Name	Humboldt University of Berlin
Native name	Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Latin name	Alma Universitas Humboldtiana Berolinensis'' (older: ''Universitas Friderica Gulielma Berolinensis'')
Established	1810
Type	Public university
President	Jan-Hendrik Olbertz
Students	34,072 ''(WS 2008/2009)
Staff	407 ''(2008)''
City	Berlin
Country	Germany
Campus	Urban
Affiliations	EUA, Atomium Culture
Website
Image name	Seal of the Humboldt University of Berlin.svg
Footnotes	Data }}

The Humboldt University of Berlin (German ''Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin'') is Berlin's oldest university, founded in 1810 as the University of Berlin (''Universität zu Berlin'') by the liberal Prussian educational reformer and linguist Wilhelm von Humboldt, whose university model has strongly influenced other European and Western universities. From 1828 it was known as the Frederick William University (''Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität''), later (unofficially) also as the Universität unter den Linden after its location. In 1949, it changed its name to ''Humboldt-Universität'' in honour of both its founder Wilhelm and his brother, naturalist Alexander von Humboldt.

History

The first semester at the newly founded Berlin university occurred in 1810 with 256 students and 52 lecturers in faculties of law, medicine, theology and philosophy under rector Theodor Schmalz. The university has been home to many of Germany's greatest thinkers of the past two centuries, among them the subjective idealist philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte, the theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher, the absolute idealist philosopher G.W.F. Hegel, the Romantic legal theorist Savigny, the pessimist philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, the objective idealist philosopher Friedrich Schelling, cultural critic Walter Benjamin, and famous physicists Albert Einstein and Max Planck. Founders of Marxist theory Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels attended the university, as did poet Heinrich Heine, founder of structuralism Ferdinand de Saussure, German unifier Otto von Bismarck, Communist Party of Germany founder Karl Liebknecht, African American Pan Africanist W. E. B. Du Bois and European unifier Robert Schuman, as well as the influential surgeon Johann Friedrich Dieffenbach in the early half of the 1800s. The university is home to 29 Nobel Prize winners.

The structure of German research-intensive universities, such as Humboldt, served as a model for institutions like Johns Hopkins University. Further, it has been claimed that "the 'Humboldtian' university became a model for the rest of Europe [...] with its central principal being the union of teaching and research in the work of the individual scholar or scientist."

Enlargement

In addition to the strong anchoring of traditional subjects, such as science, law, philosophy, history, theology and medicine, Berlin University developed to encompass numerous new scientific disciplines. Alexander von Humboldt, brother of the founder William, promoted the new learning. With the construction of modern research facilities in the second half of the 19th Century teaching of the natural sciences began. Famous researchers, such as the chemist August Wilhelm Hofmann, the physicist Hermann von Helmholtz, the mathematicians Ernst Eduard Kummer, Leopold Kronecker, Karl Weierstrass, the physicians Johannes Peter Müller, Albrecht von Graefe, Rudolf Virchow and Robert Koch, contributed to Berlin University's scientific fame.

During this period of enlargement, Berlin University gradually expanded to incorporate other previously separate colleges in Berlin. An example would be the Charité, the Pépinière and the Collegium Medico-chirurgicum. In 1717, King Friedrich I had built a quarantine house for Plague at the city gates, which in 1727 was rechristened by the "soldier king" Friedrich Wilhelm: "Es soll das Haus die Charité" (It is the house of Charity). By 1829 the site became Berlin University's medical campus and remained so until 1927 when the more modern University Hospital was constructed.

Berlin University started a natural history collection in 1810, which, by 1889 required a separate building and became the Museum für Naturkunde. The preexisting Tierarznei School, founded in 1790 and absorbed by the university, in 1934 formed the basis of the Veterinary Medicine Facility (Grundstock der Veterinärmedizinischen Fakultät). Also the Landwirtschaftliche Hochschule Berlin (Agricultural College of Berlin), founded in 1881 was affiliated with the Agricultural Faculties of the University.

==Third Reich== After 1933, like all German universities, it was affected by the Nazi regime. It was from the university's library that some 20,000 books by "degenerates" and opponents of the regime were taken to be burned on May 10 of that year in the Opernplatz (now the Bebelplatz) for a demonstration protected by the SA that also featured a speech by Joseph Goebbels. A monument to this can now be found in the center of the square, consisting of a glass panel opening onto an underground white room with empty shelf space for 20,000 volumes and a plaque, bearing an epigraph from an 1820 work by Heinrich Heine: "Das war ein Vorspiel nur, dort wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen" ("That was only a prelude; where they burn books, they ultimately burn people").

The Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service (German "Gesetzes zur Wiederherstellung des Berufsbeamtentums") resulted in 250 Jewish professors and employees being fired during 1933/1934 and numerous doctorates being withdrawn. Students and scholars and political opponents of Nazis were ejected from the university and often deported. During this time nearly one third of all of the staff were fired by the Nazis.

Reopening

The Soviet Military Administration in Germany (SMAD) ordered (Befehl-Nr. 4) the opening of the university in January 1946. The SMAD wanted a redesigned Berlin University based on the Soviet model, however they insisted on the phrasing "newly opened" and not "re-opened" for political reasons. The president of the German Central Administration for National Education (DZVV), Paul Wandel, in his address at the January 29, 1946, opening ceremony, said: "I spoke of the opening, and not of the re-opening of the university. [...] The University of Berlin must effectively start again in almost every way. You have before you this image of the old university. What remains of that is nought but ruins." The teaching was limited to seven departments working in reopened, war-damaged buildings, with many of the teachers dead or missing. However, by the winter semester of 1946, the Economic and Educational Sciences Faculty had re-opened.

The Workers and Peasants Faculty (German: Arbeiter-und-Bauern-Fakultät) (ABF), an education program aimed at young men who, due to political or racial reasons, had been disadvantaged under the Nazis, was established at the university during this time. This program existed at Berlin University until 1962.

The university splits

The East-West conflict in post-war Germany led to a growing communist influence in the university. This was controversial, and incited strong protests within the student body and faculty. Soviet NKVD secret police arrested a number of students in March 1947 as a response. The Soviet Military Tribunal in Berlin-Lichtenberg ruled the students were involved in the formation of a "resistance movement at the University of Berlin", as well as espionage, and were sentenced to 25 years of forced labor. From 1945 to 1948, 18 other students and teachers were arrested or abducted, many gone for weeks, and some taken to the Soviet Union and executed.

In the spring of 1948, after several university students with admission irregularities were withdrawn, the opposition demanded a Free university. Students, with support from especially the Americans, the newspaper Der Tagesspiegel, and the governing Mayor Ernst Reuter founded the Free University of Berlin in Dahlem (part of the American sector). The decades-long division of the city into East and West Berlin finally cemented the division into two independent universities permanently.

East Germany

The communist party forced it to change the name of the university in 1949. Until the collapse of the East German regime in 1989, Humboldt University remained under tight ideological control of the Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (Socialist Unity Party of Germany), or SED, which, by rigorously selecting students according to their conformity to the party line, made sure that no democratic opposition could grow on its university campuses. Its communist-selected students and scholars did not participate to any significant degree in the East German democratic civil rights movements of 1989, and elected the controversial SED member and former Stasi spy Heinrich Fink as the Rector of the university as late as 1990.

Today

After the unification of East and West Germany, the university was radically restructured and all professors had to reapply for their positions. The faculty was largely replaced with West German professors, among them the historian Heinrich August Winkler. Today, Humboldt University is a state university with a large number of students (37,145 in 2003, among them more than 4,662 foreign students) after the model of West German universities, and like its counterpart Free University of Berlin.

Its main building is located in the centre of Berlin at the boulevard Unter den Linden. The building was erected on order by King Frederick II for his younger brother Prince Henry of Prussia. Most institutes are located in the centre, around the main building, except the natural science institutes, which are located at Adlershof in the south of Berlin. Further, the university continues its tradition of a book sale at the university gates facing Bebelplatz. The books sold are reprints of those burnt during the Third Reich and is symbolic of the institution atoning for its participation.

Library

When the Royal Library proved insufficient, a new library was founded in 1831, first located in several temporary sites. In 1871-1874 a library building was constructed, following the design of architect Paul Emanuel Spieker. In 1910 the collection was relocated to the building of the Berlin State Library. During the Weimar Period the library contained 831,934 volumes (1930) and was thus one of the leading university libraries in Germany at that time. During the Nazi book burnings in 1933, no volumes from the university library were destroyed. Also, the loss through World War II was comparatively small. In 2003, natural science related books were outhoused to the newly founded library at the Adlershof campus, which is dedicated solely to the natural sciences. Since the premises of the State Library had to be cleared in 2005, a new library building is about to be erected close to the main building in the center of Berlin. The "Jacob und Wilhelm Grimm-Zentrum" will be finished in 2009. In the meantime, the collection once more is held at a temporary site. In total, the university library contains about 6.5 million volumes and 9000 held magazines and journals and is one of the biggest university libraries in Germany. As a comparison, the Elmer Holmes Bobst Library at New York University contains approximately 4.5 million volumes.

The books of the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft were destroyed during the Nazi book burnings and the institute destroyed. Under the terms of the Magnus Hirschfeld Foundation, the government had undertaken to continue the work of the institute at the university after its founder's death. However these terms were ignored. In 2001 however the university acquired the Archive for Sexology from the Robert Koch Institute, which was founded on a large private library donated by Prof. Haeberle. This has now been housed at the new Magnus Hirschfeld Center.

Notable alumni, professors and lecturers

Theodore Dyke Acland (1851-1931), surgeon and physician

Alexander Altmann (1906–1987), rabbi and scholar of Jewish philosophy and mysticism

Gerhard Anschütz (1908- ) leading jurisprudent and "father of the constitution" of the Bundesland Hesse

Michelle Bachelet (1951- ), Pediatrician and epidemiologist, President of the Republic of Chile

Azmi Bishara (1956- ), Arab-Israeli politician

Bruno Bauer (1809–1882), theologian, Bible critic and philosopher

Jurek Becker (1937–1997), writer (''Jacob the Liar'')

Eliezer Berkovits (1908-1992), rabbi, philosopher and theologian

Otto von Bismarck (1815–1898), first German chancellor

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945), theologian and resistance fighter

Max Born (1882–1970), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1954

Gottlieb Burckhardt (1836-1907), psychiatrist, first physician to perform modern psychosurgery (1888)

Michael C. Burda, macroeconomist

George C. Butte (1877-1940), American jurist

Ernst Cassirer (1874–1945), philosopher

Adelbert von Chamisso (1781–1838), natural scientist and writer

Wilhelm Dilthey (1833–1911), philosopher

W. E. B. Du Bois (1868–1963), African-American activist and scholar

Paul Ehrlich (1854–1915), physician, Nobel Prize for medicine in 1908

Albert Einstein (1879–1955), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1921

Friedrich Engels (1820–1895), journalist and philosopher

Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach (1804–1872), philosopher

Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762–1814), philosopher, rector of the university (1810-1812)

Hermann Emil Fischer (1852–1919), founder of modern biochemistry, Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1902

Werner Forßmann (1904–1979), physician, Nobel Prize for medicine in 1956

James Franck (1882–1964), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1925

