President Obama is using his last budget proposal as an opportunity to strengthen the legacy of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. 

Despite the long odds of getting anything that expands the landmark health law through a GOP-controlled Congress, Obama hopes at the very least to show the public that Democrats' plans for improving health care did not stop with the passage of the PPACA in 2010, and that there are ways to both improve the law and build around it in order to make care more affordable and better quality. 

For one, he is giving Republican-run states that rejected the expansion of Medicaid another chance to accept two years of expanded Medicaid services entirely funded by the federal government. States that accepted the expansion from the start are, in-keeping with the deal, beginning to shoulder a small percentage of the costs of covering those with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level, however, under the president's proposal, states that join the Medicaid expansion now will enjoy 100 percent federal funding of the additional services for the first two years of operation.