By Tracey Webb [twitter-follow screen_name='WebbWriterguru']
Get your daily scoop of what State of the Union is watching today, October 31, 2013.
1. Frightening numbers for Obama. This Halloween is neither trick nor treat for the President, whose public opinion numbers have plunged. According to a Gallup's daily tracking poll released Thursday, only 41 percent of Americans approve of the job Obama's doing, with 51% giving him a thumbs down. A new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll shows the President with only a 42 percent job approval rating - an all-time low for Obama in that poll - and a 51 percent disapproval rating. All recent polling suggests the overall reason the President's numbers have taken a dive is because of a series of controversies that have stymied his administration and Americans are frustrated and angry about the direction of the country.
By Tracey Webb [twitter-follow screen_name='WebbWriterguru']
Get your daily scoop of what State of the Union is watching today, October 30, 2013.
1. Sebelius gets grilled. HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius faced more than three hours of questioning at a house hearing on the troubled Healthcare.gov website. She promised that the site's troubles would be corrected by the end of November, but offered an apology. "Let me say directly to these Americans: You deserve better. I apologize. I'm accountable to you for fixing these problems," Sebelius told members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
Doctors Ezekiel Emanuel and Rep. John Fleming square off over Obamacare and how it impacts doctors.
Rep. John Fleming (R-LA) and Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel talk with Candy about the effects of Obamacare.
Candy Crowley chats with her "State of the Union" panel about the state of politics in New Jersey and Virginia.
"State of The Union" panel discusses the current political message in Washington, including healthcare and immigration.
President Obama has said over and over that if you like your health care you can keep it. In a heated exchange, Rep. John Fleming (R-LA), a family physician, and Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, an oncologist and an architect of Obamacare, debated the quality and access to health care under the Affordable Care Act.
“Almost a million Americans have…had their insurance canceled just in the last few weeks,” said Rep. Fleming. Emanuel countered that “those insurance plans are not worth the paper they're written on.”
Candy talks with Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel and Congressman John Fleming about the Obamacare rollout.
Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI), Chairman of the House Select Intelligence Committee, said he’s concerned about the level of security in the Obamacare website, and that the private information of people who apply for healthcare through the federal exchanges could be at risk.
Though he raised his concerns at a hearing last week, today he told Candy Crowley that he’s “even more concerned today than I was even last week.”
He also warned that there may be only one way to fix the problem – start over completely.
Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI) discusses recent reports of U.S. spying of allied leaders.
Rogers told Candy Crowley today in an exclusive interview that the U.S. and its European counterparts, including Germany, are still close friends and allies but that necessary information must be collected because, “sometimes our friends have relationships with our adversaries.” Rogers also said that European nations need to have “a better oversight structure” and if they did, “they would be enlightened to find out what their intelligence services may or may not be doing.”