Next week, the United States will welcome to San Francisco negotiators from seven countries for the second round of Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade negotiations. 

TPP is an exciting opportunity for the Obama Administration and the United States, because at heart TPP is about shaping America’s economic future.  We know that the Asia-Pacific is the most economically dynamic region in the world and will likely drive global growth in years to come.  Given this region’s critical importance, we should set enduring economic ties with the Asia-Pacific in a way that creates good jobs and sustainable growth in the United States.  In the TPP, we can sit down with seven like-minded nations to build a platform for economic integration across the Asia Pacific that works for Americans today and in the future.  We are looking forward to productive discussions with our counterparts from Australia, Brunei, Chile, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam. 

Last week I met with all seven TPP trade ministers in Japan, and we directed our negotiators to work hard to build on the momentum from the first negotiating round in March in Melbourne, Australia.  While negotiations are in an early stage, we have already been doing new and innovative things in the TPP.  For example, we are doing everything we can to bring Americans’ priorities to the negotiating table.  We have an unprecedented partnership with Congress to best represent their priorities, and we have been sitting down with Americans around the country to hear their views.  In just the past few months, I have met with farmers in Sacramento, port operators in Philadelphia, and manufacturers and service providers Kansas City.  Next week I’ll be hearing from businesses and other stakeholders in Rhode Island and Connecticut.  We’ll continue this outreach across the country throughout this year.  

We are also bringing greater transparency to the talks.  We have built a terrific webpage at ustr.gov/tpp, where we are posting a wealth information and hearing from folks around the country.  The site recently hosted an online chat with our chief negotiator, and we will do more online chats in the future.  We have also invited stakeholders to the negotiating round in San Francisco to make sure they are informed as negotiations progress and will be updating those across America through a dedicated webpage at ustr.gov/tpp-san-francisco.

Building on this unprecedented outreach and transparency, we are working to build the TPP into a 21st century trade agreement that reflects our nation’s economic strengths as well as its values.  We want the TPP to work for all Americans – workers, farmers, ranchers, service providers, and businesses large and small. 

We are looking forward to a productive week of talks.  And I look forward to hearing from you. 

Ambassador Demetrios Marantis is the Deputy United States Trade Representative

An opinion piece by David Brooks in today’s New York Times reminded me of the old adage, “everyone has a right to their own opinion, but not to their own facts.”

Particularly in regard to the Recovery Act, Brooks gets the facts wrong and in so doing, presents a misleading picture of where we’ve been, where we are, and what the best next steps should be.

Jobs Saved or Created: Brooks cites a model that “suggests the stimulus will create about a half-million jobs.”  That’s demonstrably wrong based on Recovery Act recipients’ own reports, and way off the consensus of outside estimates.  Each of these facts is, btw, a mouse click away.

For example, click here and learn that according the Congressional Budget Office, the nation’s premiere, independent, nonpartisan scorekeeper, as of the first quarter of this year, the Recovery Act saved or created as many as 2.8 million jobs. 

The CBO evaluates the jobs created by the full scope Recovery Act programs, from direct spending on road projects, to teacher-job preservation, to tax cuts, and so on.  But there’s another source worth examining here: recipient reporting on Recovery.gov.  Click on the link and you will see the number 681,825.  These are the number of jobs reported by a subset of Recovery Act recipients, those whose jobs came through direct spending (missing, for example, jobs created by tax cuts or jobs created indirectly through spending by direct beneficiaries). 

Note two things about this number: first, it reflects jobs created or retained with less than a fifth of the Act’s spending, and second, even though it only covers a small part of Recovery Act spending, it’s a lot higher than “half-a-million.”

Brooks may have objections to these facts, but it is misleading in the extreme to simply omit them.

Brooks then incorrectly cites the work of economist Ed Glaeser to suggest that there’s no relationship between stimulus spending and job creation.  Glaeser finds nothing of the sort—the raw relationship Glaeser reports is that unemployment has risen less where the stimulus was larger (see here for a discussion of Ed’s work).  I spoke to Ed this morning and he certainly believes the stimulus created jobs in states across the country.

