President Obama is scheduled to deliver a statement at 12:45 PM ET from the Rose Garden at the White House early this afternoon discussing the government shutdown and the first day that Obamacare exchanges are online. We've embedded a live video stream at the top of this post and will post updates throughout his remarks.
9:57 AM PT: The president was originally scheduled to speak at 12:25 PM, then 12:45 PM, and the latest we've heard is that he will begin shortly. But if you're scrambling to press the play button on the video, he hasn't started yet.
10:02 AM PT: President Obama is at the podium.
10:02 AM PT: "One faction of one party of one branch of the government shut down major parts of the government because they don't like one law."
10:03 AM PT: "Republicans refused to fund the government unless we shut down or dismantled the Affordable Care Act [...] They demanded ransom just for doing their job." Obama says that if Boehner would have let the Senate's clean funding bill to come up for a vote, the government would not have been shut down.
10:03 AM PT: Obama pointing clearly at GOP. "We know the last time the Republicans shut down the government," he says, the economy suffered.
10:04 AM PT: Shutting down the government: It's what Republicans do. "The longer this shut down continues, the worse the effects will be. [...] I urge House Republicans to reopen the government. [...] This is only going to happen when Republicans realize they do not get to hold the entire economy hostage over ideological demands."
10:06 AM PT: "This [opposing Obamacare] more than anything else seems to be what the Republican Party stands for these days." Obama calls it "strange" that Republicans would be so committed to denying people access to affordable health care.
10:07 AM PT: Obama, standing in front of people who are now able to get insurance through Obamacare, reminds people that today is the first day you can go to healthcare.gov to start enrolling in insurance. "For the 15 percent of Americans who don't have insurance, this opportunity is life-changing." You have six months to enroll, says Obama.
10:09 AM PT: Obama personalizes the impact of making insurance available by telling the stories of how the people standing behind him got health insurance using the Affordable Care Act.
10:16 AM PT: Obama acknowledges that there are and will be glitches in the rollout of Obamacare, but says just like people wouldn't suggest closing Apple because of a software bug, people shouldn't shut down the government simply because Obamacare isn't always going to be perfect: Problems should be solved, he says.
10:16 AM PT: Obama repeatedly calling it the "Republican shutdown."
10:17 AM PT: "Congress needs to stop governing by crisis. It is a drag on the economy. It's not worthy of this country." Now moves on to talking about the need to raise the debt limit. "All it does is authorize the treasury to pay the bills on what Congress has already spent."
10:17 AM PT: "If you buy a car, you don't save money by not paying the car note." If you do, "you're a deadbeat."
10:18 AM PT: "This is not a concession to me ... this is what Congress is supposed to be what Congress does as a routine matter."
10:19 AM PT: "It would be an economic shutdown. ... Let me repeat: I will not negotiate over Congress's responsibility to pay the bills they've already racked up."
10:20 AM PT: "That's not how adults operate," Obama says, of the GOP debt ceiling threats. "There's certain rules that everybody abides by because we don't want to hurt other people just because we have a political disagreement." Uses the "economic shutdown" formulation again.
12:24 PM PT: Here's a transcript of the president's remarks.