Ernst Gehrcke (1878–1960), experimental physicist

Jacob Grimm (1785–1863), linguist and literary critic

Wilhelm Grimm (1786–1859), linguist and literary critic

Fritz Haber (1868–1934), chemist, Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1918

Otto Hahn (1879–1968), chemist, Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1944

Sir William Reginald Halliday (1886–1966), Principal of King's College London (1928–1952)

Robert Havemann (1910–1982), chemist, co-founder of European Union, and leading GDR dissident

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831), philosopher

Heinrich Heine (1797–1856), writer and poet

Werner Heisenberg (1901–1976), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1932

Hermann von Helmholtz (1821–1894), physician and physicist

Gustav Hertz (1887–1975), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1925

Heinrich Hertz (1857–1894), physicist

Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–1972) rabbi, philosopher, and theologian

Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff (1852–1911), chemist, Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1901

Max Huber (1874–1960), international lawyer and diplomat

Christoph Wilhelm Hufeland (1762–1836), founder of macrobiotics

Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767–1835), politician, linguist, and founder of the university

Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859), natural scientist

Jane Ising (1902- ), economics

Hermann Kasack (1896–1966), writer

Gustav Kirchhoff (1824–1887), physicist

Robert Koch (1843–1910), physician, Nobel Prize for medicine in 1905

Albrecht Kossel (1853–1927), physician, Nobel Prize for medicine in 1910

Arnold Kutzinski (d. 1956), psychiatrist

Arnold von Lasaulx (1839–1886) mineralogist and petrographer

Max von Laue (1879–1960), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1914

Wassily Leontief (1905–1999), economist, Nobel Prize for economics in 1973

Karl Liebknecht (1871–1919), socialist politician and revolutionary

Friedrich Loeffler (1852–1915), bacteriologist

Herbert Marcuse (1898–1979), philosopher

Karl Marx (1818–1883), philosopher

Ernst Mayr (1904–2005), biologist

Lise Meitner (1878–1968), physicist, Enrico Fermi Award in 1966

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (1809–1847), composer

Theodor Mommsen (1817–1903), historian, Nobel Prize for literature in 1902

Edmund Montgomery (1835-1911), philosopher, scientist, physician

Max Planck (1858–1947), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1918

Leopold von Ranke (1795–1886), historian

Robert Remak (1815–1865), cell biologist

Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling (1775–1854), philosopher

Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher (1768–1834), philosopher

Bernhard Schlink (1944- ), writer, ''Der Vorleser'' (The Reader)

Carl Schmitt (1888-1985), German jurist, political theorist, and professor of law.

Menachem Mendel Schneerson (1902–1994), rabbi, philosopher, and theologian

Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860), philosopher

Erwin Schrödinger (1887–1961), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1933

Georg Simmel (1858–1918), philosopher and sociologist

Joseph B. Soloveitchik (1903–1993), rabbi, philosopher, and theologian

Herman Smith-Johannsen (1875-1987), sportsman who introduced cross-country skiing to North America

Werner Sombart (1863–1941), philosopher, sociologist and economist

Hans Spemann (1869–1941), biologist, Nobel Prize for biology in 1935

Max Stirner (1806–1856), philosopher

Gustav Tornier (1859–1938), paleontologist and zoologist

Kurt Tucholsky (1890–1935), writer and journalist

Rudolf Virchow (1821–1902), physician and politician

Alfred Wegener (1880–1930), scientist, geologist, and meteorologist, early "Continental Drift" theorist

Karl Weierstraß (1815–1897), mathematician

Wilhelm Heinrich Westphal (1882–1978), physicist

Wilhelm Wien (1864–1928), physicist, Nobel Prize for physics in 1911

Ulrich von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff (1848–1931), philologist

Richard Willstätter (1872–1942), chemist, Nobel Prize for chemistry in 1915

Komitas Vardapet (1869–1935), Armenian priest, composer, choir leader, singer, music ethnologist, music pedagogue and musicologist

There are 40 Nobel Prize winners affiliated to the Humboldt University, namely:

1901 Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff (Chemistry)

1901 Emil Adolf von Behring (Physiology or Medicine)

1902 Hermann Emil Fischer (Chemistry)

1902 Theodor Mommsen (Literature)

1905 Adolf von Baeyer (Chemistry)

1905 Robert Koch (Physiology or Medicine)

1907 Albert Abraham Michelson (Physics)

1907 Eduard Buchner (Chemistry)

1908 Paul Ehrlich (Physiology or Medicine)

1909 Karl Ferdinand Braun (Physics)

1910 Otto Wallach (Chemistry)

1910 Albrecht Kossel (Physiology or Medicine)

1910 Paul Heyse (Literature)

1911 Wilhelm Wien (Physics)

1914 Max von Laue (Physics)

1915 Richard Willstätter (Chemistry)

1918 Fritz Haber (Chemistry)

1918 Max Planck (Physics)

1920 Walther Nernst (Chemistry)

1921 Albert Einstein (Physics)

1925 Gustav Ludwig Hertz (Physics)

1925 James Franck (Physics)

1925 Richard Adolf Zsigmondy (Chemistry)

1928 Adolf Otto Reinhold Windaus (Chemistry)

1929 Hans von Euler-Chelpin (Chemistry)

1931 Otto Heinrich Warburg (Physiology or Medicine)

1932 Werner Heisenberg (Physics)

1933 Erwin Schrödinger (Physics)

1935 Hans Spemann (Physiology or Medicine)

1936 Peter Debye (Chemistry)

1939 Adolf Butenandt (Chemistry)

1944 Otto Hahn (Chemistry)

1950 Kurt Alder (Chemistry)

1950 Otto Diels (Chemistry)

1953 Fritz Albert Lipmann (Physiology or Medicine)

1953 Hans Adolf Krebs (Physiology or Medicine)

1954 Max Born (Physics)

1956 Walther Bothe (Physics)

1991 Bert Sakmann (Physiology or Medicine)

2007 Gerhard Ertl (Chemistry)

Rankings

In 2010 QS World University Rankings ranked Humboldt University 123rd overall in the world, and 6th in Germany. Its subject rankings were: 22nd in Arts & Humanities, 198th in Engineering & IT, 72nd in Life Sciences & Biomedicine, 44th in Natural Sciences, and 51st in Social Sciences.

Organization

These are the 11 faculties into which the university is divided:

Faculty of Law

Faculty of Agriculture and Horticulture

Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences I (Biology, Chemistry, Physics)

Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences II (Geography, Computer Science, Mathematics, Psychology)

Charité - Berlin University Medicine

Faculty of Philosophy I (Philosophy, History, European Ethnology, Department of Library and Information Science)

Faculty of Philosophy II (Literature, Linguistics, Scandinavian Studies, Romance literatures, English and American Studies, Slavic Studies, Classical Philology)

Faculty of Philosophy III (Social Sciences, Cultural Studies/Arts, Asian/African Studies (includes Archeology), Gender Studies)

Faculty of Philosophy IV (Sport science, Rehabilitation Studies, Education, Quality Management in Education)

Faculty of Theology

Faculty of Economics and Business Administration

Furthermore, there are two independent institutes (''Zentralinstitute'') that are part of the university:

Centre for British Studies (in German: ''Großbritannienzentrum'')

Museum für Naturkunde (Museum of Natural History)

Points of interest

Späth-Arboretum

See also

List of modern universities in Europe (1801–1945)

List of Universities in Berlin

Charité

Free University of Berlin

Technical University of Berlin

Hertie School of Governance

Berlin University of the Arts

Humboldt Museum

Sources

External links

Humboldt University of Berlin website

Category:Universities in Berlin Berlin Humboldt Category:Educational institutions established in 1810 Category:Public universities Category:Buildings and structures in Mitte

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Name	Eric Schmidt
Birth date	April 27, 1955
Birth place	Washington, D.C., United States
Residence	Atherton, California, U.S.
Occupation	Executive Chairman of Google
Alma mater	Princeton University (B.S. 1976)University of California, Berkeley (M.S. in 1979 and PhD in 1982)
Salary	$557,466 compensation in 2006
Networth	US$7 billion (2011)
Website	Google Inc. Profile }}

Eric Emerson Schmidt (born April 27, 1955) is an American engineer, executive chairman of Google and former member of the board of directors of Apple Inc. From 2001–2011, he served as chief executive of Google. He is a co-author of the lex lexical analyzer software for Unix. He has also sat on the boards of trustees for Carnegie Mellon University and Princeton University.

Biography

Schmidt was born in Washington, D.C. and grew up in Blacksburg, Virginia. After graduating from Yorktown High School, Schmidt attended Princeton University where he earned a B.S. in Electrical Engineering in 1976. At the University of California, Berkeley, he earned an MS in 1979 for designing and implementing a network linking the campus computer center, the CS and the EECS departments, and a PhD in 1982 in EECS with a dissertation about the problems of managing distributed software development and tools for solving these problems. He was joint author of ''lex'' (a lexical analyzer and an important tool for compiler construction). He taught at Stanford Business School as a part time professor.

Schmidt lives in Atherton, California, with his wife Wendy.

He is also on the list of ARTnews 200 top art collectors.

He is also a member of the Bilderberg Group and attended the Swiss 2011 Bilderberg conference in St. Moritz, Switzerland.

The Eric Schmidt Family Foundation

The Eric Schmidt Family Foundation addresses issues of sustainability and the responsible use of natural resources. Wendy and Eric Schmidt, working with Heart Howerton, a San Francisco architectural firm that specializes in large-scale land use, have inaugurated several projects on the island of Nantucket that seek to sustain the unique character of the island, and to minimize the impact of seasonal visitation on the island's core community. Wendy Schmidt offered the prize purse of the Wendy Schmidt Oil Cleanup X CHALLENGE, a challenge award for efficient capturing of crude oil from seawater motivated by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

Career

Early career

Early in his career, Schmidt held a series of technical positions with IT companies, including Bell Labs, Zilog and Xerox’s famed Palo Alto Research Center (PARC).

From Sun to Google

Schmidt joined Sun Microsystems in 1983 as its first software manager. He rose to become director of software engineering, vice president and general manager of the software products division, vice president of the general systems group, and president of Sun Technology Enterprises. In April 1997, he became CEO and chairman of the board of Novell.

Schmidt left Novell after the acquisition of Cambridge Technology Partners. Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin interviewed Schmidt. Impressed by him, they recruited Schmidt to run their company in 2001 under the guidance of venture capitalists John Doerr and Michael Moritz.

Google

Schmidt joined Google's board of directors as chairman in March 2001 and became the company's CEO in August 2001. At Google, Schmidt shared responsibility for Google's daily operations with founders Page and Brin. As indicated by page 29 of Google's 2004 S-1 Filing Schmidt, Page, and Brin ran Google as a triumvirate. Schmidt had legal responsibilities typically assigned to the CEO of a public company and focused on management of the vice presidents and the sales organization.

According to Google's website, Schmidt also focuses on "building the corporate infrastructure needed to maintain Google's rapid growth as a company and on ensuring that quality remains high while product development cycle times are kept to a minimum."

In 2007, ''PC World'' ranked Schmidt as the first on the list of the 50 most important people on the web, along with Google co-Founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin.

In 2009, Schmidt was considered one of the "TopGun CEOs" by Brendan Wood International, an advisory agency.

