Zeke J Miller

"If people want to make sure that... their families are safe, the very best thing they can do is make sure that everybody in their family is getting a flu shot"

President Barack Obama said Wednesday he is “cautiously more optimistic” about efforts to keep Ebola from spreading in the United States as his administration looks to centralize its response to the disease.

Speaking to reporters following a meeting with aides, including his new “Ebola Response Coordinator” Ron Klain, Obama expressed relief that many of those who were potentially exposed to the first U.S. victim, Thomas Eric Duncan, have made it through the 21-day incubation period without contracting symptoms.

“What we’re seeing is that the public health infrastructure and systems that we are now putting in place across the board around the country should give the American people confidence that we’re going to be in a position to deal with any additional cases of Ebola that might crop up without it turning into an outbreak,” Obama said, reiterating that “the prospect of an outbreak here is extremely low.”

“If people want to make sure that, as we go into the holiday season, their families are safe, the very best thing they can do is make sure that everybody in their family is getting a flu shot, because we know that tens of thousands of people will be affected by the flu this season, as is true every season,” Obama said.

Obama’s comments come a day after U.S. officials required all travelers from West Africa to fly through one of five U.S. airports where enhanced screening procedures have been implemented. On Wednesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that it would begin monitoring all travelers from West Africa for 21 days.

Klain, a longtime Washington political operative, began working in the West Wing Wednesday to lead the administration’s response to the epidemic in West Africa and efforts to keep it from U.S. shores. He is reporting to National Security Advisor Susan Rice and Obama’s Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Advisor Lisa Monaco.

Obama referenced the two Dallas nurses who contracted Ebola after treating Duncan, noting they appeared to be recovering. “Again, we’re cautiously optimistic,” Obama said. “They seem to be doing better. And we continue to think about them.” The president highlighted new CDC standards for personal protective equipment which were put in place following those infections.

“We’re going to systematically and steadily just make sure that every hospital has a plan, that they are displaying CDC information that is currently been provided so that they can take step-by-step precautions when they’re dealing with somebody who might have Ebola,” Obama said.

It's not what he said. It's how it will sound when edited.

The journalist Michael Kinsley observed that “A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth – some obvious truth he isn’t supposed to say.” New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s sin Tuesday provided a modern corollary.

Speaking at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Christie seemed to invite the controversy by saying, “I gotta tell you the truth, I’m tired of hearing about the minimum wage, I really am.”

On Twitter, Democrats instantly seized on the quote fragment. The Democratic National Committee and Democratic Governors Association swiftly blasted out statements in condemnation, as opposition research group American Bridge posted it to YouTube. “Our hearts are breaking,” said DNC Press Secretary Mike Czin in a statement. “Poor guy. It must be almost as tiring for him as it is for the millions of Americans who work full time but live in poverty because the minimum wage is too low.”

In proper context, Christie’s statement fit within the Republican Party’s longstanding position on the minimum wage: He argued the focus should be on creating minimum wage jobs, not raising the pay scale for the least-paid. “I don’t think there’s a mother or father sitting around a kitchen table tonight in America who are saying, ‘You know honey, if my son or daughter could just make a higher minimum wage, my God, all our dreams would be realized,” Christie said. “Is that what parents aspire to for their children?”

But that more nuanced argument is not something most voters will hear this fall—or when Christie mounts a likely bid for the White House in 2016. Instead they are likely to hear “I’m tired of hearing about the minimum wage,” over and over and over again thanks to his Democratic foes, especially if Christie becomes the Republican Party’s nominee.

The moment was not unlike Mitt Romney’s 2012 line that “I like being able to fire people” when they do poor work—a tenet of the free market, but an statement that played into the insensitive rich guy narrative Democrats and his GOP primary opponents had already invested millions in developing.

In the modern campaign, where every public or private utterance is liable to be recorded or tweeted by a reporter or opposing tracker, Christie’s unforced error Tuesday wasn’t saying something wrong. It was saying something that could be edited to sound like something else entirely.