Current Conditions:  The other lynchpin of Brook’s argument is the fact that in the last jobs report, of the 431,000 net jobs created in May, only 41,000 were private sector jobs.  In March and April, however, the number of private sector jobs created were 158,000 and 218,000, respectively.   Every economist who follows these numbers knows they bounce around, so cherry-picking one month to make your case is just bad analysis (see here for a gaggle of economists making this important point).  Presumably, Brooks wouldn’t have made this point last month, and it’s implausible that the stimulus worked in April but not in May.

The average of private sector job growth over the past three months has been about 140,000 per month.  One year ago, that same average was negative 575,000…per month!   Over the past three months, we’ve gained over 400,000 private sector jobs.  Over that same period last year, we lost 1.7 million.

Economists across the spectrum widely agree that the Recovery Act played a key role in that reversal.  Mark Zandi, one of the most frequently cited economists in America (and an economist who previously advised the McCain campaign), called the Recovery Act “the catalyst for the transition from recession to recovery.”

We know we have a long way to go before working Americans once again have the economic opportunities they need and deserve, and the President is working aggressively to build off of the momentum described above.  But we can’t effectively plan next steps if we fail to objectively and factually evaluate where we’ve been.

Jared Bernstein is Chief Economic Advisor to the Vice President

One of the little-noticed efforts of the past 16 months has been what President Obama and his team have done to change how Washington does business – bringing a new sense of responsibility for taxpayer dollars by eliminating what doesn’t work, cracking down on waste, and making government more transparent and responsive to the American people.

Since before he came to the Senate, the President believed that for too long the government has allowed ineffective programs to accumulate, duplicate, and ultimately undermine the purposes for which they were created in the first place. Indeed, driving this initiative is not the dollars it may produce to reduce the deficit, but a deeply-held belief that it is the obligation of government not to waste taxpayer money regardless of whether the budget is in surplus or deficit.

With this in mind, the Administration has been developing a wide array of efforts over the past year to cut waste, streamline how government works, and make the federal government more responsive to the American people. And this week, we rolled out a group of them.

On Monday, we announced our intention to create a new incentive for agencies to save on administrative expenses by allowing them to keep half of any savings they identify with the other half going to deficit reduction. The Pentagon already has a similar authority which is assisting Secretary Gates in his efforts to cut waste in the Defense Department, and this would add to that and apply to all agencies.

On Tuesday, we put out budget guidance for the 2012 fiscal year which reasserted the President’s commitment to the non-security discretionary budget freeze. In addition, Budget Director Peter Orszag and White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel sent a memo to all agencies asking them to identify their bottom-performing 5 percent of programs.

Also, that day, Director Orszag laid out how the Administration plans to use information technology to save money and make government services as convenient and cost-effective as all the online and mobile services we use in our daily lives. And the President directed the Department of Health and Human Services to cut the Medicare payment error rate in half over the next three years.

And just today, the President issued a memo to all agency heads directing them to take steps to better use and get rid of excess real estate holdings – from warehouses to office buildings and shacks on the Appalachian trail. And the US Department of Agriculture announced a reform of the crop insurance program which, over the next decade, will produce $4 billion for deficit reduction and $2 billion for high-priority farm programs.

All these moves build on efforts we have already taken including: identifying approximately $20 billion in terminations, reductions, and savings in each budget we have proposed; asking Congress for a new expedited rescissions authority to give us a new tool to stop wasteful and unnecessary spending; signing into law statutory pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) legislation; charging federal departments and agencies with saving $40 billion annually in contracting by Fiscal Year 2011 (a goal we are well on the way to meeting);  and going after $100 billion in improper payments that go out from the federal government each year.

In the weeks to come, look for more efforts to save money and modernize government that we’ll be announcing because creating a government that is effective and efficient, open and responsive is a continuing commitment of this Administration.

