Health Care: Obama to Reveal New Plans

Thanks to President Obama, healthcare and jobs will be seeing some big changes. Just as Obama will board Air Force One on Thursday with a flight to Austin, he will also kick off a series of "Middle Class Jobs and Opportunity Tours" designed to push his budget plans and criticize congressional Republicans for inaction on the economy.

The president will be promoting a new plan to develop "a thriving and rising middle class in America", according to White House spokesman Jay Carney, and Friday, Obama will headline a White House event to promote the implementation of the 2010 health care law, an issue that looms prominently in next year's congressional elections.

The idea of the jobs tours is to highlight cities and regions generating jobs and economic growth and show how their examples can be applied nationwide.

It starts in the Austin area, a high-tech hub in the heart of the Lone Star State. Obama will visit Manor New Technology High School, meet with middle class workers, speak with entrepreneurs and visit a high-tech company. He says his proposed spending plans for education and research will spur similar growth throughout the country.

There is "the need to make sure that we have these kinds of jobs of the future here in the United States, the need to ensure that our workers have the skills they need to fill those jobs, and the necessity that those jobs pay well enough to sustain a middle-class life," Carney said.

As the president pushes for what he refers to as a "balanced" plan, one that includes both budget cuts and new tax revenue to be derived by closing tax loopholes that benefit the wealthy, he is expected to receive a lot of criticism from congressional Republicans who oppose higher taxes and believe economic recovery will be slow.

Obama will also kick off a health care event, tied to Mother's Day.

He's scheduled to discuss benefits available to women under the plan, including mammograms and cancer screenings. He is likely to ask mothers to encourage their young, uninsured children to sign up for coverage when health care exchanges roll out in October.