House Democrats unveiled the new health care bill today. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said that the $894 bill will provide “universal quality affordable health care for all Americans.”

In a written statement, President Obama said, “As I’ve said throughout this process, a public option that competes with private insurers is the best way to ensure choice and competition that are so badly needed in today’s market. And the House bill clearly meets two of the fundamental criteria I have set out: it is fully paid for and will reduce the deficit in the long term.”

This is a “historic moment for our nation and our families,” said Pelosi, speaking on the steps at the West Front of the Capitol building. “The drive for health care reform is moving forward.”

The bill, while not adding additional debt to the deficit, would insure 36 million more Americans in the next 10 years. Pelosi said that this bill would cover 96 percent of all Americans. That is more than the Senate bill currently being negotiated, which would cover an estimated 29 million additional people.

Just eight months into his presidency, President Barack Obama was shocked to wake up and discover that he’d won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize. Rather than awarding specific achievements, awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to Obama is clearly a symbolic gesture meant to honor Obama’s political moment and his aspirations rather than achievements.

“To be honest, I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many of the transformative figures who’ve been honored by this prize — men and women who’ve inspired me and inspired the entire world through their courageous pursuit of peace,” Obama said. “But I also know that throughout history the Nobel Peace Prize has not just been used to honor specific achievement; it’s also been used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes.
That is why I’ve said that I will accept this award as a call to action, a call for all nations and all peoples to confront the common challenges of the 21st century. These challenges won’t all be met during my presidency, or even my lifetime. But I know these challenges can be met so long as it’s recognized that they will not be met by one person or one nation alone.”

One thing we do know is that the Nobel committee also recognized the President for his position on climate change. “Thanks to Obama’s initiative, the USA is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting,” they stated.

Nobel committee chairman Thorbjorn Jagland said of Obama’s new approach to foreign policy: “Obama has as President created a new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position, with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can play. Dialogue and negotiations are preferred as instruments for resolving even the most difficult international conflicts,” he said.

Obama is scheduled to personally accept his Nobel Peace Prize at the December 10 awards ceremony in Oslo. He will donate his $1.4 million prize money to charity.

Controversial climate change legislation will not move out of a key Senate committee until September, after lawmakers return from their summer recess, according to U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer.

Two days after the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee opened hearings aimed at quick passage of climate legislation, Senator Boxer,a California Democrat, said she has changed the target date for mark up of the bill from August 7 to sometime in early September. The bill is expected to parallel legislation approved by the House June 26, which would place a cap on greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming and create a system for trading in permits to emit the heat-trapping gases.

The intention is to have a bill in front of President Obama by December, when world leaders will meet in Copenhagen to finalize a global deal curbing greenhouse gas emissions that will take effect after the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012.

Greenpeace went out on a limb – or ledge today, hanging a giant, 65-foot banner over Mount Rushmore to draw attention to Climate Action. The banner read “America honors leaders not politicians: Stop Global Warming” and featured a half-finished portrait of President Obama.

The banner was up for almost an hour before being taken down early this afternoon.

Obama met G8 leaders in Italy today to discuss the global warming crisis as a preface to the UN climate treaty negotiations which are to take place in Copenhagen this December.

Greenpeace made it clear to the media that they respect American monuments.

Greenpeace wrote on their blog, “Global warming is an environmental crisis the likes of which we’ve never faced before, but so far, our leaders seem content to play politics with the issue. Yet, given the powerful forces who are actively working to delay action, addressing it adequately will require bold leadership, not political dealing. The banner hang on Mount Rushmore is intended to press President Obama to be a leader in establishing science-based global warming policy not just here in the U.S., but also internationally at the UN climate change discussions to be held in Copenhagen this December.”

Today the House passed a $6.4 billion multiyear school construction bill for a 21st Century Green High-Performing Public School Facilities Act, which will create hundreds of thousands of jobs, reduce energy consumption and create healthier, cleaner learning environments. The bill create will grants and low interest loans so school districts can build and modernize schools to make them safer and more energy-efficient.

The plan faced Republican opposition over the cost of the bill, which was made a part of Obama’s economic stimulus plan, passed 275-155.