On January 20, 2011, Google announced that Schmidt would step down as CEO of Google, but continue as the executive chairman of the company, and act as an adviser to co-founders Page and Brin. Page replaced Schmidt as CEO on April 4, 2011.

The 2011 book ''In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives'' by Steven Levy claims that in 2001, Schmidt requested that a political donation he made be removed from Google search results. The request was not fulfilled. Schmidt has denied this ever occurred.

Apple

Schmidt was elected to Apple's board of directors on August 28, 2006. On August 3, 2009, it was announced that Schmidt would resign from the board of directors at Apple due to conflict of interests amid the growing competition between Google and Apple.

President Barack Obama

Schmidt "was a campaign advisor and major donor to Barack Obama, and when he announced he was leaving that perch, he planned to remain 'at the forefront of Google’s government relations team.' And Obama even has considered him for Commerce Secretary." Schmidt was an informal advisor to the Obama presidential campaign and began campaigning the week of October 19, 2008, on behalf of the candidate. He had been mentioned as a possible candidate for the chief technology officer position which Obama created in his administration. After Obama won, Schmidt was a member of President Obama's transition advisory board. He proposed that the easiest way to solve all of the problems of the United States at once, at least in the domestic policy, is by a stimulus program that rewards renewable energy and, over time, attempts to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy. He has since become a new member of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology PCAST.

New America Foundation

The New America Foundation is a non-profit public policy institute and think tank, founded in 1999. Schmidt is the current chairman of the board of directors. He succeeded founding chairman James Fallows in 2008.

Compensation

Upon being hired, Eric Schmidt was paid a salary of $250,000, and an annual performance bonus. He was granted 14,331,703 shares of class B common stock at 30 cents per share, and 426,892 shares of Series C preferred stock at purchase price of $2.34.

Schmidt and the Google founders agreed to a base salary of $1 in 2004 (which continued through 2010), with other compensation of $557,465 in 2006, $508,763 in 2008 and $243,661 in 2009. He did not receive any additional stock, or options in 2009 or 2010. Most of his compensation was for "personal security" and charters of private aircraft. Schmidt is one of the few people who became billionaires (in United States dollars) based on stock options received as an employee in a corporation of which he was neither the founder nor a relative of the founder. In its 2011 'World's Billionaires' list, Forbes ranked Schmidt as the 136th richest person in the world, with an estimated wealth of $7 billion. Google gave him $100 million in 2011 as a parting gift.

Views

During an interview, aired on December 3, 2009 on the CNBC documentary "Inside the Mind of Google", Schmidt was asked, "People are treating Google like their most trusted friend. Should they be?" His reply was: "I think judgment matters. If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place, but if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines including Google do retain this information for some time, and it’s important to remember, for example, that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act. It is possible that that information could be made available to the authorities." At the Techonomy conference on August 4, 2010, Schmidt expressed that technology is good, but he said that the only way to manage the challenges is "much greater transparency and no anonymity." Schmidt also stated that in an era of asymmetric threats, "true anonymity is too dangerous."

In August 2010, Schmidt clarified his company's views on network neutrality: "I want to be clear what we mean by Net neutrality: What we mean is if you have one data type like video, you don't discriminate against one person's video in favor of another. But it's okay to discriminate across different types, so you could prioritize voice over video, and there is general agreement with Verizon and Google on that issue."

Proposition 8

In 2008, Schmidt was part of a group of Silicon Valley leaders who supported the defeat of Proposition 8 in California.

See also

List of billionaires

70/20/10 Model — business model advocated by Schmidt

RechargeIT

References

External links

;Speeches

Eric Schmidt and Larry Page speaking at Stanford (May 1, 2002)

Eric Schmidt talks about innovation on Executive Talks, November 2006

Schmidt-ceo-of-google.html Eric Schmidt interview by iinnovate, March 2007

YouTube: Eric Schmidt at the Seoul Digital Forum. (2007.06.05)

Eric Schmidt speaks as part of NASA 50 years Lecture Series, January 17, 2008

Mobile World Congress 2010 Keynote: Eric Schmidt, CEO, Google(Feb 2010)

iTunes: Google making of a modern company.

;Articles

CNET: Google balances privacy, reach (July 14, 2005), which uses Eric Schmidt as an example of the personal information held by Google.

Princeton University Board of Trustees

Category:1955 births Category:American art collectors Category:American billionaires Category:American chief executives Category:American electrical engineers Category:Apple Inc. employees Category:Businesspeople from Washington, D.C. Category:Google employees Category:Living people Category:People from Washington, D.C. Category:Princeton University alumni Category:University of California, Berkeley alumni

ar:إيريك شميت be-x-old:Эрык Шмідт bg:Ерик Шмид de:Eric Schmidt es:Eric Schmidt fa:اریک اشمیت fr:Eric Schmidt gu:એરિક શ્મિટ ko:에릭 슈미트 hi:एरिक इ. श्मिट id:Eric Schmidt he:אריק שמידט kn:ಎರಿಕ್‌ ಸ್ಮಿತ್‌‌ lt:Eric Schmidt hu:Eric E. Schmidt ml:എറിക് ഇ. ഷ്മിറ്റ് nl:Eric Schmidt ja:エリック・シュミット pl:Eric Schmidt pt:Eric Schmidt ru:Шмидт, Эрик sq:Eric E. Schmidt sv:Eric Schmidt ta:எரிக் ஷ்மிட் te:ఎరిక్ ఇ. ష్మిత్ th:เอริก ชมิดต์ tr:Eric E. Schmidt vi:Eric Schmidt zh:埃里克·施密特

name	Michael C. Burda
color	lightsteelblue
birth date	April 04, 1959
nationality
institution	Humboldt University of Berlin
field	MacroeconomicsLabor economics
alma mater	Harvard University
awards	Gossen Prize (1998)
signature
repec prefix	e | repec_id pbu123 }}

Michael Christopher Burda (born April 4, 1959) is an American macroeconomist and professor at the Humboldt University of Berlin.

Since 1993 he has served as director of the Institute for Economic Theory II and since 2007 visiting professor at the European School of Management and Technology (ESMT). He has also taught at Berkeley and INSEAD. In 1998, Burda received the Gossen Prize of the German Verein für Socialpolitik. He is research fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) and a fellow of the European Economic Association.

Burda received his B.A., M.A. and Ph.D. (1987) at Harvard University. His research is primarily in macroeconomics, labor economics and issues of European integration.

In 2009 Michael Burda and Charles Wyplosz published the 5th edition of their textbook “Macroeconomics: A European Text”, Oxford University Press, which has been translated into twelve other languages.

References

CV of Michael Christopher Burda (pdf)

Textbook Web Ressources

External links

Website of the Institute Economic Theory II

Category:1959 births Category:Living people Category:American economists Category:Harvard University alumni Category:University of California, Berkeley faculty Category:Humboldt University of Berlin faculty

de:Michael C. Burda

order	44th
office	President of the United States
term start	January 20, 2009
vicepresident	Joe Biden
predecessor	George W. Bush
birth date	August 04, 1961
birth place	Honolulu, Hawaii, United States
birthname	Barack Hussein Obama II
nationality	American
party	Democratic
spouse	Michelle Obama (m. 1992)
children	Malia (b.1998) Sasha (b.2001)
residence	The White House
alma mater	Occidental CollegeColumbia University (B.A.)Harvard Law School (J.D.)
profession	Community organizerAttorneyAuthorConstitutional law professorUnited States SenatorPresident of the United States
religion	Christian, former member of United Church of Christ
signature	Barack Obama signature.svg
website	WhiteHouse.gov
footnotes	}}

The Presidency of Barack Obama began at noon EST on January 20, 2009, when he became the 44th President of the United States. Obama was a United States Senator from Illinois at the time of his victory over Arizona Senator John McCain in the 2008 presidential election. Barack Obama is the first African-American president of the United States, as well as the first born in Hawaii.

His policy decisions have addressed a global financial crisis and have included changes in tax policies, legislation to reform the United States health care industry, foreign policy initiatives and the phasing out of detention of prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba. He attended the G-20 London summit and later visited U.S. troops in Iraq. On the tour of various European countries following the G-20 summit, he announced in Prague that he intended to negotiate substantial reduction in the world's nuclear arsenals, en route to their eventual extinction. In October 2009, Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for "his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."

Transition period

The presidential transition period began following Obama's election to the presidency on November 4, 2008. The Obama-Biden Transition Project was co-chaired by John Podesta, Valerie Jarrett, and Pete Rouse. During the transition period, Obama announced his nominations for his Cabinet and administration. Shortly after the election on November 4, Obama chose Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois as White House Chief of Staff.

Cabinet nominations included former Democratic primary opponents Hillary Rodham Clinton for Secretary of State and Bill Richardson for Secretary of Commerce (although the latter withdrew on January 4, 2009). Obama appointed Eric Holder as his Attorney General, the first African-American appointed to that position. He also nominated Timothy F. Geithner to serve as Secretary of the Treasury. On December 1, Obama announced that he had asked Robert Gates to remain as Secretary of Defense, making Gates the first Defense head to carry over from a president of a different party. He nominated former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Susan Rice to the United States Ambassador to the United Nations, which he restored to a Cabinet-level position.

During his transition, he maintained a website Change.gov, on which he wrote blogs to readers and uploaded video addresses by many of the members of his new cabinet. He announced strict rules for federal lobbyists, restricting them from financially contributing to his administration and forcing them to stop lobbying while working for him. The website also allowed individuals to share stories and visions with each other and the transition team in what was called the Citizen's Briefing Book, which was given to Obama shortly after his inauguration. Most of the information from Change.gov was transferred to the official White House website whitehouse.gov just after Obama's inauguration.

Inauguration

Barack Obama was inaugurated on January 20, 2009. He officially assumed the presidency at 12:00 noon, EST, and completed the oath of office at 12:05 PM, EST. He delivered his inaugural address immediately following his oath. After his speech, he went to the President's Room in the House Wing of the Capitol and signed three documents: a commemorative proclamation, a list of Cabinet appointments, and a list of sub-Cabinet appointments, before attending a luncheon with congressional and administration leaders and invited guests. To commemorate the 200th anniversary of the birth of former President Abraham Lincoln, the same Bible that was used for Lincoln's inauguration was used in Obama's inauguration.

In administering the oath, Chief Justice John G. Roberts misplaced the word "faithfully" and erroneously replaced the phrase "President of the United States" with "President to the United States" before restating the phrase correctly; since Obama initially repeated the incorrect form, some scholars argued the President should take the oath again. On January 21, Roberts readministered the oath to Obama in a private ceremony in the White House Map Room, making him the seventh U.S. president to retake the oath; White House Counsel Greg Craig said Obama took the oath from Roberts a second time out of an "abundance of caution".

First 100 days

Expectations

Obama's 100th day in office was April 29, 2009. In his first post-election interview with ''60 Minutes'', Obama said that he has been studying Roosevelt's first 100 days, while adding, "The first hundred days is going to be important, but it's probably going to be the first thousand days that makes the difference."

