Today First Lady Michelle Obama sent an email to the White House email list to wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving and encourage Americans to get involved in serving their communities.  If you didn't get the email, you can sign up for the White House email list here.

Thanksgiving is a great opportunity to come together with family and friends to give thanks for all the blessings in our lives.  It's also an important time to be thankful for our men and women in uniform and their families who risk everything so that we can be safe and free.  And we must also remember those in our community who are in need of our help and support -- especially during these tough economic times.  
 
In our family, we have a tradition:  Every year on the day before Thanksgiving, we take some time as a family to help out people in our community who are in need.  Today, we're handing out turkeys, stuffing, pumpkin pies and all the Thanksgiving fixings with our friends and family at Martha's Table, a local non-profit organization.
 
This Thanksgiving, I encourage all Americans to find a way to give back -- and maybe even start a family tradition of your own.  Whether you volunteer at a local soup kitchen, visit the elderly at a nursing home or reach out to a neighbor or friend who comes from a military family, there are plenty of ways to get involved in your community. If you're not sure how to get started, visit Serve.gov. 

 
President Obama and I wish you and your family a very happy and safe Thanksgiving.
 
Sincerely,
 
Michelle Obama
First Lady of the United States

Tomorrow is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and it will be commemorated across the globe.  This morning the Vice President released a statement marking the Day and the Obama Administration’s commitment to ending violence against women:

Around the globe, violence against women is an epidemic. Violence robs women and girls of their full potential and causes untold human suffering.  Violence against women impedes economic development, threatens peace and prosperity, and inhibits full participation in civic life. For every woman who has been beaten in her own home, for the millions of women who have been raped as a weapon of war, for every girl who has been attacked on her way to school, for all of the children - girls and boys - who have witnessed this brutality, we must do better.  On this International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, we join with the world community in calling for an end to these abuses. Our Global Development Policy makes clear our commitment to investing in the health, education and rights of women. Today, we are working to reduce gender-based violence in schools, provide care for rape victims, and train health workers. The U.S. government is committed to continuing our efforts to respond to, reduce, and work toward eliminating gender-based violence worldwide.

Today, President Obama will pardon the National Thanksgiving Turkey in a ceremony in the Rose Garden, celebrating the 63rd anniversary of the National Thanksgiving Turkey presentation. The President will take some time to reflect upon the time-honored traditions of Thanksgiving and wish American families a warm, safe, and healthy holiday.

Watch the President pardon the National Thanksgiving Turkey live at 10:30 a.m. EDT on WhiteHouse.gov/live.

The President will pardon Apple and its alternate Cider, both 21-week old, 45-pound turkeys. The names of the turkeys were chosen from over 200 submissions from California school children who participated in California’s Agriculture in the Classroom program where they learned about how the National Thanksgiving Turkey was raised.

In his last White House White Board, CEA Chairman Austan Goolsbee told the story of GM and the comeback of the American auto industry.  It's an inspiring story even told through charts and graphs, but today both the Vice President and the President visited Kokomo, Indiana to see a town that's part of that story up close.  As the Vice President explained in his remarks there, it was personal for him already:

Look, I’m the son of an automobile man, and I want to tell you he managed automobile facilities for my entire life.  And Kokomo, anybody in the automobile business has already known, was one of the great auto towns in America -- not only making Chrysler automobiles but Delphi, supplying parts and so many other suppliers, and all the related jobs that go with that.

To bring Kokomo back, to bring the automobile industry back, we knew we had to change things.  We couldn’t just keep doing the things the way we did.  We knew the auto industry had to get leaner, had to get tougher, had to be more competitive.  And we insisted that they did.  And now you see the result -- an old industry adapting to a whole new era, competing again, leading again, and most importantly, hiring again.  Hiring again. 

President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden walk together before delivering remarks at the Chrysler Transmission Plant in Kokomo, Indiana, November 23, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

In late 2007, Kokomo Sanitation Pottery closed, laying off nearly 100 workers.  And when Chrysler laid off over 11,000 workers nationwide in 2007, Kokomo lost even more jobs.  In mid-2008, hundreds of manufacturing jobs were lost at the local Delphi plant.  By the end of 2008, Kokomo had been labeled one of “America’s Fastest Dying Towns.”  Now the town is turning around, in no small part because of the Recovery Act and the President's tough decisions on the auto industry.  "So here’s the lesson," the President said to enthusiastic applause, "Don't bet against America. Don't bet against the American auto industry.  Don't bet against American ingenuity.  Don't bet against the American worker.  Don't bet against us."