Rep. Ben Chandler, D-Ky., sponsor of the legislation, said, “It will give much needed money to our schools struggling with huge budget deficits and deteriorating facilities while encouraging energy efficency and creating jobs for Americans that cannot be shipped overseas.”

The swine flu may have hit the White House. An aide working for the Obama Administration who had accompanied the President on a recent trip to Mexico became sick with flu-like symptoms, which looks to be a probable case of swine flu, the White House announced today. Three of his members also contracted the illness.

“This individual never flew on Air Force One,” press secretary Robert Gibbs said. “He was asked specifically if he ever came within 6 feet of the president and the answer to that was no.”

Gibbs said that the aide arrived in Mexico on April 13 and became ill on April 16. He developed flu-like symptoms on April 17, the day Obama left Mexico. The aide, who has not been identified, flew back via commercial airline to Dulles on a United flight on April 18.

“Obviously we’ll do everything in our power to ensure that what can be done to alert them will be done,” he said.

Gibbs added that Obama has had no symptoms of swine flu and doctors see no need to conduct any tests.

The good people over at The Daily Green have put together a list of green accomplishments Barack Obama has achieved during his first 100 days in office.  These guys are serious – putting together an extensive list of one hundred initiatives the Obama administration has implemented since his inauguration.

Here are a few of our favorites:

2. Vehicle Tax Credits
Want an excuse to drive a plug-in hybrid car? How about $7,500 for the first 200,000 buyers from each manufacturer? You can also get $2,500 for plug-in electric motorcycles and other low-speed or three-wheeled vehicles.

6. Declaring Greenhouse Gases Dangerous
In acknowledging the by-now obvious — greenhouse gas pollution causes global warming, and our environment, health and well-being is threatened by global warming — Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency set the stage for the first national carbon regulations on cars and power plants. Whether that regulation comes from the EPA, Congress or both remains to be seen, but for the first time the price of fouling the climate will be factored into the cost of doing business, and ultimately that the U.S. will confront the threat of global warming. Though the costs of higher energy or other regulation may be a short-term burden, Obama and many economists believe that the cost of doing nothing will prove far costlier.

30. The Largest Expansion of Wilderness Protection in 15 Years
Another bill in the works before Obama took office, the Omnibus lands bill nonetheless has his signature, and designates 2 million acres of wilderness, scenic rivers, national parks, historic trails and other public protected landscapes. It’s one beautiful legacy.

Obama is reversing Bush’s rule that allows mountaintop mining waste to be dumped near stream, asking a federal court to abolish the rule that made it easier for coal mining companies to dump waste near streams. The Obama hopes to begin drawing up new regulation that better protects waterways.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said that Bush signed the rule during his last two month of office and called the move, “bad policy.”

“The responsible development of our coal supplies is important to America’s energy security,” Salazar said. “But as we develop these reserves we must also protect our treasured landscapes, our land, our water and our wildlife.”

Good news, world: A new scientific study has found that the worst case scenarios of global warming can still be avoided if the entire world cuts emission of greenhouse gases. If we follow the guidelines President Barack Obama and Europe have laid out, it’s not too late to avoid the dire predictions about global warming.

The National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, looked at what would happen by the end of the century if greenhouse gas levels were cut by 70 percent via computer simulation.

Their findings, which will be published next week in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, showed that although the world would still be a warmer, the damage would be by 2 degrees rather than 4 degrees, meaning the Arctic sea ice would still shrink, but not disappear. Moreover, sea levels would rise less than had previously been predicted, while droughts and floods can be avoided and heat waves would be 55 percent less intense.

Thus enforcing his commitment to the environment, today President Barack Obama has signed the Omnibus Public Lands Management Act that sets aside more than 2 million acres that protects land from California’s Sierra Nevada mountains to the Jefferson National Forest in Virginia. The bill also expands wilderness protection efforts.

The law represents one of the largest expansions of wilderness protection in twenty-five years. Today, as Obama signed the bill, he commented that the most valuable things in life are those already possessed and that this legislation protects the land, lakes and shorelines for future generation.

“Our lands have always provided great bounty,” Obama said as he signed. “What these gifts require in return is our wise stewardship.”