Obama's first 100 days were highly anticipated ever since he became the presumptive nominee. Several news outlets created web pages dedicated to covering the subject. Commentators weighed in on challenges and priorities within domestic, foreign, economic, and environmental policy. CNN lists a number of economic issues that "Obama and his team will have to tackle in their first 100 days", foremost among which is passing and implementing a recovery package to deal with the financial crisis. Clive Stafford Smith, a British human rights lawyer, expressed hopes that the new president will close Guantanamo Bay detention camp in his first 100 days in office. After aides of the president announced his intention to give a major foreign policy speech in the capital of an Islamic country, there were speculations in Jakarta that he might return to his former home city within the first 100 days.

''The New York Times'' devoted a five-part series, which was spread out over two weeks, to anticipatory analysis of Obama's first hundred days. Each day, the analysis of a political expert was followed by freely edited blog postings from readers. The writers compared Obama's prospects with the situations of Franklin D. Roosevelt (January 16, Jean Edward Smith), John F. Kennedy (January 19, Richard Reeves), Lyndon B. Johnson (January 23, Robert Dallek), Ronald Reagan (January 27, Lou Cannon), and Richard Nixon.

Legislation and executive orders

Within minutes of taking the Oath of Office on January 20, Obama's Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, issued an order suspending last-minute federal regulations pushed through by outgoing President George W. Bush, planning to review everything still pending. Due to the economic crisis, the President enacted a pay freeze for Senior White House Staff making more than $100,000 per year, as well as announcing stricter guidelines regarding lobbyists in an effort to raise the ethical standards of the White House. He asked for a waiver to his own new rules, however, for the appointments of William Lynn to the position of Deputy Defense Secretary, Jocelyn Frye to the position of director of policy and projects in the Office of the First Lady, and Cecilia Muñoz to the position of director of intergovernmental affairs in the executive office of the president, leading to some criticism of hypocrisy and violation of his pledge for governmental openness.

In his first week in office, Obama signed Executive Order 13492 suspending all the ongoing proceedings of Guantanamo military commission and ordering the detention facility to be shut down within the year. He also signed Executive Order 13491 - Ensuring Lawful Interrogations requiring the Army Field Manual to be used as a guide for terror interrogations, banning torture and other coercive techniques, such as waterboarding. Obama also issued an executive order entitled "Ethics Commitments by Executive Branch Personnel", setting stricter limitations on incoming executive branch employees and placing tighter restrictions on lobbying in the White House. Obama signed two Presidential Memoranda concerning energy independence, ordering the Department of Transportation to establish higher fuel efficiency standards before 2011 models are released and allowing states to raise their emissions standards above the national standard. He also ended the Mexico City Policy, which banned federal grants to international groups that provide abortion services or counseling.

In his first week he also established a policy of producing a weekly Saturday morning video address available on whitehouse.gov and YouTube, much like those released during his transition period. The first address had been viewed by 600,000 YouTube viewers by the next afternoon.

The first piece of legislation Obama signed was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 on January 29, which revised the statute of limitations for filing pay discrimination lawsuits. Lilly Ledbetter joined Obama and his wife, Michelle, as he signed the bill, fulfilling his campaign pledge to nullify ''Ledbetter v. Goodyear''. On February 3, he signed the Children's Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act (CHIP), expanding health care from 7 million children under the plan to 11 million.

| format = Ogg | type = speech }} After much debate, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) was passed by both the House and Senate on February 13, 2009. Originally intended to be a bipartisan bill, the passage of the bill was largely along party lines. No Republicans voted for it in the House, and three moderate Republicans voted for it in the Senate (Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania). The bill combined tax breaks with spending on infrastructure projects, extension of welfare benefits, and education. The final cost of the bill was $787 billion, and almost $1.2 trillion with debt service included. Obama signed the Act into law on February 17, 2009, in Denver, Colorado.

On March 9, 2009, Obama lifted restrictions on federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, and in doing so, called into question some of George W. Bush's signing statements. Obama stated that he too would employ signing statements if he deems upon review that a portion of a bill is unconstitutional, and he has issued several signing statements.

Early in his presidency, Obama signed a law raising the tobacco tax 62 cents on a pack of cigarettes. The tax is to be "used to finance a major expansion of health insurance for children", and "help some [smokers] to quit and persuade young people not to start".

In October 2011, Obama instituted the We Can't Wait program, which involved using executive orders, administrative rulemaking, and recess appointments to institute policies without the support of Congress. The initiative was developed in response to Congress's unwillingness to pass economic legislation proposed by Obama, and conflicts in Congress during the 2011 debt ceiling crisis.

Approval ratings and opinion

2009

After his transition period, Obama entered office with an approval rating of 82%. At the end of his first week, 68% of respondents in a Gallup poll approved of how Obama was handling his job, matching the early approval ratings of Dwight D. Eisenhower and trailing only John F. Kennedy in post-World War II presidents.

Throughout early February polls showed scattered approval ratings: 62% (CBS News), 64% (USA Today/Gallup), 66% (Gallup), and 76% in an outlier poll (CNN/Opinion Research). Gallup reported the congressional address in late February boosted his approval from a term-low of 59% to 67%.

Throughout autumn 2009, Rasmussen estimated Obama's approval as fluctuating between 45% and 52% and his disapproval between 48% and 54%; as of November 11, Pew Research estimated Obama's approval between 51% and 55% and his disapproval between 33% and 37% since July.

Handling of the economy

Rasmussen reported in mid-February 2009, that 55% of voters gave Obama good or excellent marks on his handling of the economy. In early March, a ''The Wall Street Journal'' survey of 49 economists gave Obama an average grade of 59 out of 100, with 42% of the respondents surveyed giving the administration's economic policies a grade below 60 percent. In comparison, only 30% of those same economists considered the response of governments around the world to the global recession to have been adequate. In April, a Gallup poll showed trust in Obama's economic policy with 71% saying they had "a fair amount" or "a great deal" of confidence in Obama's handling of the economy, higher than for Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner, or leaders of Congress. Another Gallup poll in June showed 55% of Americans approved Obama's overall handling of the economy, but 48% and 51% disapproved of his handling of the federal budget deficit and controlling federal spending, respectively. A CBS News poll taken August 27–31 showed 53% of those polled approved of his handling of the economy. A Rasmussen poll taken on November 12 found 45% of Americans rating Obama's handling of the economy as poor and 39% rating him as doing a good or excellent job. They found 72% of Democrats rated his handling of the economy as good or excellent, while only 10% of Republicans and 27% of voters not affiliated with either party agreed.

2010

On March 25, 2010, following his signing of landmark health care reform legislation into law, Obama's polling was revealed by Bloomberg to be 50%, with higher marks for relations with other countries (58%) and his running of the war in Afghanistan (54%). "Obama's approval rating is roughly equal to what Bill Clinton had at this point in his presidency, according to data maintained by Gallup (and) higher than the 45 percent Ronald Reagan recorded in April 1982" and more favorable than Democrats or Republicans office in 2010. They found Obama's approval rating was at 85% among Democrats, compared with 46% among independents and 11% among Republicans.

Fox News released the results of two polls on April 8–9, 2010. The first showed a drop in Obama's approval rating to 43%, with 48% disapproving. In that poll, Democrats approved of Obama's performance 80–12%, while independents disapproved 49–38%. The other poll, which concentrated on the economy, showed disapproval of Obama's handling of the economy by a 53–42% margin, with 62% saying they were dissatisfied with the handling of the federal deficit. According to a Gallup Poll released April 10, 2010, President Obama had a 45% approval rating, with 48% disapproving. In a poll from Rasmussen Reports, released April 10, 2010, 47% approved of the President's performance, while 53% disapproved.

2011

Obama's approval rating jumped to a high following the death of Osama Bin Laden on May 2, 2011. A GfK poll conducted May 5, 2011 found his approval rating to be 60%. During the debt ceiling debate in August 2011, Obama's approval rating dropped to the low-40s.

Major legislation

2009

January 29: Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act

February 4: Children's Health Insurance Reauthorization Act

February 11: DTV Delay Act

February 17: American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

March 30: Omnibus Public Lands Management Act of 2009

April 21: Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act

May 20: Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act

May 20: Helping Families Save Their Homes Act of 2009

May 22: Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure Act of 2009

June 22: Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act

August 6: Cash For Clunkers Extension Act

October 22: Veterans Health Care Budget Reform and Transparency Act

October 28: Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act

October 28: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010

October 30: Ryan White HIV/AIDS Treatment Extension Act

November 6: Worker, Homeownership, and Business Assistance Act of 2009

2010

January 27: Emergency Aid to American Survivors of Haiti Earthquake Act

March 4: Travel Promotion Act

March 18: Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act (HIRE Act)

March 23: Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act

March 30: Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010

May 5: Caregivers and Veterans Omnibus Health Services Act of 2010

May 17: Daniel Pearl Freedom of the Press Act

July 1: Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act

July 21: Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act

July 22: Unemployment Compensation Extension Act of 2010

July 22: Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Act of 2010

August 10: SPEECH Act of 2010

September 27: Small Business Jobs and Credit Act of 2010

December 9: Animal Crush Video Prohibition Act of 2010

December 13: Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010

December 17: Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010

December 22: Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010

2011

January 2: James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act of 2010 () January 4: Food Safety and Modernization Act, ,

January 7: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2011

August 2: Budget Control Act of 2011

December 31: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012

Personnel

Cabinet appointees

Twenty-two members of the Obama administration are either in the United States Cabinet (15) or are in positions considered to be Cabinet-level (7). The members of the Cabinet are the heads of the fifteen major departments (State, Defense, Justice, etc.), and the seven cabinet-level positions are the Vice President, White House Chief of Staff, Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Director of the Office of Management and Budget, U.S. Trade Representative, Ambassador to the United Nations, and the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers. Since Robert Gates was a member of the previous administration, his letter of resignation (a formality at the end of a President's term) was simply not accepted, and he did not need confirmation. On January 19, 2009, Senate Democratic leaders requested fifteen of the twenty positions to be ratified by unanimous consent, and seven gained unanimous confirmation by voice vote the next day: Ken Salazar, Steven Chu, Arne Duncan, Peter Orszag, Eric Shinseki, Tom Vilsack, and Janet Napolitano. On January 21, Obama presided over the swearing in of the seven unanimous nominees. Later that day, the Senate confirmed Hillary Clinton by a 94–2 vote. On January 22, several more confirmations were approved unanimously: Susan E. Rice, Ray LaHood, Lisa P. Jackson, and Shaun Donovan. On January 26, the Senate confirmed Geithner by a 60–34 margin.

At the conclusion of Obama's first week as President, Hilda Solis, Tom Daschle, Ron Kirk, and Eric Holder had yet to be confirmed, and there had been no second appointment for Secretary of Commerce. Holder was confirmed by a vote of 75–21 on February 2, and on February 3, Obama announced Senator Judd Gregg as his second nomination for Secretary of Commerce. Daschle withdrew later that day amid controversy over his failure to pay income taxes and potential conflicts of interest related to the speaking fees he accepted from health care interests. Solis was later confirmed by a vote of 80-17 on February 24, and Ron Kirk was confirmed on March 18 by a 92-5 vote in the Senate.