Last week, Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke and Fast Company  hosted a special live chat to answer your questions about this Administration's role in promoting innovation-based, high-growth entrepreneurship.

You can check out the full video of the chat or use the links below to jump directly to the questions you're interested in.

Questions are paraphrased.

• What plans are in place to increase the privacy protection for consumers in the electronic marketplace?
• What steps are being put into place to encourage corporations to keep research jobs here in the US?
• What mechanisms are in place to keep universities from competing head to head with small businesses in terms of research?
• Do you contemplate any special investments made directly to Minority communities?
• What role do you envision broadband playing in increasing entrepreneurship?
• Where does the Government stand in promoting small businesses in burgeoning technology industries?
• Are you working on any new initiatives resulting from the recent trip to India?
• What steps are you taking to help small businesses?
• How will councils help companies bringing new technologies to markets survive the endless Federal approval process?
• Follow-up: How is access to capital for small businesses being expanded?
• What sort of pressure is the Department of Commerce putting on banks to give loans to businesses?
• What projects are you undertaking to address the patent process?
• What is the time frame for reforming the patent process?
• How can the incentive to move manufacturing offshore be reduced?
• What are some of the ways that you are increasing access to capital for small businesses other than the Recovery Act?
• Why do you think that small business owners are not aware of some of the tax cuts available to their companies?

This morning, the Obama Administration issued a regulation implementing a provision of the Affordable Care Act that will require insurance companies to spend at least 80 to 85 percent of premium dollars on medical care and health care quality improvement, rather than on administrative costs, starting in 2011.  If they don’t, the insurance companies will be required to provide a rebate to their customers starting in 2012.

President Obama highlighted the new policy in an email this afternoon, and White House Office of Health Reform Director Nancy-Ann Deparle has recorded a new White House White Board video discussing the policy.

Consumer groups, Congressional leaders and advocates are praising the new rules for helping to give consumers a better value for their premium dollar and brining transparency to the health insurance marketplace. Here’s what they are saying:

American Medical Association
"Patients deserve to get the maximum value from their health insurance premiums, and requiring that at least 80 percent of the patients' premium dollars be spent on medical care can help accomplish this goal. The AMA worked closely with the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) to prevent the health insurance industry from undermining this important patient benefit from the new health care law."

National Business Coalition on Health
"NBCH is pleased to see that quality improvement efforts will be considered a direct medical expense and not administrative overhead. This strengthens the incentive for health plans to invest in developing a robust quality improvement infrastructure than can drive the health care system towards higher value."

AARP
"We are pleased that the Administration has adopted consumer-friendly medical loss ratio rules that, on the whole, strike a smart balance between ensuring value for consumers and compensating insurers for legitimate administrative costs.  Coupled with new benefits under the health care law, these regulations ensure consumers will receive better value for their health care dollars."

Consumers Union
"The term ‘medical loss ratio’ isn’t exactly consumer-friendly, but these new rules are very good for consumers.  People are going to get better value for their premium dollars."

American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network
"The Affordable Care Act for the first time requires health insurance companies to disclose information that is intended to help consumers understand the value they are getting for the premiums they pay. This strong rule will help to ensure that patients are accurately informed about the portion of their premiums that are spent on medical care instead of company profits, broker commissions or administrative costs. It signifies the start of a critical consumer-education process that will finally help people with cancer or at risk for cancer to make informed decisions about the plans they purchase."

Speaker Nancy Pelosi
"Today, we take a major step forward to ensure consumers more value for their health care dollars, increasing transparency and requiring health insurers to spend 80 to 85 percent of consumers’ premiums on direct care for patients and efforts to improve care quality."

Congressman Henry Waxman
"In today’s market, too many insurers – particularly in the individual health care market – charge high premiums and yet spend 30 percent or more on administrative costs, high salaries, and profits.  The American public deserves to know what happens to their premium dollars, and they deserve to have those dollars devoted to providing health care services."

