Obama Demonstrates Bold Leadership On Complex Issues

Photo: Chip Somodevilla
Getty Images

This week's Supreme Court decision to uphold the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) marked a major victory in President Obama's courageous fight to revise the broken healthcare system in America.

While the ACA may be both Obama's signature achievement and his achilles heel, there is no denying its boldness.

The President’s attack on the lobbyist-dominated monstrosity that is the American healthcare system showed enormous mettle. Regardless of what one thinks of Obamacare, it should be noted that no other president has been able to muster the know-how, the political muscle, and the intestinal fortitude to successfully pass legislation to overhaul our broken healthcare system.

Obamacare is not the only recent example of the President's willingness to take a stand and lead America forward. 

Two weeks ago, in a statement delivered from the White House Rose Garden, the President declared the United States will no longer pursue deportation of undocumented immigrants who were brought into the country illegally as children.

Conservative pundits questioned the President’s motives in making the election-year policy change, while Republican Congressional leaders had relatively little to say on the issue, partly in deference to Mitt Romney, who continues to take a nuanced non-position on the announced changes.

Why would the President take the politically risky step of allowing some illegal immigrant children to stay in the U.S.?

The End of AIDS Is Only Dollars Away

The iconic symbol of
support for those with AIDS

Have you heard that the beginning of the end of the AIDS pandemic is on the horizon?

In what to me is the most under-reported story of 2011, scientists announced a major breakthrough in the global fight against the spread of AIDS. New research shows that the antiviral drugs used to treat those who already have HIV can actually prevent the spread of the virus to others. 

Amazingly, when antivirals are administered soon enough after infection, they are nearly 100% effective in stopping the transmission of HIV.

Prior to 2011, antiviral drugs were seen only as a course of treatment, but this new research indicates that the drugs may be pivotal in helping to actually end the worldwide pandemic. The challenge this breakthrough discovery presents going forward is in large part a financial one. 

Antiviral drug therapy is expensive, and until now, it has only been an element of treatment after the immune system of an infected individual becomes significantly compromised. In other words, those who have HIV and who are still perceived as healthy are not currently eligible for antiviral drug treatment, and consequently, may still be spreading the virus. Scientists now believe if newly infected individuals are started on a course of antivirals immediately after diagnosis, they will no longer be able to transmit the disease to others.