Gregg, who was the leading Republican negotiator and author of the TARP program in the Senate, after publication that he had a multi-million dollar investment in the Bank of America, on February 12, withdrew his nomination as Secretary of Commerce, citing "irresolvable conflicts" with President Obama and his staff over how to conduct the 2010 census and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Former Washington governor Gary Locke was nominated on February 26 as Obama's third choice for Commerce Secretary and confirmed on March 24 by voice vote.

On March 2, Obama introduced Kansas governor Kathleen Sebelius as his second choice for Secretary of Health and Human Services. He also introduced Nancy-Ann DeParle as head of the new White House Office of Health Reform, which he suggested would work closely with the Department of Health and Human Services. At the end of March, Sebelius was the only remaining Cabinet member yet to be confirmed.

Six high-ranking cabinet nominees in the Obama administration had their confirmations delayed or rejected among reports that they did not pay all of their taxes, including Tom Daschle, Obama's original nominee for Health and Human Services Secretary, and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. Though Geithner was confirmed, and Senator Max Baucus, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, thought Daschle would have been confirmed, Daschle withdrew his nomination on February 3. Obama had nominated Nancy Killefer for the position of Chief Performance Officer, but Killefer also withdrew on February 3, citing unspecified problems with District of Columbia unemployment tax. A senior administration official said that Killefer's tax issues dealt with household help. Hilda Solis, Obama's nominee for Secretary of Labor, faced delayed confirmation hearings due to tax lien concerns pertaining to her husband's auto repair business, but she was later confirmed on February 24. While pundits puzzled over U.S. Trade Representative-designate Ron Kirk's failure to be confirmed by March 2009, it was reported on March 2 that Kirk owed over $10,000 in back taxes. Kirk agreed to pay them in exchange for Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus's aid in speeding up the confirmation process; he was later confirmed on March 18. On March 31, Kathleen Sebelius, Obama's nominee for Health and Human Services secretary, revealed in a letter to the Senate Finance Committee that her Certified Public Accountant found errors in her tax returns for years 2005-2007. She, along with her husband, paid more than $7,000 in back taxes, along with $878 in interest.

Notable non-Cabinet positions

Appointees serve at the pleasure of the President and were nominated by Barack Obama except as noted.

Chair of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation

*Sheila Bair¹ (2009–2011)

Special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan

*Richard Holbrooke (2009–2010)

*Marc Grossman (2011–present)

Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs

* Retired General James L. Jones (2009–2011)

* Thomas E. Donilon (2011–present)

Special envoy to the Middle East

* George J. Mitchell (2009–2011)

* David Hale (2011–present)

Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation

* Robert Mueller² (2009–present)

Director of the Central Intelligence Agency

* Leon Panetta (2009–2011)

* Michael Morell (Acting-2011)

* David Petraeus (2011–present)

Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers

* Christina Romer (2009–2010)

* Austan Goolsbee (2010–2011)

* Alan Krueger (2011–present)

Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission

* Mary Schapiro (2009–present)

Assistant to the President for Economic Policy and Director of National Economic Council

* Lawrence Summers (2009–2010)

* Gene Sperling (2011–present)

Chairman of the Economic Recovery Advisory Board

* Paul Volcker (2009–2011)

* ''Replaced by Council on Jobs and Competitiveness in 2011''

Chairperson of the Council on Jobs and Competitiveness

* Jeffrey R. Immelt (2011–present)

¹Appointed by George W. Bush in 2006 to a five-year term ²Appointed by George W. Bush in 2001 to a ten-year term

Judicial nominees

United States Supreme Court

Obama appointed the following Justices to the Supreme Court of the United States: Sonia Sotomayor 2009 Elena Kagan 2010

Other courts

Outside of the Supreme Court, by October 2009, Obama had nominated fewer than two dozen judges to fill judicial vacancies, of which there were close to 100. This has prompted some Democrats to criticize the pace of Obama's judicial appointments as too slow. In December 2009, Senator Patrick Leahy criticized Republicans for stalling those judicial nominations that had been made, noting that the Senate confirmed more district and circuit court nominees during the first year of the George W. Bush administration than it had approved by that point during the Barack Obama presidency.

As of July 2010, Obama's nominees to the district and circuit courts had been confirmed at a rate of only 43.5 percent, compared to 87.2 percent during Bill Clinton's administration and 91.3 percent for George W. Bush. The Center for American Progress, which compiled the data, commented:

Judicial confirmations slowed to a trickle on the day President Barack Obama took office. Filibusters, anonymous holds, and other obstructionary tactics have become the rule. Uncontroversial nominees wait months for a floor vote, and even district court nominees—low-ranking judges whose confirmations have never been controversial in the past—are routinely filibustered into oblivion. Nominations grind to a halt in many cases even after the Senate Judiciary Committee has unanimously endorsed a nominee.

Policies

Economy

Upon entering office, Obama planned to center his attention on handling the global financial crisis. Even before his inauguration he lobbied Congress to pass an economic stimulus bill, which became the top priority during his first month in office. As President, Obama made a high profile trip to Capitol Hill, Washington, D.C. to dialog with Congressional Republicans and advocate for the bill. On February 17, 2009, Obama signed into law a $787 billion plan that included spending for health care, infrastructure, education, various tax breaks and incentives, and direct assistance to individuals. The tax provisions of the law reduced taxes for 98 per cent of taxpayers, bringing tax rates to their lowest levels in 60 years.

As part of the 2010 budget proposal, the Obama administration has proposed additional measures to attempt to stabilize the economy, including a $2–3 trillion measure aimed at stabilizing the financial system and freeing up credit. The program includes up to $1 trillion to buy toxic bank assets, an additional $1 trillion to expand a federal consumer loan program, and the $350 billion left in the Troubled Assets Relief Program. The plan also includes $50 billion intended to slow the wave of mortgage foreclosures. The 2011 budget includes a three-year freeze on discretionary spending, proposes several program cancellations, and raises taxes on high income earners to bring down deficits during the economic recovery.

In a July 2009 interview with ABC News, Biden was asked about the sustained increase of the U.S. unemployment rate from May 2007 to October 2009 despite the administration's multi-year economic stimulus package passed five months earlier. He responded "The truth is, we and everyone else, misread the economy. The figures we worked off of in January were the consensus figures and most of the blue chip indexes out there ... the truth is, there was a misreading of just how bad an economy we inherited." The White House indicates that 2 million jobs were created or saved due to the stimulus package in 2009 and self reporting by recipients of the grants, loans, and contracts portion of the package report that the package saved or created 608,317 jobs in the final three months of 2009.

The unemployment rate rose in 2009, reaching a peak in October at 10.1% and averaging 10.0% in the fourth quarter. Following a decrease to 9.7% in the first quarter of 2010, the unemployment rate fell to 9.6% in the second quarter, where it remained for the rest of the year. Between February and December 2010, employment rose by 0.8%, which was less than the average of 1.9% experienced during comparable periods in the past four employment recoveries. GDP growth returned in the third quarter of 2009, expanding at a 1.6% pace, followed by a 5.0% increase in the fourth quarter. Growth continued in 2010, posting an increase of 3.7% in the first quarter, with lesser gains throughout the rest of the year. Overall, the economy expanded at a rate of 2.9% in 2010.

During November–December 2010, Obama and a lame duck session of the 111th Congress focused on a dispute about the temporary Bush tax cuts, which were due to expire at the end of the year. Obama wanted to extend the tax cuts for taxpayers making less than $250,000 a year. Congressional Republicans agreed but also wanted to extend the tax cuts for those making over that amount, and refused to support any bill that did not do so. All the Republicans in the Senate also joined in saying that, until the tax dispute was resolved, they would filibuster to prevent consideration of any other legislation, except for bills to fund the U.S. government. On 7 December, Obama strongly defended a compromise agreement he had reached with the Republican congressional leadership that included a two-year extension of all the tax cuts, a 13-month extension of unemployment insurance, a one-year reduction in the FICA payroll tax, and other measures. On December 10, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) led a filibuster against the compromise tax proposal, which lasted over eight hours. Obama persuaded many wary Democrats to support the bill, but not all; of the 148 votes against the bill in the House, 112 were cast by Democrats and only 36 by Republicans. The $858 billion Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010, which ''The Washington Post'' called "the most significant tax bill in nearly a decade", passed with bipartisan majorities in both houses of Congress and was signed into law by Obama on December 17, 2010.

Ethics

Lobbying reform

Early in his presidential campaign, Obama stated that "they [lobbyists] won't find a job in my White House", but softened his stance later in the campaign. On January 21, 2009, Obama issued an executive order for all future appointees to his administration, which stated, no appointee who was a registered lobbyist within the two years before his appointment could participate on matters in which he lobbied for a period of two years after the date of appointment. Three formal waivers were initially issued in early 2009, out of 800 executive appointments: to William J. Lynn III, a lobbyist for Raytheon, to hold the position of Deputy Secretary of Defense; to Jocelyn Frye, former general counsel at the National Partnership for Women and Families, to serve as Director of Policy and Projects in the Office of the First Lady; and to Cecilia Muñoz, former senior vice president for the National Council of La Raza, to serve as Director of Intergovernmental Affairs in the Executive Office of the President. As of March 21, 2009, at least thirty officials appointed by Obama had been lobbyists in the past five years. Ten additional waivers were announced in September 2009.

Not all recent former lobbyists require waivers; those without waivers write letters of recusal stating issues from which they must refrain because of their previous jobs. ''USA Today'' reported that 21 members of the Obama administration have at some time been registered as federal lobbyists, although most have not within the previous two years. Lobbyists in the administration include William Corr, an anti-tobacco lobbyist, as Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services and Tom Vilsack, who lobbied in 2007, for a national teachers union, as Secretary of Agriculture. Also, the Secretary of Labor nominee, Hilda Solis, formerly served as a board member of American Rights at Work, which lobbied Congress on two bills Solis co-sponsored, and Mark Patterson, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's chief of staff, is a former lobbyist for Goldman Sachs.

The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington have criticized the administration, claiming that Obama is retreating from his own ethics rules barring lobbyists from working on the issues about which they lobbied during the previous two years by issuing waivers. According to Melanie Sloan, the group's executive director, "It makes it appear that they are saying one thing and doing another."

Transparency

The Obama administration has said that all executive orders, non-emergency legislation, and proclamations will be posted to the official White House website, whitehouse.gov, allowing the public to review and comment for five days before the President signs the legislation. The pledge was twice broken during Obama's first month in office when he signed SCHIP legislation and the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act with less than the full five days of "sunlight before signing". The administration has said that they are still "working through implementation procedures and some initial issues with the congressional calendar".

During his first week in office, Obama announced plans to post a video address each week on the site, and on YouTube, informing the public of government actions each week. During his speech at the 2008 Democratic National Convention, Obama stated, "I will also go through the federal budget, line by line, eliminating programs that no longer work and making the ones we do need work better and cost less - because we cannot meet twenty-first century challenges with a twentieth century bureaucracy."