Jeffrey Fowle is on his way home, officials say

North Korea has released Jeffrey Fowle, one of three Americans who have been detained by the reclusive country, the White House confirmed Tuesday.

“I am in a position to confirm that Jeffrey Fowle has been allowed to depart the DPRK and is on his way home to his family as we speak,” White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said in a briefing.

The U.S. negotiated Fowle’s release through the government of Sweden, which handles consular cases for American citizens in North Korea.

Fowle, who was visiting the country as a tourist, was arrested earlier this year for leaving a Bible in the restroom of a club. Two other Americans, Kenneth Bae and Matthew Miller, continue to be held.

North Korea requested that the U.S. provide transportation for Fowle out of the country, and Earnest said the Department of Defense arranged transport for his trip back to the U.S.

An excuse for why he's not campaigning for more Democrats.

President Barack Obama has found a silver lining in months of global crises: an excuse for why he’s not out on the campaign trail for Democrats this fall.

Asked Monday if it was odd two weeks before the midterm elections that Obama was not spending more time on the road for Democrats, Principal Deputy Press Secretary Eric Schultz pointed to all the president’s other commitments, including the twin crises of Ebola and ISIS, which have upended Senate campaigns around the country.

“I don’t think it’s weird given everything that we are trying to manage,” he told reporters in Chicago, where Obama cast an early ballot this morning and held one of just seven pre-Election Day rallies last night. “As I think we’ve said now for some time there’s a lot of significant, complex situations going on both around the world and here at home and I think a lot of those issues have dominated the president’s time. Given that the elections are a few weeks away, obviously that is a priority as well. So I think you’ll see the president as he did yesterday campaign when he can.”

Few Democrats around the country have invited Obama out on the campaign trail, given his toxic appeal in swing states this cycle. Nationwide, Obama’s approval rating, as measured by Gallup, stands at 40%, just above his historic low of 38%. In the second week of October, 41% of the country disapproved of Obama’s performance, compared with the 37% approval rate George W. Bush had at the same point in his presidency.

Last week the White House announced that Obama would appear at only seven rallies in Democratic-leaning states, and would only appear with a single Democratic Senate candidate before Election Day. The Senate appearance will be with Gary Peters, a Democratic candidate in Michigan, who has been leading by double digits in some recent polls. One of the seven rallies, for Connecticut Gov. Dan Malloy, was postponed last week so Obama could attend meetings at the White House on Ebola. The White House said it would be rescheduled before the election.

Republicans need to pick up six seats to win control of the U.S. Senate next year. Current polling averages suggest the party is slightly favored to win at least that many, with fifteen days to go before polls close.

"Now my grandchildren love it"

Supreme Court Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is intimately familiar with the popular Tumblr created in tribute to her, Notorious R.B.G.

At an event at the 92nd St Y in New York Sunday evening, Ginsburg said she maintains “quite a large supply” of t-shirts bearing her face and the reference to the late rapper Biggie Smalls, known also as The Notorious B.I.G. In an interview with National Public Radio legal affairs correspondent Nina Totenberg, Ginsburg said she gives them out as gifts.

Totenberg: On a somewhat lighter note, I want to ask you about the Notorious RBG t-shirt.[Applause, Cheers]. I gather there are some people he who’ve worn them. I wear mine on the weekends all the time. And people will occasionally—The guy at the drug store said to me last weekend, he said, who is that woman, she looks very familiar, but who is she? I said she’s a supreme court justice. He said, oh good, I’ve learned something today. So how did you find out about the notorious RBG t-shirts.

Ginsburg: I think a law clerk told me about this tumblr and also explained to me what Notorious RBG was a parody on. And now my grandchildren love it and I try to keep abreast of the latest that’s on the tumblr. I have—and in fact I think I gave you a Notorious RBG—

Totenberg: Two of my three. I bought one.

Ginsburg: I have quite a large supply.

Totenberg: Do you have the one—what’s the one ‘you can’t have truth without Ruth'”

Ginsburg: Without Ruth. [nods]

Ginsburg offered high praise for Tumblr earlier this year in an interview with Yahoo News’ Katie Couric.

