As part of his efforts to promote healthcare reform, President Barack Obama attended a town hall meeting at Southwest High School in Green Bay, Wisconsin, on June 11. The president was introduced by Laura Klitzka, a 35-year-old mother of two who is battling breast cancer. Klitzka spoke about the thousands of dollars in unpaid medical bills her family has incurred and how devastating this has been. President Obama thanked her for sharing her story and noted that she is not unique; millions of Americans worry not just about their health, “but whether they can afford to get well.”

A suicide bomber somehow managed to gain entry to a CIA base in eastern Afghanistan on December 30 and detonated explosives that killed at least eight Americans. This is thought to represent the deadliest single attack on U.S. intelligence personnel during the war in Afghanistan and one of the worst attacks ever suffered by the CIA.

The Navy Times website reported on December 28 that a Defense Department survey of service members for 2008 showed a higher attempted-suicide rate in the U.S. Navy than any other branch of the armed forces.

Obama administration officials on December 6 made it perfectly clear that American military forces will remain in Afghanistan for a long time, playing down President Barack Obama’s announcement last week that U.S. withdrawal could begin in July 2011.

President Barack Obama’s December 1 speech at West Point was meant to justify sending 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan at a cost of $30 billion per year, but he neglected to mention one small detail: U.S. intelligence officials estimate there are as few as 100 al-Qaeda operatives in all of Afghanistan.

The tide of U.S. public opinion is turning against the war in Afghanistan according to an ABC News/Washington Post poll conducted November 12-15. According to the random sample of 1,001 adults, 52 percent of Americans say the Afghan war has not been worth it.

President Barack Obama’s top advisers differ on what course of action to take with the war in Afghanistan, the New York Times reported on September 3.

Former Miss California USA Carrie Prejean has filed a religious discrimination lawsuit against the franchise that operates the Miss California Organization, K2 Productions, naming specifically co-executive directors Keith Lewis and Shanna Moakler and publicist Roger Neal, Fox News reported August 31.

President Barack Obama on June 17 issued a presidential memorandum that extended a number of benefits to same-sex partners of federal workers. The move received mixed reviews by homosexual rights activists, some of whom were more angered than appeased. The president had earlier proclaimed the month of June "Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month."

The concept of “paying it forward” — doing a good deed while asking only that the person helped would in turn help someone else — provided the motivation for a Good Samaritan in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to pay it all the way forward to Chicago, Illinois.