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Obama: Health care website problems unacceptable - USA TODAY Posted: 21 Oct 2013 08:49 AM PDT President Obama said Monday that problems with the new health care website are inexcusable, but argued that the law overall will benefit millions of Americans. While Healthcare.gov "hasn't worked as as smooth as it was supposed to have worked," Obama said in a White House speech that thousands of once-uninsured Americans have signed up for coverage. Obama said his health care team will reach out to tech experts to fix massive website problems that have hampered the rollout of his landmark piece of legislation, the Affordable Care Act. "Nobody's more frustrated by that than I am," Obama said. "There's no excuse for the problems." Aside from the website, Obama said the new health care law is providing consumer protections and benefits for millions of Americans, including mammograms and birth control services. "The essence of the law ... is working just fine," Obama said. In a blog post, the Department of Health and Human Services said some users of HealthCare.gov "have had trouble creating accounts and logging in to the site, while others have received confusing error messages, or had to wait for slow page loads or forms that failed to respond in a timely fashion." As a result, HHS said it is "bringing in some of the best and brightest from both inside and outside government to scrub in with the team and help improve HealthCare.gov." The administration did not provide specific names of experts. For his speech in the Rose Garden, the president was joined by consumers, small business owners and pharmacists who, the White House said, "have either benefited from the health care law already or are helping consumers learn about what the law means for them and how they can get covered." Obama's guests also included "individuals who have already applied for and enrolled in quality, affordable coverage through the marketplaces and those who are planning to after exploring and comparing their new health care options," the White House said. Congressional Republicans who opposed the 2010 health care law said the initial problems call the entire program into question. Citing reports that few people have signed up for health care exchanges, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said that "another campaign-style event won't solve the myriad problems facing consumers under Obamacare." McConnell said that "for months, the American people have been learning about the impact Obamacare will have on individuals and families in the form of higher premiums, disrupted insurance and lost jobs -- more broken promises from the administration." |
Who are the parents of the blond girl in the Gypsy camp? - CBS News Posted: 21 Oct 2013 06:09 AM PDT (CBS News) Authorities in Greece are making an international appeal as they try to identify a young girl found in a raid at a Gypsy camp last week. They fear she could be the victim of child trafficking. The girl answers to the name of Maria, is thought to be 4 years old, and is now being cared for by social services in Greece. It was the girl's looks that were the first clue. She has blond hair and blue eyes, which alerted an official that she did not belong. She did not have the typical Gypsy dark hair and dark eyes. The little girl was spotted in a Gypsy community in the central Greek region of Larissa when police arrived to investigate another issue. Greek Gypsies fear backlash after blond girl found in camp DNA tests proved the girl did not come from the same family as the one she was living with and members of the group are now arguing the child had been "given" to the family for care and that she had been treated well. Others have taken a dimmer view and believed that she was stolen for resale, or perhaps that she had some other value, such as a blonde child is good for street begging. A family home video shown to reporters apparently confirms the child has been with the group for some time. In the video she appears to be about 2-years-old. A charity has published a poster image of the girl and says it's received thousands of calls from around the world, including four calls it called "promising" from the United States. Blond, blue-eyed girl in Greek Gypsy camp sparks child trafficking worries "It shows that it could be kidnapping and combined effort of these people to buy and sell children, and when you have a good commodity like this one, they try to find a better price," said Kostas Yannopoulos, President of Smile of the Child. A man and a woman were arrested and taken from the Gypsy community. They are appearing in court today charged with abducting a minor. Their lawyer, Kostas Katsavos, said they will offer a defense. "Our clients' claim is that 'we never abducted this child, we just adopted', in a way non-legal," said Katsavos. A lot happens in Gypsy communities that is off the books, but this case has raised the hopes of a lot of families of children who have disappeared. One may be lucky, but for the others it may simply open some terrible wounds. |
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