April 16, 2009 – The first family is doing pretty well when it comes to income, according to the Obamas’ 2008 tax return.  The president and his wife made $2.7 million last year. 

While this year the president’s salary will be $400,000 for his day job, last year’s million-dollar take was from his two best-selling books.  Michelle spent most of her time on the campaign trail, but the couple filed jointly and she added $62,707 from her executive job at the University of Chicago Hospital. 

This isn’t bad for two folks from such humble beginnings. 

But would you believe the Obamas made millions less in 2008 than they did in 2007? Why?  Because in 2007 his books were flying off the shelves during the early days of his campaign for the presidency and he racked up $4.2 million.

The two best-selling books, “Dreams from My Father” and “The Audacity of Hope” were  goldmines for the Obamas. The White House released the first family’s federal income tax filing on Wednesday.
 
Now don’t forget the former senator’s salary.  Obama also made a little cash before moving down the street to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue; he earned $139,204 as senator from Illinois last year before the November election.

The couple did have a few deductions, like the interest on their south side Chicago home, but their total federal tax came to $855,323, about  32 percent of their adjusted gross income of $2,656,902.

It looks like the Obamas will be part of the group of folks his economic plan will target to pay higher taxes.

See President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama’s tax return here.

March 18, 2009 – The recent news that African-American NCAA college athletes continue to fall behind their White counterparts is troubling.  And if the Obama administration is going to reach its lofty goal of leading the world in college graduates by 2020, these students will need to be counted. 

On Monday, studies conducted by the University of Central Florida’s Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport, were released that looked at men’s and women’s college teams and analyzed NCAA data on graduation rates and how well college athletes were doing academically. 

I know President Barack Obama is a huge basketball fan – but he might not be a fan of these findings. 

The study took an even closer look at teams competing in the NCAA men’s and women’s tournaments.

The top seeds in the men’s NCAA; North Carolina, Pittsburgh, Louisville and Connecticut are winning on the hardwood, but struggling to cross the stage on graduation day. 

North Carolina tops the positive list with a graduation rate of 86 percent compared to UConn’s poor showing of 33 percent. Louisville faired a tad better at 42 percent, with Pitt in the below-average range with 69 percent.

But the most alarming news was the study discovered the ongoing gaps between the graduation rates of White and African-American players. Of the collegiate teams they surveyed for the report, 25 tournament teams had a gap of 20 percentage points or more between Black and White players.

NCAA President Myles Brand’s academic reform package is working. “This is far better than the 35 men’s teams (54 percent) below the 925 score in 2008. Nonetheless, the continuing significant disparity between the academic success between African-American and White men’s basketball student-athletes is deeply troubling,” Brand said.

Richard Lapchick, director of the institute responsible for the study, said in a written statement, “The good news is that the gaps are narrowing slightly.”

All of this is something Obama may want his administration to keep an eye on.  The president has an ambitious agenda and wants to improve public school education and accountability.  He’s also set a goal of having the highest proportion of college graduates in the world by 2020.  I’m sure he’s also planning to count college athletes. 

Why do you think African-American college basketball players aren’t getting their degrees?

By Pamela Gentry, Senior Political Analyst 

Feb. 24, 2009 — Tonight, when President Barack Obama addresses the joint session of Congress, everyone will be waiting to hear how he plans to keep his pledge to cut the U.S. budget deficit by half during his first term.

The president will give an overview of his priorities Tuesday, said White House press secretary Robert Gibbs yesterday. “The President outlined in his radio address [Saturday] a budget that is sober in its assessments, honest in its accounting — which is a change — that will, as I said, invest in what we need, cut out what we don’t, and restore fiscal responsibility.”

 The details of the president’s first budget will be rolled out on Thursday.

During the opening of a summit on fiscal responsibility, Obama told participants, “If we confront this crisis without also confronting the deficits that helped cause it, we risk sinking into another crisis down the road.”

The summit was called to look at what’s in store for the nation’s fiscal future and to examine the financial health of the country.  The president and Vice President Joe Biden met with Republican and Democratic governors, who could benefit from his $787 billion emergency spending-and-tax-cut measure.

Warning signs of a tough road ahead were scattered throughout the president’s remarks, but ended with an optimistic plan for the future. It’s true he inherited a $1.3 trillion deficit when he took office and he noted interest payments in 2008 alone hit $250 billion. That’s the bad news.

“We cannot and will not sustain deficits like these without end,” he said. “Today I’m pledging to cut the deficit we inherited by half by the end of my first term in office.”

The summit, like his address to Congress, had folks from both sides of aisle.  Republicans are now calling for a spending freeze on the heels of the president’s stimulus bill becoming law.

Tuesday night we’ll hear a lot focused on pulling the United States out of recession, getting folks back to work and addressing the problems in the financial sector that sparked the downturn.  But that won’t be all. Obama also wants to make good on campaign promises that he’ll extend health care benefits to the uninsured, tackle the fighting climate change and reduce dependence on foreign oil.

This sounds like a tall order.

By Pamela Gentry,  Senior Political Analyst

 Feb. 9, 2008 – President Obama made the case for his economic plan during his first nationally televised news conference.  He called on his critics to “set aside” differences and work with him to get the economy back on track and the American people back to work.

“It is absolutely true that we cannot depend on government alone to create jobs or economic growth. That is and must be the role of the private sector. But at this particular moment, with the private sector so weakened by this recession, the federal government is the only entity left with the resources to jolt our economy back to life,” he said in his opening statement.

Questions were raised about his outreach to Republicans, repairing the banking system, Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq, but the majority of the questions centered on the economy.

Obama said he would judge the success of his economic plan if it opened credit markets and lenders were confident in the economy; housing market stabilized; job loss declined and new jobs were created.

“The recovery and reinvestment package is not the only thing we have to do. It’s one leg of the stool. We are still going to have to make sure that we are attracting private capital, get the credit markets flowing again, because that’s the lifeblood of the economy.

 What do you think of the President’s speech? Do you think he made a strong case?