Over the past 12 months First Lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden have encouraged an entire nation to commit to honoring and serving military families as they have served us. As Dr. Biden has said: “while troops serving our nation may be only 1 percent of the population, we want to make sure that 100 percent of Americans are supporting them.”

While the primary focus of the first year has been to increase employment opportunities and to promote improved care for service members, veterans, and their families, we've also had a lot of fun meeting with the families of our brave troops and been inspired by the courage and sacrifice of so many proud Americans.

To celebrate the one year anniversary of Joining Forces, we've put together a slideshow that chronicles the journey -- check it out: 

Sidewinder, the Missouri Air National Guard rock band, was at the White House Wednesday to help First Lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden celebrate the one-year anniversary of Joining Forces.

While the band was deployed in the Middle East, a video taken by an audience member went viral on YouTube, garnering national attention. If you weren't one of the millions of people that watched Sidewinder's version of Adele's "Rolling in the Deep" on YouTube, you may have seen them perform recently on "The Ellen DeGeneres Show" or watched Staff Sgt. Angie Johnson on "The Voice." And if you haven't heard of Sidewinder before, be sure to check out their performance at the White House.

Go backstage with the band at the White House and check out video of their performances, including their covers of Adele's "Rolling in the Deep", KT Tunstall's "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" and Journey's "Don't Stop Believing."

Learn more:

• See a gallery of highlights from the first year of Joining Forces
• Find out how Joining Forces is helping veterans and military spouses find jobs
• Find out how you can get involved 

Note: This live session of Office Hours has concluded. Check out the full question and answer session below or at Storify.com

Tomorrow, the White House, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Commerce and the Council of the Americas, will host the White House Conference on Connecting the Americas leading up to the President's participation in the 6^th Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia this weekend. Building off the Summit's theme – “Connecting the Americas: Partners in Prosperity,” Obama Administration officials will join Hispanic community and business leaders from across the country who have cultural and economic ties to the rest of the Americas to further identify ways in which they can partner up with the Administration to promote economic growth and prosperity.

Join us tomorrow, Thursday, April 12^th at 11:30 a.m. EDT, for a special session of Office Hours on Twitter with Dan Restrepo, Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Western Hemisphere Affairs. He'll be taking your questions about the upcoming Summit, and the work the Administration has carried out over the past three years to embark on a new era of regional cooperation based on equal partnership and shared responsibility with our neighbors in the Americas. Ask your questions now using the hashtag #WHChat.

The President believes we should build an economy where everyone does their fair share and everyone plays by the same set of rules. That’s why he proposed the Buffett Rule. It’s simple: if you make more than $1 million a year, you should pay at least the same percentage of your income in taxes as middle class families do. On the other hand, if you make under $250,000 a year – like 98 percent of American families do – your taxes shouldn’t go up. 

Today at the White House the President met with millionaires and their assistants who support the Buffett Rule.  The fact is, a majority of the American people agree with this idea.  Surveys have found that most millionaires and nearly half of Republicans also agree. There’s another Republican who also agreed with this principle: President Ronald Reagan.

The President originally introduced the Buffett Rule as a principle of a broader tax reform plan – just like Ronald Reagan – that would simplify the tax code and lower tax rates – just like Ronald Reagan – including getting rid of subsidies for millionaires that they do not need –  just like Ronald Reagan.  And yet, Congressional Republicans managed to denounce President Obama’s proposal even before he had even introduced it.  Congressional Republicans have another shot at supporting Buffett Rule next week.  We’ll see where they stand.

Let’s take a look at what the President said today:

I’m not the first President to call for this idea that everybody has got to do their fair share.  Some years ago, one of my predecessors traveled across the country pushing for the same concept.  He gave a speech where he talked about a letter he had received from a wealthy executive who paid lower tax rates than his secretary, and wanted to come to Washington and tell Congress why that was wrong.  So this President gave another speech where he said it was “crazy” -- that's a quote -- that certain tax loopholes make it possible for multimillionaires to pay nothing, while a bus driver was paying 10 percent of his salary.  That wild-eyed, socialist, tax-hiking class warrior was Ronald Reagan.

He thought that, in America, the wealthiest should pay their fair share, and he said so.  I know that position might disqualify him from the Republican primaries these days, but what Ronald Reagan was calling for then is the same thing that we’re calling for now:  a return to basic fairness and responsibility; everybody doing their part.  And if it will help convince folks in Congress to make the right choice, we could call it the Reagan Rule instead of the Buffett Rule.