Dan Pfeiffer is White House Communications Director

Dr. Biden concluded her Kenya visit this morning with a stop at the Starehe Girls Centre in Nairobi.

This is a boarding school for teenage orphan girls from across Kenya. It's a model school training young women in academics, athletics, arts and agriculture. With help from USAID and partners like the Global Give Back Circle, this school is giving girls across Kenya the skills they need for a brighter future for them and their families.  

Dr. Biden toured a computer lab, visited an English classroom and watched a singing and dance performance before addressing the school and faculty.

Watch this video and hear directly from Dr. Biden on how these young girls inspired her - and how she's leaving Kenya with a renewed sense of the resilience of the human spirit.

We're now on our way to South Africa and the World Cup. Stay tuned for more "On Board" updates from the Vice President and Dr. Biden's trip.

Annie Tomasini is Press Secretary to Dr. Jill Biden

Ed. Note: For more information on federal response resources, volunteer opportunities, and assistance for those in affected areas visit WhiteHouse.gov/Deepwater-BP-Oil-Spill.

This afternoon, the President received a briefing on the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill from Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change Carol Browner in the Oval Office. On Monday, June 14, and Tuesday, June 15, the President will travel back to the Gulf Coast for his fourth trip to the region since the BP oil spill. The President will visit Mississippi, Alabama and Florida to further assess the latest efforts to contain and clean up the oil and restore the Gulf Coast.  

President Barack Obama receives a briefing on the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill from Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change Carol Browner in the Oval Office. With Browner are Counsel to the President Bob Bauer and Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett. June 9, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

President Barack Obama receives a briefing on the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Oval Office. June 9, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

Today, National Incident Commander Admiral Allen meet with BP claims officials to assert claims oversight and ensure BP meets commitments to restore Gulf Coast communities. Read more of the latest in the ongoing Administration-wide response provided by the Joint Information Center below.   

Heidi Avery is White House Deputy Homeland Security Advisor

Today was the day of the Vice President’s big speech in Kenya to area university students.   This speech was a centerpiece of his visit because he spoke directly to the Kenyan people about the importance of the constitutional referendum coming up in August, which could lead to major reforms in the country.

He started with a profound message:  “I come here as a representative of the United States to say one thing: We stand with you on your journey to a secure, free, democratic, and prosperous Kenya.”

And he closed by quoting President Lyndon Baines Johnson in the end of his letter to Prime Minister Kenyatta on December 10, 1963 – the day of Kenya’s independence:  “May the responsibilities of freedom wake the best that is in you, and may its benefits be known by generations yet unborn.”

Watch today’s video showing behind-the-scenes footage of the Vice President as he reviews, prepares and delivers today’s speech.

Vice President Joe Biden takes questions from university students after a speech at Kenyatta International Conference Center, Nairobi, Kenya, June 9, 2010. (Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)

A university student takes a photo of Vice President Joe Biden as he takes questions from after a speech at Kenyatta International Conference Center, Nairobi, Kenya, June 9, 2010. (Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)

Vice President Joe Biden's motorcade en route to US Ambassador Michael Ranneberger's residence, Nairobi, Kenya, June 9, 2010. (Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)

Elizabeth Alexander is Press Secretary to the Vice President

Speaking in the Diplomatic Room, the President wasted no time in getting to the substance of his remarks:

Today, the United Nations Security Council voted overwhelmingly to sanction Iran for its continued failure to live up to its obligations.  This resolution will put in place the toughest sanctions ever faced by the Iranian government, and it sends an unmistakable message about the international community’s commitment to stopping the spread of nuclear weapons.

For years, the Iranian government has failed to live up to its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.  It has violated its commitments to the International Atomic Energy Agency.  It has ignored U.N. Security Council resolutions.  And while Iran’s leaders hide behind outlandish rhetoric, their actions have been deeply troubling.  Indeed, when I took office just over 16 months ago, Iranian intransigence was well-established.  Iran had gone from zero centrifuges spinning to several thousand, and the international community was divided about how to move forward.