Senator Max Baucus
"This rule delivers better health care to individuals and families and more value for every dollar spent on health care, ensuring consumers’ premium dollars are spent on quality care, not insurance company profits.  By increasing transparency and making clear how insurers spend premium dollars, health reform helps end insurance companies’ abuses, including unjustified premium increases."

Senator Tom Harkin
"Finally, millions of American consumers will be able to pay their health insurance premiums with some confidence, knowing that those dollars will go towards their health care rather than executive salaries or administrative costs.  Because of the historic consumer protections in The Affordable Care Act, insurers will now be held strictly accountable for providing a high value for every premium dollar and reporting the results to consumers." 

Senator Patty Murray
"These new rules will make sure that the premiums paid by families in my home state of Washington go toward health care for patients, not excessive profits for insurance companies. We worked to reform our broken health care system to make sure patients and families came first, and this new rule is an important step toward that goal."

Senator Al Franken
"Implementation of the medical loss ratio provision is a huge step toward ensuring consumers’ premium dollars go to actual health care, not insurance company coffers. Many health insurers spend as little as 65 percent of your premiums on care, and the rest goes to enormous CEO salaries, advertising, or wasteful administrative costs. These regulations will hold health insurers accountable and make sure consumers get more value for their money."

Congressman Pete Stark
"The new medical loss ratio standard will help consumers get better value for their health insurance -- ensuring that at least 80 cents of every patients' premium dollar is spent on medical care.  This important consumer protection is another example of how health reform will help consumers even before full implementation of the law in 2014."

Congressman Sander Levin
"Today’s announcement is yet another example of how health reform is putting the consumer first and guaranteeing that Americans will get the full value of their premium dollar."

Senator Ben Nelson
"This new pro-consumer, states-developed rule means Nebraskans will know that most of the money they pay for insurance is being spent on medical care and quality improvement initiatives, rather than on administrative overhead, marketing and profits."

Stephanie Cutter is Assistant to the President for Special Projects

Today, the Department of Health and Human Services issued a new rule called the “medical loss ratio” rule that will require health insurance companies to spend 80 to 85 percent of your health care insurance premiums on making you healthier instead of overhead costs like advertising or executive compensation. Like many other provisions in the Affordable Care Act, the medical loss ratio rule brings a whole new level of transparency to the health insurance marketplace and holds the insurers accountable.

Nancy-Ann DeParle, Director of the Office of Health Reform at the White House, takes some time to explain the new rule and why it’s so important in this video:

If you’d like to learn more, visit HealthCare.gov. And if you have questions about the medical loss ratio rule or the Affordable Care Act in general, tune in tomorrow for a live chat with Nancy-Ann DeParle at 2:15 p.m. EST.

The President says ratifying the New START, a pivotal treaty with Russia on nuclear weapons, must happen this year.  He explains that failure to ratify the treaty this year would not only mean losing our nuclear inspectors in Russia, but also undermine the international coalition pressuring Iran, put at risk the transit routes used to equip our troops in Afghanistan, and undo decades American leadership and bipartisanship on nuclear security. 

[UPDATE: This event has now concluded.]

Ed. Note: The Department of Health and Human Services issued a new rule called the “medical loss ratio” rule that will require health insurance companies to spend 80 to 85 percent of your health care insurance premiums on making you healthier instead of overhead costs like advertising or executive compensation. Nancy-Ann DeParle took some time to explain the new rule and why it’s so important in this video.

Nancy-Ann DeParle, Director of the White House Office of Health Reform, is answering your questions on health reform implementation in a live video chat for Tuesday Talks. In March 2010, President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law — the Act gives you better health security by putting in place comprehensive health insurance reforms that hold insurance companies accountable, lower health care costs, guarantee more choice, and enhance the quality of care for all Americans. 

Join us for a talk with Nancy-Ann DeParle on Tuesday, November 23rd at 2:15 p.m. EST.

Here's how you can participate:

• Ask your questions in advance on WhiteHouse.gov
• Ask your questions in advance on Facebook
• Join the discussion live through the White House Facebook application
• Watch the chat through WhiteHouse.gov/live

Visit WhiteHouse.gov/healthreform to learn more about health care reform.