Daily Beast: “America’s 23 million veterans are facing an unprecedented crisis as the backlog of disability claims at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has grown to nearly 1 million–more than double what it was when President Obama took office.”

“Given the breadth of the crisis, this widespread outrage isn’t surprising. But perhaps what is surprising is that for the first time, several prominent veteran advocates who’ve been staunch supporters of Obama are now joining the chorus of critics who say the president has badly mishandled the VA.”

President Obama “has begun his second term by consolidating his personal control of the White House, Democrats in
and outside the Administration say, reflecting a shift from his less centralized first term,” BuzzFeed reports.

“The shift has become clear in the new style of management under Obama’s new Chief of Staff, Denis McDonough, who — unlike his predecessors — acts more as Obama’s enforcer than as a principal in his own right.”

“Once, McDonough’s predecessors, notably Rahm Emanuel, made strategic choices and served as the key liaisons to Congress. Now, Obama sets the strategy and priorities and makes the calls to Capitol Hill himself; and the chief of staff’s role has been handed to a trusted ally who shares the president’s vision.”

“The days ahead could be decisive ones for the main pieces of President Obama’s second-term agenda: long-range deficit reduction, gun safety and changes to immigration law,” the New York Times reports.

“Members of both parties say Mr. Obama faces a conundrum with his legislative approach to a deeply polarized Congress. In the past, when he has stayed aloof from legislative action, Republicans and others have accused him of a lack of leadership; when he has gotten involved, they have complained that they could not support any bill so closely identified with Mr. Obama without risking the contempt of conservative voters.”

Politico: “The window for action on these issues will start to close as the 2014 midterm election cycle whips into full swing at the end of the year. After that, the next Congress figures to be colored by partisan posturing for the 2016 presidential election.”

Garance Franke-Ruta explains why President Obama needed to apologize for calling California Attorney General Kamala Harris “the best-looking attorney general.”

“Just as it’s perfectly appropriate to tell a colleague she looks gorgeous when she’s dressed to the nines for some black tie work event, it would be inappropriate to refer to her as ‘gorgeous over there’ during a work meeting. Doing so takes her out of the system of power and puts her into the system of beauty in a setting in which power is the value that’s brought her to the table. And that, dear readers, is a gaffe.”

Vice President Joe Biden “won’t be following the president’s lead and returning some of his pay to the Treasury, but may if his staff faces furloughs,” Politico reports.

“Several members of the president’s Cabinet have said they will cut
checks to charities or to the Treasury, though most are wealthier than
the vice president. Secretary of State John Kerry’s net worth is
estimated as being as much as $300 million, while Defense Secretary
Chuck Hagel’s net worth is estimated to be as much as about $10 million.”

President Obama called California Attorney General Kamala Harris (D) to apologize after referring to her as “the best-looking attorney general” during a Democratic fundraiser on Thursday, The Hill reports.

“The comment came under heavy criticism from those who said the president’s remark was sexist.”

First Lady Michelle Obama mistakenly referred to herself as a “single mother” during an interview with WCAX-TV.

Said Mrs. Obama: “Believe me, as a busy single mother — or I shouldn’t say single — as a busy mother, sometimes when you’ve got a husband who is president it can feel a little single. But he’s there.”

“When you bring that up you get people who get crazy on us. And they’ll start saying, ‘Oh there you go comparing to the Nazis.’ And I understand the reaction, but it’s the truth.”

— Mike Huckabee, on his radio show, defending comparisons of the Obama administration to Nazi Germany.

Attorney General Eric Holder will join Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and President Obama in taking a pay cut this year as a result of sequestration, Time reports.

The Week: A meaningful gesture?

President Obama “seems resigned to the reality that big chunks of his second-term agenda will die without Nancy Pelosi holding the speaker’s gavel,” Roll Call reports.

“In remarks at two fundraisers for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee on Wednesday night, Obama said he still hopes to achieve bipartisan action on an immigration overhaul, guns and the budget… But he balanced that with an acknowledgement that much of his agenda isn’t going anywhere as long as Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) runs the House.”

The Fix: “By taking a voluntary cut in his own pay — no matter the size or amount — President Obama is forcing the sequester back into the news and back to the top of peoples’ minds, at least for a day or two.”

“And, what he is clearly hoping is that other Administration figures and other elected officials take his cue to forego some salary and, in so doing, keep the story in the news — ratcheting up the pressure on those (mostly Republicans) who are just fine with keeping the sequester in place.”

“Making a down payment on his vow to go all in for Democrats in 2014,
President Barack Obama is courting well-heeled donors in California on a
two-day fundraising jaunt that requires the president to walk a fine
line: Berate Republicans too much, and Obama could put fragile prospects
for achieving his second-term goals in jeopardy,” the AP writes.

First Read: “If it had its druthers, we’re guessing the White House would have preferred to hold off on some fundraising for a bit. But there’s another reason why Obama agreed to these early funders. The president had his own intra-party politics to worry about which. Some House and Senate Dems are nervous the president is more focused on raising money for Organizing for Action rather than help the party, so this is an attempt to quiet down those critiques. Also, the Obama campaign gave the DCCC and DSCC virtually no financial help in 2012, and the folks on Capitol Hill noticed. Today, Obama remains in California, where he hits two more fundraisers — this time for the Democratic National Committee.”

“My intention here is to try to get as much done with the Republican
Party over the next two years as I can, ’cause we can’t have perpetual
campaigns.”

— President Obama, quoted by Reuters.

President Obama “plans to return 5 percent of his salary to the Treasury in solidarity with federal workers who are going to be furloughed as part of the budget cutting process known as sequester,” the New York Times reports.

“The voluntary move would be retroactive to March 1 and apply through the rest of the calendar year… The White House came up with the 5 percent figure to approximate the level of automatic spending cuts to non-defense federal agencies that took effect that day.”

On April 25, President Obama will be united with his four living predecessors in Dallas for the opening of the George W. Bush Presidential Center at Southern Methodist University, Time reports.

John Podhoretz: “Barack Obama is a serious man. Yes, he likes to golf, and yes, he ran a campaign with cutesy Facebook pictures and seemingly inane Flash slideshows like ‘Life of Julia.’ No, he does not seem interested in the mechanics of legislation, nor does he seem adept at negotiation. But the weird condescension his opponents display toward him is ludicrously wrongheaded. They seem eager to believe he is a lightweight, and he is not. Obama is very possibly a world-historical political figure, and until those who oppose him come to grips with this fact, they will get him wrong every time.”

President Obama “will dine with a dozen Republican senators on April 10 at a dinner organized by Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA),” Roll Call reports.

“This will be the second such gathering over the course of about a month. Obama had dinner with a group of GOP senators on March 6 to talk about a wide array of issues.”

President Obama will appoint Julia Pierson, a veteran U.S. Secret Service agent, as the first female director of the agency, the Washington Post reports.

“Obama’s selection of Pierson comes after an extraordinarily difficult year at the service, and amid calls that the next director make internal changes at the agency whose masculine culture was exposed during an overseas trip last year.”