“Most of it I think is very funny. There is a rap song, and there is one using the words from the Hobby Lobby dissent. I haven’t seen anything that isn’t either pleasing or funny on the Web site,” she said. “I think she has created a wonderful thing with Notorious R.B.G. I will admit I had to be told by my law clerks, what’s this Notorious, and they explained that to me, but the Web site is something I enjoy, all of my family do.”

"They will not be sent to West Africa or elsewhere overseas and will be called upon domestically only if deemed prudent by our public health professionals"

The U.S. military is forming a 30-person medical team to prepare to respond to additional cases of Ebola in the United States, the Pentagon announced Sunday.

The “expeditionary medical support team” will consist of 20 critical care nurses, five doctors trained in infectious disease, and five trainers in infectious disease protocols, Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby said in a statement.

“In response to a request from the Department of Health and Human Services—and as an added prudent measure to ensure our nation is ready to respond quickly, effectively, and safely in the event of additional Ebola cases in the United States—Secretary Hagel today ordered his Northern Command Commander, Gen. Chuck Jacoby, to prepare and train a 30-person expeditionary medical support team that could, if required, provide short-notice assistance to civilian medical professionals in the United States,” Kirby said.

The team will begin specialized training in infection control and the use of personal protective equipment within the next week, at Fort Sam Houston.

“Upon conclusion of training, team members will remain in a ‘prepare to deploy’ status for 30 days, available to be sent to other [contiguous United States] locations as required,” Kirby said. “They will not be sent to West Africa or elsewhere overseas and will be called upon domestically only if deemed prudent by our public health professionals.”

Up to 4,000 American troops are being deployed to assist in responding to the Ebola epidemic in West Africa, but they are not involved in direct patient care.

The Pentagon team formation follows last week’s Ebola diagnosis of a second health care professional in Dallas, the third confirmed case of the virus in the United States, causing public concern about the spread of the disease to reach new heights.

The virus is only spread through direct contact with the bodily fluids of those who are symptomatic with the disease.

U.S. officials say they are confident they can stop the spread of the disease in the U.S. In an appearance on Fox News Sunday, Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the National Institutes of Health reiterated that the risk of an outbreak in the U.S. is minimal.

“There aren’t absolutes. Nothing is completely risk-free,” he said. “But the relative risk of things, people need to understand, is very, very small.”

A State Department investigation has found that aides to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton contributed to the “appearance of undue influence and favoritism” in three departmental investigations related to alleged sexual conduct by officials in the field.

In the highest-level case, the department’s inspector general found that senior State Department officials declared an allegation that the U.S. Ambassador to Belgium had solicited a prostitute in a public park as a “management issue.” The move effectively halted an investigation by the department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security. The ambassador, Howard Gutman, was recalled to Washington from Belgium to meet with Under Secretary of State for Management Patrick Kennedy and Clinton Counselor and Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills, according to the report.

“At the meeting, the Ambassador denied the allegations and was then permitted to return to post. The Department took no further action affecting the Ambassador.” But the inspector general report finds that department officials offered varying reasons for declaring it a “management issue,” and that the diplomatic security investigation was halted before all potential witnesses, including the Ambassador, were interviewed.

In the second case, department managers were found to have interfered in the investigation into a Regional Security Officer accused of sexual misconduct and harassment. In the third, the Assistant Secretary of State for Diplomatic Security was found to have improperly delayed for four months a diplomatic security interview with Brett McGurk, the Obama administration nominee’s to be Ambassador to Iraq in 2012. McGurk withdrew his nomination after flirtatious emails were leaked between him and a then-Wall Street Journal reporter while the two were based in Baghdad in 2008. The inspector general said the investigation into the leak was brought to a temporary standstill until McGurk could be interviewed.

The revelations were first reported in a 2013 leaked draft of the inspector general report.

Republicans, looking for any ammunition to use against Clinton as she prepares for a likely presidential run in 2016, are likely to attempt tying Clinton to the report’s findings, though the inspector general did not find any direct link to the former secretary.