On January 21, 2009, by executive order, Obama revoked Executive Order 13233, which had limited access to the records of former United States Presidents. Obama issued instructions to all agencies and departments in his administration to "adopt a presumption in favor" of Freedom of Information Act requests. In April 2009, the United States Department of Justice released four legal memos from the Bush administration to comply voluntarily with a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union. The memos were written by John Yoo and signed by Jay Bybee and Steven Bradbury, then Principal Assistant Attorneys General to the Department of Justice, and addressed to John A. Rizzo, general counsel of the Central Intelligence Agency. The memos describe in detail controversial interrogation methods the CIA used on prisoners suspected of terrorism. Obama became personally involved in the decision to release the memos, which was opposed by former CIA directors Michael Hayden, Porter Goss, George Tenet and John Deutch. Former Vice President Dick Cheney criticized Obama for not releasing more memos; Cheney claimed that unreleased memos detail successes of CIA interrogations.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act requires all recipients of the funds provided by the act to publish a plan for using the funds, along with purpose, cost, rationale, net job creation, and contact information about the plan to a website Recovery.gov so that the public can review and comment. Inspectors General from each department or executive agency will then review, as appropriate, any concerns raised by the public. Any findings of an Inspector General must be relayed immediately to the head of each department and published on Recovery.gov.

On June 16, 2009, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed a lawsuit against the Obama administration in order to get information about the visits of coal company executives. Anne Weismann, the chief counsel for CREW, stated "The Obama administration has now taken exactly the same position as the Bush administration... I don't see how you can keep people from knowing who visits the White House and adhere to a policy of openness and transparency." On June 16, MSNBC reported that its more comprehensive request for visitor logs since Obama's January 20 inauguration had been denied. The administration announced that White House visitor logs will be made available to the public on an ongoing basis, with certain limitations, for visits occurring after September 15, 2009. Beginning on January 29, 2010, the White House did begin to release the names of its visitor records. Since that time, names of visitors (which includes not only tourists, but also names of union leaders, Wall Street executives, lobbyists, party chairs, philanthropists and celebrities), have been released. The names are released in huge batches up to 75,000 names at a time. Names are released 90–120 days after having visited the White House. The complete list of names is available online by accessing the official White House website.

Obama stated during the 2008 Presidential campaign that he would have negotiations for health care reform televised on C-SPAN, citing transparency as being the leverage needed to ensure that people stay involved in the process taking place in Washington. This did not fully happen and Politifact gives President Obama a "Promise Broken" rating on this issue. After White House press secretary Robert Gibbs initially avoided addressing the issue, President Obama himself acknowledged that he met with Democratic leaders behind closed doors to discuss how best to garner enough votes in order to merge the two (House and Senate) passed versions of the health care bill. Doing this violated the letter of the pledge, although Obama maintains that negotiations in several congressional committees were open, televised hearings. Obama also cited an independent ethics watchdog group describe his administration as the most transparent in recent history.

The Obama administration has been characterized as much more aggressive than the Bush and other previous administrations in their response to whistleblowing and leaks to the press. Three people have been prosecuted under the rarely used Espionage Act of 1917. They include Thomas Andrews Drake, a former National Security Agency (NSA) employee who was critical of the NSA's Trailblazer Project, Stephen Jin-Woo Kim, a State Department contractor who allegedly had a conversation about North Korea with James Rosen of Fox News, and Jeffrey Sterling, who allegedly was a source for James Risen's book State of War. Risen has also been subpoenaed to reveal his sources, another rare action by the government.

Foreign policy

In his inaugural address, Obama suggested that he plans to begin the process of withdrawing from Iraq and continuing to focus on the war in Afghanistan. He also mentioned lessening the nuclear threat through "working tirelessly with old friends and former foes". He spoke about America's determination to combat terrorism, proclaiming America's spirit is "stronger and cannot be broken — you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you." To the Muslim world, Obama extended an invite to "a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect". He also said the USA would "extend a hand" to those "who cling to power through corruption and deceit" if they "are willing to unclench" their fists. Shortly after his inauguration President Obama first called President Abbas of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA). Calls were also made to President Mubarak of Egypt, Prime Minister Olmert of Israel and King Abdullah of Jordan. Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton named George Mitchell as Special Envoy for Middle East peace and Richard Holbrooke as special representative to Pakistan and Afghanistan on January 23, 2009. At the same time, Obama called on Israel to open the borders of Gaza, detailing early plans on his administration's peace plans for the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. On February 18, 2009, Obama announced that the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan would be bolstered by 17,000 new troops by summer. The announcement followed the recommendation of several experts including Defense Secretary Robert Gates that additional troops be deployed to the war-torn nation.

Obama declared his plan for ending the Iraq War on February 27, 2009, in a speech at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, before an audience of Marines stationed there. According to the president, combat troops will be withdrawn from Iraq by August 2010, leaving a contingent of up to 50,000 servicemen and servicewomen to continue training, advisory, and counterterrorism operations until as late as the end of 2011.

Other characteristics of the Obama administration on foreign policy include a tough stance on tax havens, continuing military operation in Pakistan, and avowed focus on diplomacy to prevent nuclear proliferation in Iran and North Korea.

On April 1, 2009, Obama and China's President, Hu Jintao, announced the establishment of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue and agreed to work together to build a positive, cooperative, and comprehensive U.S.-China relationship for the 21st century.

In that same month, Obama requested that Congress approve $83.4 billion of supplemental military funding, mostly for the war in Iraq and to increase troop levels in Afghanistan. The request also includes $2.2 billion to increase the size of the US military, $350 million to upgrade security along the US-Mexico border, and $400 million in counterinsurgency aid for Pakistan.

In May 2009, it was reported that Obama plans to expand the military by 20,000 employees.

On June 4, 2009, Obama delivered a speech at Cairo University in Egypt. The wide ranging speech called for a "new beginning" in relations between the Islamic world and the United States. The speech received both praise and criticism from leaders in the region. In March 2010, Secretary of State Clinton criticized the Israeli government for approving expansion of settlements in East Jerusalem.

On April 8, 2010, Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed the latest Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), a "major" nuclear arms control agreement that reduces the nuclear weapons stockpiles of both countries.

In March 2011, international reaction to Muammar Gaddafi's military crackdown on rebel forces and civilians in Libya culminated in a United Nations resolution to enforce a no fly zone in Libya. Obama authorized U.S. forces to participate in international air attacks on Libyan air defenses using Tomahawk cruise missiles to establish the protective zone.

Guantánamo Bay detention camp

On his first day in office, Obama requested a 120-day suspension of all trials for alleged terrorists held at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp, so the new administration could "review the military commissions process, generally, and the cases pending before military commissions , specifically". Another order established a task force to lead a review of detention policies, procedures and individual cases. Obama addressed the State Department that "the United States will not torture" and drafted an executive order to close Guantánamo within a year. On January 22, 2009, Obama signed an executive order ensuring safe, lawful, and humane treatment of individuals detained in armed conflicts. This order restricts interrogators to methods listed and authorized by an Army Field Manual. A detainee released since Obama took office claimed in an interview with Agence France-Presse that conditions at Guantánamo had worsened, stating guards wanted to "take their last revenge" before the facility is closed. On March 13, 2009, the administration announced that it would no longer refer to prisoners at Guantánamo Bay as enemy combatants, but it also asserted that the president has the authority to detain terrorism suspects there without criminal charges.

The case review of detainee files by administration officials and prosecutors was made more difficult than expected as the Bush administration had failed to establish a coherent repository of the evidence and intelligence on each prisoner. By September 2009, prosecutors recommended to the Justice Department which detainees are eligible for trial, and the Justice Department and the Pentagon worked together to determine which of several now-scheduled trials will go forward in military tribunals and which in civilian courts. While 216 international terrorists are already held in maximum security prisons in the U.S., Congress was denying the administration funds to shut down the camp and adapt existing facilities elsewhere, arguing that the decision was "too dangerous to rush". In November, Obama stated that the U.S. would miss the January 2010 date for closing the Guantánamo Bay prison as he had ordered, acknowledging that he "knew this was going to be hard". Obama did not set a specific new deadline for closing the camp, citing that the delay was due to politics and lack of congressional cooperation. The state of Illinois has offered to sell to the federal government the Thomson Correctional Center, a new but largely unused prison, for the purpose of housing detainees. Federal officials testified at a December 23 hearing that if the state commission approves the sale for that purpose, it could take more than six months to ready the facility.

Killing of Osama bin Laden

Starting with information received in July 2010, intelligence developed by the CIA over the next several months determined what they believed to be the location of Osama bin Laden in a large compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, a suburban area 35 miles from Islamabad. CIA head Leon Panetta reported this intelligence to Obama in March 2011. Meeting with his national security advisers over the course of the next six weeks, Obama rejected a plan to bomb the compound, and authorized a "surgical raid" to be conducted by United States Navy SEALs. The operation took place on May 1, 2011, resulting in the death of bin Laden and the seizure of papers and computer drives and disks from the compound. Bin Laden's body was identified through DNA testing, and buried at sea several hours later. Within minutes of Obama's announcement from Washington, DC, late in the evening on May 1, there were spontaneous celebrations around the country as crowds gathered outside the White House, and at New York City's Ground Zero and Times Square. Reaction to the announcement was positive across party lines, including from predecessors George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, and from many countries around the world.

Overseas Contingency Operation

Obama discontinued use of the term "War on Terror" and instead uses the term "Overseas Contingency Operation". However, Obama has stated that the U.S. is at war with Al-Qaeda, saying "Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred."

In April 2010, the Obama administration took the extraordinary step of authorizing the targeted killing of an American citizen, the radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who was believed to have shifted from encouraging attacks on the United States to directly participating in them.

Gun control

During the presidential campaign, Obama announced that he favors measures that respect Second Amendment rights, while at the same time keeping guns away from children and criminals. On February 25, 2009, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Obama administration would seek a new assault weapons ban across the United States, saying that it would have a positive impact on the drug-related violence in Mexico. After the statement drew criticism from the NRA and some House Democrats, the Administration reportedly ordered the Justice Department to end public discussion of the issue. Obama has signed into law two bills containing amendments reducing restrictions on gun owners, one which permits guns to be transported in checked baggage on Amtrak trains and another which allows carrying loaded firearms in national parks located in states allowing concealed carry.

Science and technology

Cybersecurity

Obama initiated a 60-day review of cybersecurity by Melissa Hathaway, a consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton, appointed Acting Senior Director for Cyberspace.

''The New York Times'' reported in 2009, that the NSA is intercepting communications of American citizens including a Congressman, although the Justice Department believed that the NSA had corrected its errors. United States Attorney General Eric Holder resumed the wiretapping according to his understanding of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 Amendments Act of 2008 that Congress passed in July 2008, but without explaining what had occurred.

Environment

On January 27, 2009, Obama issued two presidential memoranda concerning energy policy. One directed the Department of Transportation to raise fuel efficiency standards incrementally to by 2020, and the other directed the Environmental Protection Agency to allow individual states to set stricter tailpipe emissions regulations than the federal standard.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 provides $54 billion in funds to double domestic renewable energy production, renovate federal buildings making them more energy-efficient, improve the nation's electricity grid, repair public housing, and weatherize modest-income homes.

On February 10, 2009, Obama overturned a Bush administration policy that had opened up a five-year period of offshore drilling for oil and gas near both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has been quoted as saying, "To establish an orderly process that allows us to make wise decisions based on sound information, we need to set aside" the plan "and create our own timeline".

