Obama's First 100 Days: Ten Achievements You Might Have Missed

Despite the anticipation that accompanies it, the marking of a president's first 100 days in office is a decidedly predictable affair. The White House, while downplaying the metric, nevertheless goes to great lengths to stress the enormity of its own accomplishments. Critics, not surprisingly, carry a diametrically different message; only this time, terms like socialist and fascist are bandied about.

That said, conservatives and progressives alike do seem to be in agreement on one aspect of the Obama presidency: one hundred days into office and a lot has been done. From new approaches to two wars to more than a trillion dollars of government spending; from pirate attacks to flu epidemics; from controversial cartoons to Senatorial defections; a full news day has not this administration lacked.

The abnormally packed cycle has had its side effects. Stories that once could or would receive front page treatment have faded fast. Indeed, some of the most consequential changes made by the president to date - affecting our nation's health care system, infrastructure, urban and foreign policy - have received modest to little coverage, either discussed but not appreciated, or reported but not in great depth. As Obama gets set to host a press conference marking his first 100 days, the Huffington Post asked administration officials as well as Democrats inside and out of government for their picks of under-appreciated stories during this time period. Here are ten of those stories.

Health Care: The Obama White House cleared an important hurdle in the health care reform debate when it appropriated $19 billion in the stimulus package to help implement an electronic medical record system. The money is paltry compared to the hundreds of billions set aside for an overhaul of the health care system in the budget. But officials inside and out of the White House say its significance is hard to overstate.

"We need to have health IT so we have a better idea both of what works but also... so people can share information," Zeke Emanuel, Obama's health care adviser told the Huffington Post in mid-March. "We are on our way in a way that we have never committed ourselves before."