The President recounted the repeated attempts from his Administration and the world to engage Iran diplomatically: “In short, we offered the Iranian government the prospect of a better future for its people, if – and only if – it lives up to its international obligations.”  Just as consistently, however, these offers were refused and ignored, leading to the vote today that saw support from nations in five continents, including Russia and China:

So let me repeat:  We recognize Iran’s rights.  But with those rights come responsibilities.  And time and again, the Iranian government has failed to meet those responsibilities.  Iran concealed a nuclear enrichment facility in Qom that raised serious questions about the nature of its program.  Iran further violated its own obligations under U.N. Security Council resolutions to suspend uranium enrichment.  Instead, they’re enriching up to 20 percent.  It has failed to comply fully with IAEA’s requirements.  Indeed, Iran is the only NPT signatory in the world -- the only one -- that cannot convince the IAEA that its nuclear program is intended for peaceful purposes.

That’s why the international community was compelled to impose these serious consequences.  These are the most comprehensive sanctions that the Iranian government has faced.  They will impose restrictions on Iran’s nuclear activities, its ballistic missile program, and, for the first time, its conventional military.  They will put a new framework in place to stop Iranian smuggling, and crack down on Iranian banks and financial transactions.  They target individuals, entities, and institutions -– including those associated with the Revolutionary Guard –- that have supported Iran’s nuclear program and prospered from illicit activities at the expense of the Iranian people.  And we will ensure that these sanctions are vigorously enforced, just as we continue to refine and enforce our own sanctions on Iran alongside our friends and our allies.

• Read the White House Fact Sheet on the new UN Security Council Sanctions on Iran.

The President said that while nobody expects these sanctions to change behavior overnight, the vote was a concrete demonstration of the consequences of the Iranian government’s actions, and that it should give an additional push for Iran to engage diplomatically rather than be an excuse to avoid it.  He also said clearly that “these sanctions are not directed at the Iranian people,” reminding all of what happened last year:

Saturday will mark one year from the day that an election captivated the attention of the world -– an event that should have been remembered for how the Iranian people participated with remarkable enthusiasm, but will instead be remembered for how the Iranian government brutally suppressed dissent and murdered the innocent, including a young woman left to die in the street.

Actions do have consequences, and today the Iranian government will face some of those consequences.  Because whether it is threatening the nuclear non-proliferation regime, or the human rights of its own citizens, or the stability of its own neighbors by supporting terrorism, the Iranian government continues to demonstrate that its own unjust actions are a threat to justice everywhere.

President Barack Obama speaks about the U.N. Security Council vote to impose sanctions against Iran during a statement in the Diplomatic Room of the White House, June 9, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

Yesterday, seniors across the country participated in President Obama’s tele-town hall meeting on the Affordable Care Act. Tens of thousands of seniors listened or watched the event while others gathered at more than 100 watch parties, some of which were attended by senior Obama Administration officials.

• Watch the full event, with direct links to each question.

At the event, President Obama knocked down the misinformation campaign opponents of reform have been waging for a year.  Here’s what he said:

Now, this debate got pretty contentious at times last year. I think you remember.  And just when you were looking for accurate information about what this reform would mean for you, there were a lot of opponents of health care reform generally that sought to deny you that information.  And they ran some pretty nasty rumors in hopes that it would scare folks.  I know that’s hard to imagine in politics -- but that’s what happened.

So here’s the truth:  First and foremost, what you need to know is that the guaranteed Medicare benefits that you’ve earned will not change, regardless of whether you receive them through Medicare or Medicare Advantage.  Your guaranteed benefits will not change.  Eligibility won’t change.  Medicare will continue to cover your costs the way it always has.  If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.

He discussed how the Affordable Care Act will help seniors across the country and strengthen Medicare.

This new law gives seniors and their families greater savings, better benefits and higher-quality health care. That’s why it ensures accountability throughout the system so that seniors have greater control over the care that they receive.  And that’s why it keeps Medicare strong and solvent -– today and tomorrow.