On May 19, 2009, Obama announced a plan to increase the CAFE national standards for gasoline mileage, by creating a single new national standard that will create a car and light truck fleet in the United States that is almost 40 percent cleaner and more fuel-efficient by 2016, than it is today, with an average of 35.5 miles per gallon. Environmental advocates and industry officials welcomed the new program, but for different reasons. Environmentalists called it a long-overdue tightening of emissions and fuel economy standards after decades of government delay and industry opposition. Auto industry officials said it would provide the single national efficiency standard they have long desired, a reasonable timetable to meet it and the certainty they need to proceed with product development plans.

On March 30, 2010, Obama partially reinstated Bush administration proposals to open certain offshore areas along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling. The proposals had earlier been set aside by President Obama after they were challenged in court on environmental grounds.

On May 27, 2010, Obama extended a moratorium on offshore drilling permits after the April 20, 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill which is considered to be the worst oil spill in U.S. history. Although BP took responsibility for the disaster and its ongoing after effects, Obama began a federal investigation along with forming a bipartisan commission to review the incident and methods to avoid it in the future. Obama visited the Gulf Coast on May 2 and May 28 and expressed his frustration on the June 8 ''NBC Today Show'', by saying "I don't sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar. We talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick." Obama's response to the disaster has drawn confusion and criticism within segments of the media and public.

NASA

Obama set up the Augustine panel to review the Constellation program in 2009, and announced in February 2010, that he was cutting the program from the 2011 United States federal budget, describing it as "over budget, behind schedule, and lacking in innovation." After the decision drew criticism in the United States, a new "Flexible path to Mars" plan was unveiled at a space conference in April 2010. It included new technology programs, increased R&D; spending, a focus on the International Space Station and contracting out flying crew to space to commercial providers. The new plan also increased NASA's 2011 budget to $19 billion from $18.3 billion in 2010.

In July 2009, Obama appointed Charles Bolden, a former astronaut, to be administrator of NASA.

Stem cell research

On March 9, 2009, Obama repealed a Bush-era policy that prevented federal tax dollars from being used to fund research on new lines of embryonic stem cells. Such research has been a matter of debate between those who emphasize the therapeutic potential of such research and those who suggest that elements of this research breach ethical limitations. Obama stated that "In recent years, when it comes to stem cell research, rather than furthering discovery, our government has forced what I believe is a false choice between sound science and moral values...In this case, I believe the two are not inconsistent. As a person of faith, I believe we are called to care for each other and work to ease human suffering. I believe we have been given the capacity and will to pursue this research — and the humanity and conscience to do so responsibly."

Social policy

On January 23, 2009, Obama rescinded the Mexico City Policy, a measure from the Reagan and Bush eras that required any non-governmental organization receiving U.S. Government funding to refrain from performing or promoting abortion services in other countries.

On June 17, 2009, Obama authorized the extension of some benefits (but not health insurance or pension benefits) to same-sex partners of federal employees. Obama has chosen to leave larger changes, such as the repeal of Don't ask, don't tell and the Defense of Marriage Act, to Congress.

On October 19, 2009, the U.S. Department of Justice issued a directive to federal prosecutors in states with medical marijuana laws not to investigate or prosecute cases of marijuana use or production done in compliance with those laws.

On December 16, 2009, President Obama signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2010, which repealed a 21-year-old ban on federal funding of needle exchange programs.

On December 22, 2010, Obama signed the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010, a bill that provides for repeal of the Don't ask, don't tell policy of 1993, that has prevented gay and lesbian people from serving openly in the United States Armed Forces. Repealing "Don't ask, don't tell" had been a key campaign promise that Obama had made during the 2008 presidential campaign.

Health care reform

Once the stimulus bill was enacted, health care reform became Obama's top domestic priority. On July 14, 2009, House Democratic leaders introduced a 1,000 page plan for overhauling the US health care system, which Obama wanted Congress to approve by the end of the year.

The U.S. Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated the ten-year cost to the federal government of the major insurance-related provisions of the bill at approximately $1.0 trillion. In mid-July 2009, Douglas Elmendorf, director of the CBO, testified that the proposals under consideration would significantly increase federal spending and did not include the "fundamental changes" needed to control the rapid growth in health care spending. However after reviewing the final version of the bill introduced after 14 months of debate the CBO estimated that it would reduce federal budget deficits by $143 billion over 10 years and by more than a trillion in the next decade.

After much public debate during the Congressional summer recess of 2009, Obama delivered a speech to a joint session of Congress on September 9 where he addressed concerns over his administration's proposals. In March 2010, Obama gave several speeches across the country to argue for the passage of health care reform. On March 21, 2010, after Obama announced an executive order reinforcing the current law against spending federal funds for elective abortion services, the House, by a vote of 219 to 212, passed the version of the bill previously passed on December 24, 2009, by a 60-vote supermajority in the Senate. The bill, which includes over 200 Republican amendments, was passed without a single Republican vote. On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed the bill into law. Immediately following the bill's passage, the House voted in favor of a reconciliation measure to make significant changes and corrections to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, which was passed by both houses with two minor alterations on March 25, 2010, and signed into law on March 30, 2010.

Education reform

On March 30, 2010, Obama signed the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, which ended the role of private banks in lending out federally-insured student loans. By directly lending to students, the government is projected to save taxpayers $68 billion dollars over the next several years. Federally-insured student loans will instead be distributed by the Department of Education. The law also increased the amount of Pell Grant awards given each year, doubling its current funding. Starting in 2014, the law permits borrowers to cap the amount they spend on student loans each year to ten percent of their discretionary income and have their balance forgiven if they have faithfully paid the balance of their loan over 20 years. Additionally, the law seeks to make it easier for parents to qualify for Grad PLUS loans, and spends billions on poor and minority schools and $2 billion for community colleges.

Gates arrest controversy

On July 16, 2009, prominent African American Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., was arrested at his Cambridge, Massachusetts home by a local white police officer, Cambridge Police Sgt. James Crowley, for disorderly conduct. Gates, who was locked out of his house, had attempted to break into his own property, thus causing the initial alarm from a neighbor who called 9-1-1. The incident sparked national controversy over whether Gates's civil rights had been violated by Crowley. On July 21, the Cambridge Police Department dropped charges against Gates. On July 22, President Barack Obama, commented on the incident over national and international television, criticized the arrest, and stated the police acted "stupidly" in handling the incident. National law enforcement organizations and members objected to Obama's comments and criticized his handling of the issue. In the aftermath, Obama stated that he regretted his comments exacerbating the situation, and hoped that the situation could become a "teachable moment". To reduce tensions, on July 24, Obama invited both parties to the White House to discuss the issue over beers, and on July 30, Obama and Vice President Joe Biden joined Crowley and Gates in a private, cordial meeting in a courtyard near the White House Rose Garden; this became known colloquially as the "Beer Summit".

Wall Street reform

On July 21, 2010, Obama signed Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, considered to be the largest financial system overhaul since the New Deal. The law recognizes complex financial derivatives and makes rules to protect consumers from unfair practices in loans and credit cards by establishing a new consumer protection agency. At the signing ceremony in the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington D.C. Obama proclaimed, "There will be no more taxpayer-funded bailouts. Period." Obama also mentioned that "These reforms represent the strongest consumer financial protections in history." At the ceremony were Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., and Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the two committee chairmen who sponsored the bill.

2010 midterm elections

Due in large part to voter frustration over high unemployment and a stalled economy, Republicans won control of the House in the 2010 midterm elections. On reflection after the election, Obama blamed himself, in part, for the many Democrats who went down to defeat knowing that they had risked their careers to support his agenda of economic stimulus legislation and a landmark health care bill. Democrats narrowly retained the Senate majority and will continue to control it through the 112th Congress.

Obama called the elections "humbling" and a "shellacking". He said that the results came because not enough Americans had felt the effects of the economic recovery.

2012 re-election campaign

On April 4, 2011, President Obama announced that he would seek re-election in the 2012 presidential election. The campaign will be based in Chicago and is being run by many former members of the White House staff and members of the successful 2008 campaign.

References

External links

"Obama's People" (photography: Nadav Kander)

The Official White House YouTube page

"President Barack Obama's Inaugural Address". The White House.

"Wrapping Up Open for Questions". The White House.

"President Obama's State of the Union Address" C-SPAN.

Obama, Barack

cs:Vláda Baracka Obamy es:Administración Obama fr:Présidence de Barack Obama ko:버락 오바마 행정부 sw:Urais wa Barack Obama no:Barack Obamas regjering ru:Президентство Барака Обамы sv:Obamas kabinett th:การดำรงตำแหน่งประธานาธิบดีของบารัก โอบามา

name	Lyrics Born
background	solo_singer
birth name	Tsutomu Shimura
alias	LB, Asia Born, Macka Dang Dang
born	Tokyo, Japan
origin	Berkeley, California, United States
instrument	Vocals
genre	Hip hop, pop, rock, funk
occupation	Radio DJ, MC, producer, recording artist
years active	1992–present
label	Quannum Projects, Epitaph, Decon
associated acts	Quannum ProjectsLatyrxLateefBlackaliciousGift of GabJoyo VelardeJurassic 5
website
notable instruments	}}

Lyrics Born (born Tsutomu "Tom" Shimura), is a Japanese American rapper, record producer, songwriter, and voice over announcer. He is also one half of the group Latyrx with Lateef the Truthspeaker.

History

Through his childhood, Shimura lived in Tokyo, Japan, Salt Lake City, Utah, and Berkeley, California. He is the son of Japanese author, Takao Shimura, and an Italian/Jewish-American union organizer, Charlotte Arzio-Shimura. Shimura's parents were divorced by age 2, at which point he moved with his mother from Tokyo to Salt Lake City, Utah, and then finally to Berkeley California.

Shimura attended Berkeley public schools from the time he was 6 yrs old, often excelling in creative writing. "I think I got my gift from my father. Not only the talent, but the work ethic and lifestyle. Being an author and all, I saw how hard he worked, the hours he kept, and how much focus it required." He began dabbling in Hip-Hop and rapping when he entered Berkeley High School. He left after one year, and entered Bishop O'Dowd High School in Oakland. He left again after his sophomore year, and graduated from St. Mary's High School, located in Berkeley, California in 1990. Shimura began his hip hop career while at college at University of California, Davis, where he was a DJ at the college station KDVS. He is a founding member of the seminal, independent record label, Quannum Projects. He came up with fellow Bay Area and UC Davis companions Gift of Gab, and Chief Xcel of Blackalicious, Lateef the Truthspeaker, DJ Shadow, Joseph Patel, and Jeff Chang (formerly known as DJ Zen).

He changed his stage name from Asia Born to Lyrics Born in 1995 citing the desire to have his career based on his merits as opposed to his ethnicity.

Career

In 1993, Lyrics Born released his first single "Send Them", under the moniker "Asia Born", on the independent record label Solesides. In 1996 he formed the group "Latyrx", with Solesides label mate and fellow Bay-Area native, Lateef The Truthspeaker. Latyrx is a combination of the names, "Lateef" and "Lyrics". In 1997 Latyrx released the seminal album, "Latyrx-The Album". The album was well-received and is often regarded as a classic within underground circles. 1 year later Solesides was disbanded and reformed as the current Quannum Projects label. In 1999, to commemorate the transformation of Solesides to Quannum, the label released "Quannum Spectrum", a label compilation executive-produced by Lyrics Born. The album spawned the international hit single and video, "I Changed My Mind". This would also signify Lyrics Born's first collaboration with German Funk group, The Poets of Rhythm, whom he would later executive produce for the Quannum label.

