Obama, Clinton make joint pitch to uninsured Americans

White House officials said the rare, hour-long appearance by the two presidents was an attempt to focus attention on next week's opening of enrollment in health insurance exchanges, which are key to the health law's expansion of coverage.

NPR: Commander In Chief, Explainer-In-Chief Tout Health Care Law
President Obama's health care law has so far survived challenges in Congress and the courts. But its biggest test could begin next week. That's when the online marketplaces offering health care coverage to the uninsured are set to start signing people up. The question is, will they come? (Horsley, 9/25).

The New York Times: Obama And Clintons Share Stage For Health Care Talk
After delivering a much-anticipated speech to the United Nations General Assembly in the morning and meeting with world leaders in the afternoon, President Obama turned to health care on Tuesday evening, sharing center stage with the Clinton family at an event to highlight the rollout of the Affordable Care Act (Shear, 9/24).

Los Angeles Times: With Bill Clinton At His Side, Obama Sells Healthcare Law
President Obama accused foes of his healthcare law of trying to sabotage it for political gain, saying opposition has become a "litmus test" for Republicans. The result, Obama said Tuesday evening, is that the law is mired in partisan politics in state legislatures and Congress. … As he spoke, Sen. Ted Cruz, a tea party Republican from Texas, was staging a filibuster at the Capitol to try to strip funding for the nearly 4-year-old law, an effort that threatened to shut down the federal government. It also divided the GOP over tactics (Hennessey, 9/24).

The Associated Press: Reunited Obama, Bill Clinton Tout Health Care Law
Joining forces under dimmed lights in a hotel ballroom in New York, Obama and Clinton laid out the law's benefits and its connection to the economy while dispelling what they called disinformation about its downsides. Clinton, acting as host, lobbed the questions; Obama answered with the eagerness of a guest on a daytime TV talk show (Superville, 9/24).

The Washington Post: President Obama Enlists Bill Clinton To Help Pitch New Health Insurance Exchanges
The two men who stand as bookends for the modern Democratic Party made a united sales pitch to millions of uninsured Americans to enroll when new insurance marketplaces open Oct. 1. … Obama has enlisted Clinton again as his "secretary of explaining stuff," a nickname he earned after his well-received speech at the 2012 Democratic National Convention. The aim is for Clinton to help sell the health-care law to skeptics across the country while combating Republican attempts to undermine it (Rucker, 9/24).

Politico: Clintons To The Rescue On Obamacare
President Barack Obama on Tuesday tapped into what is becoming his Obamacare elixir: the Clintons. For the second time in a month, Obama leaned on the former first family to help untangle the complexities of the health care law with less than a week left to go before the open enrollment begins Oct. 1 (Budoff Brown, 9/24).

NBC News: Obamacare Created Insurance Company Competition, Clinton Says
Obama tapped Bill Clinton to demystify his health care law at the Clinton Global Initiative, where they spoke for more than an hour (Todd, 9/24).

ABC News: One Obama And Two Clintons Share A Stage
It all played out at an event in midtown Manhattan this evening, with former President Bill Clinton moderating an unusual and at times wonky one-on-one discussion with President Obama about how the new health care law will work. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton introduced both men before they took the stage. Clinton, whom Obama once dubbed the "Secretary of Explaining Things," asked leading questions of the president, who spoke at length about benefits of the law he said Americans will enjoy (Dwyer, 9/24).

Also in the news, a look at the White House campaign to promote enrollment in health exchanges -

Reuters: As Ad War Heats Up, White House Pushes To Enroll Millions In Obamacare
The White House on Tuesday kicked off a six-month campaign to encourage millions of Americans to sign up for health coverage under "Obamacare," an effort in which the president and other political celebrities promote the law's promise of subsidized health coverage. But the massive public education campaign faces a long, difficult slog to persuade nearly 3 million healthy young people with low to moderate incomes to purchase private insurance (Morgan, 9/24).