Nancy Clark is the owner of Glen Group, a small advertising and marketing agency in North Conway, New Hampshire, which serves people from across the state. As a small business owner, Nancy is mindful of her business’ expenses, and has had to cut back where she could. But one thing that Nancy tells us she never considered cutting was the health insurance she offers to her employees.

“My personal philosophy is health care is a right and it should be affordable,” Nancy says. “So here as a very small business owner, I will always offer the mechanism by which people can have access to health care.” 

The small business tax credit provided by the Affordable Care Act was important to Nancy’s company. For 2010 and 2011, the credit helped with Glen Group’s bottom line. And now that the economy and Nancy’s business are getting stronger, she says: “My hope is that in 2012 we will … take that tax credit and I would like to use it to pay down deductibles or even to pay … one co-pay or two co-pays.”

In this new White House White Board, Brian Deese, the Deputy Director of the National Economic Council, explains why the Buffett Rule is necessary to restore fairness to the American tax system -- and ensure that everyone plays by the same set of rules.

Later this morning, President Obama will discuss the Buffett Rule from the White House. Tune in at 10:15 AM ET at WhiteHouse.gov/live.

President Obama was in Florida today to talk about our economy, and what he called the essence of America: the idea that everyone who works hard should be able to do well.  

America has always been a place where anybody who's willing to work and play by the rules can make it.  A place where prosperity doesn’t trickle down from the top, it grows from the bottom; it grows outward from the heart of a vibrant middle class.

Instead of giving more than a trillion dollars in tax breaks to the very wealthiest Americans—those who make more than $250,000 a year—we need to be investing in the things like education and research and health care. These are the same investments we’ve been making for generations because they lead to strong, broad based economic growth that helps everyone, as the President explained:

What drags our entire economy down is when the benefits of economic growth and productivity go only to the few, which is what’s been happening for over a decade now, and gap between those at the very, very top and everybody else keeps growing wider and wider and wider and wider.

 The fact is, the share of our national income going to the top 1 percent of earners is as high as it’s been since the 1920s. And those same people are paying taxes at one of the lowest rates in 50 years. To address this imbalance in our tax system, President Obama has proposed the Buffett Rule, based on the simple idea that people who make more than $1 million each year pay at least the same share of their income in taxes as middle-class families do. With the Buffett Rule in place, the President said:

 …it makes it affordable for us to be able to say for those people who make under $250,000 a year -- like 98 percent of American families do -- then your taxes don’t go up. And we can still make those investments in things like student loans and college and science and infrastructure and all the things that make this country great.   

President Barack Obama delivers waves to the crowd before delivering remarks on the economy at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Fla., April 10, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

Yesterday the President and First Lady hosted more than 30,000 people from all 50 states on the South Lawn of the White House for the 134th annual Easter Egg Roll. There was singing, there was dancing, there was reading, there were crafts, there were cooking demonstrations,and there was basketball drills, hula hoops, and, of course, there were Easter eggs. WhiteHouse.gov captured it all on camera, and livestreamed the day from several locations around the Lawn for those who couldn't join in person. But it came to our attention that some people found the sheer volume of choices overwhelming, so we packaged it into one 1:48 video. Enjoy!

Ed note: this was originally posted on the Healthcare.gov blog

The Affordable Care Act is bringing real change to a health care system that has cost us too much and could do a better job to keep Americans healthy.  As a result the law, the Department of Health and Human Services has been partnering with doctors, nurses, hospitals, and other medical providers to help patients get the best care anywhere.

Accountable Care Organizations, or ACOs, are one of these new ways for doctors, hospitals, and other providers to be rewarded based on the quality of care they provide for patients, not just on how many tests they order or how many procedures they do.

Today, HHS announced 27 new ACOs have joined this partnership – and over 150 more potential ACOs have submitted an application to begin in July.  There is enthusiasm and energy behind this program from all parts of the country, from all parts of the health care sector.

Already, 32 “Pioneer ACOs” representing health care groups with experience coordinating care for patients have been participating in a special demonstration program since the beginning of the year to improve Medicare beneficiaries’ health and experience of care, and reduce growth in health care spending.