Think Progress

WOMEN'S RIGHTS -- OBAMA SET TO SIGN FAIR PAY LEGISLATION: Tomorrow, President Obama will sign into law his first significant piece of legislation as president when he signs the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act in an East Room signing ceremony. The bill essentially overturns a 2007 Supreme Court decision and allows workers to "bring a lawsuit for up to six months after they receive any paycheck that they allege is discriminatory." The Court had ruled that workers had only six months from the very first discriminatory paycheck, even if they did not know they were being discriminated against. The House had passed a similar bill last year, but it was blocked by conservatives in the Senate and faced a veto threat from President Bush. At the time, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said women simply needed "education and training" to secure equal pay, and said the law would only "help trial lawyers." This time around, the bill passed with strong bipartisan support, winning 61 votes in the Senate; President Obama called the bill a priority during his campaign, and invited Ledbetter to join him on his pre-inaugural train ride on the way to Washington. Countering conservatives' complaints that the bill would open companies to lawsuits, Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), the bill's chief sponsor, offered this advice to employers: "If you don't want to be sued, don't discriminate."

HEALTH CARE -- CONSERVATIVES ONCE AGAIN FIGHT HEALTH INSURANCE FOR CHILDREN: Last year, President Bush vetoed legislation providing health insurance to low-income children, known as the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). This year, congressional Democrats are introducing an SCHIP bill that would expand the program by $32.8 billion over four and a half years and provide coverage for roughly four million previously uninsured children. The new bill would also eliminate "a five-year waiting period for new, legal immigrant children and mothers to enroll in the program, slightly loosening identity requirements, and in some cases loosening family income limits on eligibility for SCHIP coverage." But congressional Republicans are bent on staging a fight over the new bill. "Our Democratic colleagues have gone back on many of the prior agreements that were reached in creating that bill last year," said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). As the Wonk Room noted, "forcing immigrant children to go five years without affordable insurance only increases SCHIP’s costs once the now sicker children become eligible for insurance." Some conservatives are trotting out the same talking points that were used last year to fight the popular legislation, calling it "socialism" and stoking baseless fears about massive federal bureaucracy. Democrats are hoping to pass the bill by the end of the week.

JUSTICE -- WATCHDOG GROUPS DEMAND THE RELEASE OF SECRET BUSH ADMINISTRATION MEMOS: Seizing on President Obama's executive order last week proclaiming "a new era of openness" in Washington, two watchdog groups have asked the White House to release key documents that the Bush administration previously fought to keep secret. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) sent a letter today to the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) requesting the release of "at least 50" DOJ memos that were used as the legal foundation for approving torture, warrantless wiretapping, and secret prisons. "We don't have anything resembling a full picture of what happened over the last eight years and on what grounds the Bush administration believed it could order such methods," said Jameel Jaffer of the ACLU. The request came after Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) demanded the release of "a broad spectrum" of Bush administration documents previously withheld from the public. CREW asked for documents related to Vice President Cheney's interview with the FBI during their investigation of the CIA leak scandal, the disappearance of White House e-mails, and President Bush's role in the U.S. Attorney firings. "Signing an executive order is one thing," said CREW's Melanie Sloan. "Actually releasing documents is another." Dawn Johnsen, Obama's nominee to head the OLC, has previously indicated her belief that such documents should be made public.

House Democrats are stripping funding for the National Mall from the recovery legislation, after a wave of right-wing criticism. The move came after President Obama's chief of staff Rahm Emanuel "hosted eleven relatively moderate House Republicans...hoping to secure their support." Family planning funding was also stripped from the bill earlier this week.

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) and Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) say they want "100 percent" opposition to the recovery package. In a House GOP meeting yesterday, no Republicans "spoke up in disagreement when urged to oppose the legislation by their leaders."

The economic stimulus plan "would shower the nation's school districts, child care centers and university campuses with $150 billion in new federal spending, a vast two-year investment that would more than double the Department of Education's current budget." The expenditures "amount to the largest increase in federal aid since Washington began to spend significantly on education after World War II."

A new report from the American Society of Civil Engineers has "assigned an overall D grade to the nation’s infrastructure and estimated that it would take a $2.2 trillion investment from all levels of government over the next five years to bring it into a state of good repair."

Al Gore will testify before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and urge Congress "not to be sidetracked by the current financial crisis and to take 'decisive action' this year to reduce the heat-trapping gases responsible for global warming." "It starts with the passage of President Barack Obama's stimulus bill in its entirety," Gore told the AP. "And then, secondly, we need to put a price on carbon by passing cap and trade legislation."

After forcing Senate Democrats to delay Attorney General nominee Eric Holder's confirmation vote, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) announced yesterday he would support Holder’s nomination. "I think that Mr. Holder is entitled to the benefit of the doubt in the context of the excellent record he has," Specter said.

The U.N.'s International Labor Organization warned that up to "51 million jobs worldwide could disappear by the end of this year as a result of the...global employment crisis," driving worldwide unemployment to 7.1 percent. Even under the most optimistic scenario, the U.N. panel expects at least 18 million people to loose their jobs by the end of 2009, with developing countries suffering the most.

President Obama plans to "adopt a tougher line toward Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, as part of a new American approach to Afghanistan that will put more emphasis on waging war than on development." The new strategy will include "provincial leaders as an alternative to the central government" and leave “nation-building increasingly to European allies."

And finally: First the Jonas Brothers, now Harry Potter. In an interview with the Daily Beast, British actor Daniel Radcliffe says that he is "so proud and happy" for this country because President Obama is "everything the rest of the world liked about America and now likes again." He later extends a special offer: a "public invitation to the Obamas that if their daughters would like a private tour of the Harry Potter set, I would be honored to be their personal tour guide."