Lyrics Born released his first solo LP on Quannum Projects, ''Later That Day'', in October 2003, which spawned the hit single, "Callin' Out". The album features guests such as Cut Chemist of Jurassic 5, Gift of Gab, Lateef the Truthspeaker and Born's wife Joyo Velarde. In April 2005, he released a remix album, ''Same !@#$ Different Day'' which was again released on his own Quannum Projects label. The album features remixes of five songs from ''Later That Day'' along with a number of new tracks which feature guests such as Bay Area legend E-40, hip-hop icon KRS-One, Stereo MCs, Casual of Hieroglyphics, Evidence of Dilated Peoples, DJ Shadow and Joyo Velarde. Also in 2005, Born released ''The Lyrics Born Variety Show: Season One'' CD, which was essentially an old-school mix tape vibe with remixes and blends of his studio albums as well as guest appearances on other artist's songs in addition to exclusive tracks.

He has toured relentlessly for years in North America, South America, Australia, Europe and Japan and averages 150 shows per year.

Early in 2005, Lyrics Born replaced his usual DJ, D-Sharp with a live band. The original band consisted of versed Bay Area musicians Kevin Choice (keys, vox), B'nai Rebelfront (guitar, vox), Darius Minaee (drums) and Uriah Duffy (bass, vox). Over the years the line-up has also consisted of other various musicians including bassist Marcus Phillips, drummer Thomas McCree and keyboardists Mike Blankenship (Lauryn Hill) and Kat Ouano of fellow Bay Area group Crown City Rockers.

In 2006, he released ''The Lyrics Born Variety Show: Season Two'' CD mixed by DJ Enki, comprised once again of remixes, guest appearances, collaborations and exclusive material.

Lyrics Born's first live album ''Overnite Encore: Lyrics Born LIVE'' was released on October 31, 2006. It was recorded in Australia and features half of the album from Sydney and the other half from Melbourne. The album is a live set featuring his backing band, as well as three new bonus studio tracks including the hit song "Knock Knock" produced by Hallway Productionz . The album received a 3.5 out of 4 star review in ''Rolling Stone'' magazine and featured artists such as Mistah F.A.B., Del tha Funkee Homosapien, Pigeon John and Tim "Herb" Alexander of Primus. The CD was the first live album to be released by Quannum Projects.

His third mixtape, "The Lyrics Born Variety Show Season Three", featuring guest appearances by Chali 2na of Jurassic 5, The Gift of Gab, Lateef the Truthspeaker, Del Tha Funkee Homosapien, Joyo Velarde, Jake One, Pigeon John and more, was released in February 2008. The album was first released as a limited edition download available only on his website for $1.99. The mixtape featured exclusive tracks from his then upcoming new album, "Everywhere at Once", as well as previously unreleased studio tracks.

Lyrics Born released his 2nd full length studio album, "Everywhere at Once" on April 22, 2008 on Epitaph/Anti- Records. The album is the MC/Producer's first studio release to integrate members of his live band instead of primarily sample-based loops. The record also features Chali 2na of Jurassic 5, Joyo Velarde, C-Holiday, DJ D-Sharp, Myron Glasper and hip-hop producers Jake One and Trackademicks who co-produced some of the album's tracks.

The album spawned a video for the hit single, "I Like It, I Love It" which features the MC in various character costumes including Merlin the Wizard, Army Soldiers, Mr. T and more. The video was directed by Neon and was featured on MtvU, Australia's Rage and MySpace. The song itself was featured in the 2009 reboot of the movie, ''Friday the 13th'', which was #1 at the box office its first week out.

Other singles off the album that followed were "Hott 2 Deff", "Differences", "Top Shelf" and "Whispers", the latter of which also spawned a music video showcasing images of the MC's late friend and one-time Solesides alum, Benjamin "Mack B-Dog" Davis (whom the song was written about) intercut with performance footage of Lyrics Born. The video was directed by HKL Films and included in Pitchfork.com's top videos of 2008.

''Everywhere at Once'' was the most downloaded hip-hop album of the week on iTunes in its second week out.

In March 2009 Lyrics Born released "Funky Hit Records", the first single off of his forthcoming new album, 'As U Were'. The track was released on the internet as a free download to fans and was quickly picked up by Australia's Triple J Radio who began to play the song on air. Similar instances happened in the US when KEXP in Seattle began playing the track as well. The Lyrics Born/Trackademicks-produced song's launch included a music video which was featured on YouTube, gaining nearly 250,000 views to date. Riding the momentum of the song's buzz, the track was worked to college radio where it ended up at #1 on both RapAttack and RapNetwork charts.

Lyrics Born released a fourth mixtape in his hit franchise, 'The Lyrics Born Variety Show', featuring collaborations, remixes, exclusives and special guests. The mixtape is released via Born's own Mobile Home Recordings in conjunction with VTech. The mixtape's release date was July 7, 2009 and features artists such as Kasabian, Soulico, Dosmoccos, Joyo Velarde, J-Boogie and more. Coinciding with the mixtape release was a new single and music video for the Latyrx reunion track, "Pushed Aside, Pulled Apart". The track features Lateef the Truthspeaker while the video was directed by Ra LaMotta from ApSci.

Lyrics Born released a second proper single from his album As U Were titled "Lies X 3" with a video directed by Yoram Benz in the summer of 2010. The album As U Were was released on Decon Records and Born's own Mobile Home Recordings on October 26, 2010.

Voiceover

In the fall of 2008 Lyrics Born became the voice over announcer for Cartoon Network's new Friday night franchise, 'You Are Here'. The MC currently voices bumpers for Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Batman, The Secret Saturdays, Ben 10: Alien Force and more.

In 2009 the vocalist was featured as part of an exclusive radio ad campaign for the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, CA.

Style

Lyrics Born's rhymes showcase a large vocabulary, and often complex rhythmic patterns, deployed via regular use of various rhyming techniques, such as alliteration, internal rhyme, and double entendres. His style also frequently blends such techniques with melody, for which he has coined the term "Em-singing". His style is influenced by groups and artists such as James Brown, Curtis Mayfield, Syl Johnson, KRS-One, John Hendricks, Rakim, Kool G. Rap, The Sugarhill Gang and Ice Cube is often conversational, observant, and melodious. His signature, sandy baritone speaking/rapping voice and "Bay Area drawl" has drawn comparisons to Barry White, Tone-Loc, and Tom Waits. Songs such as "Before and After" explore the subtleties of day-to-day human relations while "The Last Trumpet" (with Lateef) features a very politically charged and globally conscious mindset.

His collaborations with Lateef on Latyrx records often see them trading lyrics back and forth in quick succession - Lyrics Born and Lateef's methodology for writing this type of lyric is described by Lateef in the book ''How to Rap'': "With Latyrx stuff, when we have parts that we’re writing that we’re both going to be trading off, we write them together for the most part. I’ll sit there and write a rhyme, like I’ll write a line or two and then we’ll break up who’s gonna say what, and he’ll write a line or two and we’ll break up who’s gonna say what. It’s a very organic process."

Collaborations

Lyrics Born has collaborated with many artists including Kasabian, Galactic, DJ Shadow, The Bamboos, Soulico, Dosmoccos, Blackalicious, Jurassic 5, DJ Z-Trip (on the 2005 song "The Get Down"), Diverse (on the song "Explosive"), Tommy Guerrero, R. L. Burnside (on the song "Someday Baby"), Morcheeba, Zion I, Mistah F.A.B. and Pigeon John.

He was instrumental in the signing of Pigeon John to Quannum in 2005 and executive produced and A&R;'d the first album from the Los Angeles-based rapper on Quannum Projects, ''Pigeon John and the Summertime Pool Party'', which was released in 2006. He executive-produced the debut EP and album from Joyo Velarde and is currently working on his forthcoming record, 'As U Were', due in the fourth quarter of 2010.

Discography

LPs

"Latyrx (The Album)" (1997, Solesides)

"Latyrx-The Muzapper's Remixes" (1998, Solesides)

''Later That Day'' (2003, Quannum Projects)

''Lyrics Born Variety Show Season One'' (2005, Mobile Home Recordings)

''Same !@#$ Different Day'' (2005, Quannum Projects)

''Lyrics Born Variety Show Season Two'' (2006, Mobile Home Recordings)

''Overnite Encore: Lyrics Born Live'' (2006, Quannum Projects)

''Lyrics Born Variety Show Season Three'' (2008, Mobile Home Recordings)

''Everywhere at Once'' (2008, Epitaph Records)

''Lyrics Born Variety Show Season Four'' (2009 Mobile Home Recordings)

''As U Were'' (2010 Mobile Home Recordings/Decon Media)

Singles

"Send Them", 1993, Solesides

"Latyrx", 1995, Solesides

"Burnt Pride", 1996, Solesides

"Balcony Beach", 1996, Solesides

"Lady Don't Tek No", 1998, Solesides

"I Changed My Mind", 1999, Quannum Projects

"Hello" b/w "One Session", 2003, Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"Callin' Out", 2003, Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"Callin' Out Remix" b/w "Do That There Remix", 2004, Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"I'm Just Raw" b/w "Pack Up Remix", 2005, Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"Big Money Talk", 2006, Decon Recordings

"I Like It, I Love It", 2008, Mobile Home Recordings/Anti- Records

"Differences", 2008, Mobile Home Recordings/Anti- Records

"Top Shelf", 2008, Mobile Home Recordings/Anti-Records

"Hott 2 Deff", 2008, Mobile Home Recordings/Anti- Records

"Whispers", 2008, Mobile Home Recordings/Anti- Records

"Funky Hit Records", 2009, Mobile Home Recordings

"Pushed Aside, Pulled Apart", 2009, Mobile Home Recordings

"Oh Baby", 2009, Mobile Home Recordings

"Lies X 3", 2010, Mobile Home Recordings/Decon Recordings

Production credits

"Latyrx: The Album", Solesides/Quannum Projects

"Latyrx 'The Muzapper's Remixes EP'", Quannum Projects

"Quannum Spectrum", Quannum Projects

"Poets of Rhythm 'Discern/Define'", Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"Later That Day", Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"Same !@#$ Different Day", Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"R.L. Burnside 'A Bothered Mind'", Fat Possum

"Overnite Encore: Lyrics Born LIVE!", Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"Pigeon John 'and the Summertime Pool Party'", Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"Everywhere At Once", Mobile Home Recordings/Anti- Records

"Joyo Velarde 'Joyo Velarde EP'", Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

"Joyo Velarde 'Love and Understanding'", Mobile Home Recordings/Quannum Projects

References

External links

Interview with Lyrics Born at MTV.com

Nichi Bei Times Interview

Lyrics Born interview with AsiaXpress.com

Category:1972 births Category:American rappers of Asian descent Category:Rappers from the San Francisco Bay Area Category:Living people Category:People from the San Francisco Bay Area Category:Quannum Projects artists Category:American people of Italian descent Category:American people of Japanese descent Category:American musicians of Japanese descent Category:People from Tokyo Category:Japanese emigrants to the United States Category:Japanese record producers

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