And the President also answered questions about Medicare Advantage:

…Here’s what we did under the law.  What we said was, you can maintain Medicare Advantage, but we are going to say to the insurance companies that you can’t use this just to pad your profits or to pay higher CEO bonuses.  Eighty-five percent of what you spend has to actually be for health services.  We’re going to review the rates that are applied.  We’re going to set a rate that is fair and appropriate so that Medicare Advantage isn’t costing people who aren’t in Medicare Advantage.

President Barack Obama, with Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, right, answers a question during a national tele-town hall meeting with senior citizens to discuss the Affordable Care Act at the Holiday Park Multipurpose Senior Center in Wheaton, Maryland, June 8, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)

This morning, local papers across the country are reporting on the recent events. Some highlights:

Pennsylvania: "Local seniors view live Obama healthcare broadcast," York Daily Record 

“If Obama's intention was to re-assure seniors, it appeared to have worked for the crowd at the White Rose center. Afterward, in response to a request by the National Council on Aging, they conducted a poll by show-of-hands.

“Nineteen of the assembled seniors raised their hands when asked how many feel they will be better off as a result of the new law. None raised their hands when asked how many feel they will be worse off."

New Jersey: "Wyckoff seniors assimilate Obama's view of health care plan at town hall teleconference," Suburban News

“Following the meeting, which lasted just over an hour, residents of the Christian Health Care Center had mostly favorable things to say about the speech…

“Lorene Snodderly called the speech ‘very good,’ and said she liked the way [President Obama] answered questions.

“‘He hits the concerns older people have,’ she said.”

New Mexico: "Health Care Benefits Come For Some Seniors," KOAT-TV

“‘When the Medicare prescription drug benefit was passed a few years ago because of budgetary concerns, Congress created this gap in coverage,’ said Rima Cohen, counselor to the Secretary for Health Policy at the Department of Health and Human Services, who came to New Mexico to help answer questions…

“Seniors will be enrolled automatically and receive a check when they reach the $2,800 spending cap, so seniors won't won't have to provide their social security number, Medicare number, or any money.”

North Carolina: "President talks with seniors about health care," WWAY-TV

“Today President Obama held a town hall meeting with senior citizens via telecast. Some folks in Southport came to the Brunswick Center to watch.

“The meeting focused on the affordable care act. One of the first efforts to ease the cost of Medicare on senior citizens is a $250 rebate check for those who fall into the prescription drug coverage gap called ‘the donut hole.’ Sally Turner was glad to finally have some answers.

“‘I think it answers a lot of questions about the Medicare bill, the new Medicare bill,’ she said. ‘And it helps kinda clear up the air a little bit about what's happening to Medicare, what's happening to Social Security, what's going to happen to our children as far as Social Security and Medicare, and I was glad to hear the answer was positive.’”

Connecticut: "New London seniors meet with president, virtually," New London Day

“Senior centers around the nation, including one in our backyard, participated in a tele-town hall meeting on the Affordable Care Act with President Barack Obama this afternoon…

“The president discussed what the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act meant to seniors to ensure that they have accurate information about the new law, which passed in March. The health care legislation gives seniors better benefits, they will see a cost savings and higher quality health care, Obama said. Preventative care services like colorectal cancer screenings, mammograms and annual wellness visits will be available free to seniors.”

Stephanie Cutter is Assistant to the President for Special Projects

Ed. Note: For more information on federal response resources, volunteer opportunities, and assistance for those in affected areas visit WhiteHouse.gov/Deepwater-BP-Oil-Spill.

On Monday, June 14, and Tuesday, June 15, the President will make his fourth trip to the Gulf Coast—traveling to Mississippi, Alabama and Florida to further assess the latest efforts to counter the BP oil spill. 

Below is the latest in the ongoing Administration-wide response provided by the Joint Information Center.  

Heidi Avery is White House Deputy Homeland Security Advisor