, I have a much better outlook about life than I have ever had. For the first time in my 43 years, I can now say I have found someone I want to have a family with.

Barry In Charge: Driving Muslims To Hate Us In Indonesia

So this is what "repairing our image around the world" looks like, eh?

JAKARTA, Indonesia – Thousands of followers of a conservative Islamic group held peaceful demonstrations Sunday in several Indonesian cities against the planned visit of President Barack Obama.

Witnesses and police said members of the Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir protested in East Java's provincial capital of Surabaya, South Sulawesi's capital of Makassar and three other cities. The group, an international network which believes Muslims should unite in a single global state governed by Islamic law, urged the Indonesian government to reject the American leader's trip, scheduled for late March.

"We know Obama spent his childhood in Indonesia, but as president his policy contradicts the people's interests in Indonesia," protest organizer Nasrudin said in Makassar.

Hundreds of police monitored the protests, which drew around 2,000 people outside the U.S. Consulate in Surabaya and another 2,000 in the streets of Makassar. No violence was reported. Dozens of demonstrators also rallied in the Java city of Yogyakarta, the West Kalimantan town of Pontianak and the eastern town of Mataram.

Men and women wearing black veils held up yellow banners reading "Reject the visit of Obama" as they marched in the streets of the two larger cities.

"He doesn't work for a peaceful world ... on the contrary, Obama is the same as George Bush, who has destroyed the Muslim world in Iraq and Afghanistan. Therefore we have to reject the visit of Obama to Indonesia," said Nasrudin, who, like many Indonesians, uses only one name.

Indonesia is the world's most populous Muslim nation. Most of its nearly 200 million Muslims practice a moderate form of the faith.

The country's largest Muslim organization, Nahdlatul Ulama, and its second largest, Muhamadyah, have both welcomed Obama's visit. (source)

Netanyahu Regrets Settler Homes ‘Incident’

The Israeli prime minister expressed regret on Sunday for the announcement last week during a visit by the US vice-president of a plan to build Jewish settler homes in mostly Arab East Jerusalem.

But, in his first public remarks since the proposal was unveiled last Tuesday, Benjamin Netanyahu gave no indication of cancelling the construction. He also played down the growing confrontation with Washington that the proposal and the timing of its disclosure – made while Joe Biden was in Israel – have triggered.

Mr Netanyahu told his cabinet: “There was a regrettable incident here, which occurred innocently. It was hurtful and certainly it should not have happened.”

The announcement to build 1,600 houses in the Jewish neighbourhood of Ramat Shlomo in Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem, which Palestinians view as the capital of their future state, appears to have spurred the biggest crisis between Israel and the US, its closest ally, in years.

Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state, on Friday used unusually harsh words by blasting the Israeli disclosure as “insulting” because it took place during a visit by Mr Biden that was aimed at boosting a new round of US-mediated Middle East peace talks.

The same day, Michael Oren, the Israeli ambassador to Washington, was summoned to an unscheduled meeting with James Steinberg, US deputy secretary of state, according to Israeli media.

Mr Netanyahu has said he did not know of the approval of the construction plan by the interior ministry, which is controlled by the ultra-orthodox, pro-settler Shas party that is a key member of his governing coalition.

He tried to deflect media reports of a growing confrontation between his predominantly pro-settler government and the Obama administration. “I suggest not to get carried away and to calm down,” he said.

Nevertheless, he added that he has appointed a group of senior officials to probe into the events that led to the announcement “to ensure procedures will be in place to prevent those kinds of incidents in the future”.

A US envoy is due in the region later in the week to try to restart peace talks that have been suspended since December 2008. The Palestinians have resisted restarting negotiations without a total Israeli settlement freeze.

The settlement plan has prompted a torrent of condemnation of Mr Netanyahu by influential Israeli media commentators.

In a front-page editorial titled Time to Panic in the mass-selling Maariv newspaper, Ben Caspit, a veteran political correspondent, wrote on Sunday: “The crisis is still in full force and is reaching new heights. It seems to be much worse than anything we have known in the past decade.”

Yaron Ezrahi, a political scientist at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University, said the US might try to take advantage of the situation.

He added: “The people in the White House are thinking of how to exploit this crisis to extract more concessions from Israel for the peace negotiations.”

Such concessions, he added, might be a cancellation of last week’s approval of the building plan or an extension of the 10-month partial freeze on construction in the occupied West Bank, which expires in September.

David Axelrod, a senior aide to Barack Obama, US president, yesterday told NBC’s Meet the Press programme that Mr Netanyahu’s comments in response to US criticism showed “the message was received”, Reuters reported from Jerusalem.
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House Vote Counter Hunting For Health Care Votes

Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina

WASHINGTON — The Democrat's chief vote counter in the House says that right now there aren't enough votes to pass President Barack Obama's health care overhaul.

But Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina says he's confident that the legislation will pass. He says the White House and Democratic leaders in Congress have gotten to a point where there's a way to send the measure to the president's desk for his signature.

Clyburn tells NBC's "Meet the Press" that "a comfort level" has been reached among the House, Senate and White House on details about the sweeping legislation. But he concedes that House supporters don't have the necessary votes right now.

House Democratic leaders are pressing for a vote on their bill as early as this coming week. (source)

Pelosi Confident House Will Pass Health Care Bill

SAN FRANCISCO – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Saturday she's confident the House will pass health care legislation and dismissed Republican criticism that she did not have enough votes for the measure.

"We're very excited about where we are and will not be deterred by estimates that have no basis in fact," she said during a dedication of the renamed Lim P. Lee Post Office in San Francisco. The post office was renamed after the nation's first Chinese-American postmaster.

Pelosi declined to say when House members would vote on a health care bill, or how many votes that she had secured. Although she added that lawmakers were "on the verge of making history."

She also dismissed criticism by House GOP leader John Boehner of Ohio that she did not have sufficient votes.

"I'm never dependent on Congressman Boehner's count. I never have," she said to a smattering of laughter from the crowd.

House Democratic leaders are pressing for a vote on their bill as early as this coming week.

The legislation would provide health care to tens of millions who currently lack it. It would require almost everyone to obtain coverage and subsidize the cost of premiums for poor and middle-income Americans.

It would also ban insurance companies from denying coverage on the basis of pre-existing conditions.

The health care bill appeared to be on the verge of passing in early January before Democrats lost a special election in Massachusetts to fill the seat of the late Edward M. Kennedy and with it, their filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.

In the weeks since, the White House and Democrats have embarked on a rescue strategy that would require the House to pass legislation that cleared the Senate in December before both houses approve a second bill that makes changes to the first.

But some anti-abortion Democrats in the House have balked at the bill, and it's not clear they will vote for final passage. The bill needs 216 votes to clear the House.