The President’s Weekly Address: "Gearing up for a fight"
February 28, 2009
On Thursday President Obama delivered his budget outline to Congress, a document that represents the ideas he campaigned on and millions of supporters fought for. "Because it represents real and dramatic change," the President explained, "it also represents a threat to the status quo in Washington." He acknowledged the fight ahead to bring this budget plan from outline to final legislation, but he also sent a clear message:
Two years ago, we set out on a journey to change the way that Washington works.
We sought a government that served not the interests of powerful lobbyists or the wealthiest few, but the middle-class Americans I met every day in every community along the campaign trail – responsible men and women who are working harder than ever, worrying about their jobs, and struggling to raise their families. In so many town halls and backyards, they spoke of their hopes for a government that finally confronts the challenges that their families face every day; a government that treats their tax dollars as responsibly as they treat their own hard-earned paychecks.
That is the change I promised as a candidate for president. It is the change the American people voted for in November. And it is the change represented by the budget I sent to Congress this week.
… I realize that passing this budget won’t be easy. Because it represents real and dramatic change, it also represents a threat to the status quo in Washington. I know that the insurance industry won’t like the idea that they’ll have to bid competitively to continue offering Medicare coverage, but that’s how we’ll help preserve and protect Medicare and lower health care costs for American families. I know that banks and big student lenders won’t like the idea that we’re ending their huge taxpayer subsidies, but that’s how we’ll save taxpayers nearly $50 billion and make college more affordable. I know that oil and gas companies won’t like us ending nearly $30 billion in tax breaks, but that’s how we’ll help fund a renewable energy economy that will create new jobs and new industries.
In other words, I know these steps won’t sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business, and I know they’re gearing up for a fight as we speak. My message to them is this:
So am I.
The system we have now might work for the powerful and well-connected interests that have run Washington for far too long, but I don’t. I work for the American people. I didn’t come here to do the same thing we’ve been doing or to take small steps forward, I came to provide the sweeping change that this country demanded when it went to the polls in November. That is the change this budget starts to make, and that is the change I’ll be fighting for in the weeks ahead – change that will grow our economy, expand our middle-class, and keep the American Dream alive for all those men and women who have believed in this journey from the day it began.
Read the full text of the President’s address . . .
The President’s Weekly Address: "Gearing up for a fight"
A Blueprint for Our Future
February 27, 2009
From David Plouffe:
Yesterday, President Obama submitted his first budget to Congress.
As the President said, the budget isn’t just numbers on a page. It establishes our plans and priorities as we confront some of the longest-standing challenges this country has ever faced.
Watch a short video of President Obama introducing his budget and share it with your friends:
With this budget, President Obama is asking Washington to do something it rarely does — look beyond the next election and take the long-term steps to ensure America’s future strength and prosperity.
It will involve sacrifices and difficult decisions. But it will also boldly invest in the three areas most critical to our economic future: energy, health care, and education.
Investing in a clean energy future will put America at the forefront of industry in the 21st century and create the jobs that will form a new foundation for the middle class.
Confronting the mounting cost of health care will put America back on a solid foundation so businesses can thrive and families can prosper.
Reforming and strengthening our education system will ensure American innovation and competitiveness well into the next century.
This budget isn’t just a reflection of President Obama’s priorities. It’s a reflection of yours.
This is the change you worked for and Americans demanded. But to make sure it succeeds, the President will need your help.
In the coming weeks, we’ll be asking you to talk directly to people in your community, to build momentum and demonstrate the broad support President Obama has for this new direction.
Thank you for your continued commitment,
David
David Plouffe
Campaign Manager
Obama for America
You can also download the full 140 page budget outline that was submitted to Congress yesterday, and visit the revamped Office of Management and Budget (OMB) site for more.
Open Thread: "More than simply numbers on a page"
February 27, 2009
White House photographer Pete Souza has put together a unique look inside the process of assembling the President’s budget proposal. You can see the full photo set at WhiteHouse.gov.
Above: President Barack Obama and Office of Management and Budget Director Peter R. Orszag discuss the federal budget in the Oval Office Monday, Jan. 26, 2009, during the President’s first week in office.
Open Thread: "More than simply numbers on a page"
President Obama Submits Budget Outline to Congress
February 26, 2009
"So often, we have come to view these documents as simply numbers on a page or laundry lists of programs. I see this document differently. I see it as a vision for America – as a blueprint for our future." – President Obama in his Address to the Joint Session of Congress, 2/24/09
Though the full details are not due until April, President Obama delivered to Congress this morning a 140-page summary of his proposed budget for fiscal year 2010.
As he outlined in his speech to Congress on Tuesday night, the budget includes investments in renewable energy, education, and health care, as well as a plan to reduce the federal budget deficit by half by 2013. President Obama explained:
While we must add to our deficits in the short term to provide immediate relief to families and get our economy moving, it is only by restoring fiscal discipline over the long run that we can produce sustained growth and shared prosperity. And that is precisely the purpose of the budget I’m submitting to Congress today.
In keeping with my commitment to make our government more open and transparent, this budget is an honest accounting of where we are and where we intend to go. For too long, our budget has not told the whole truth about how precious tax dollars are spent. Large sums have been left off the books, including the true cost of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. And that kind of dishonest accounting is not how you run your family budgets at home; it’s not how your government should run its budgets, either. We need to be honest with ourselves about what costs are being racked up — because that’s how we’ll come to grips with the hard choices that lie ahead. And there are some hard choices that lie ahead.
The budget outline presented today also makes an historic commitment to health care reform, creating a reserve fund of over $630 billion over the next 10 years that will be dedicated towards financing reforms to our health care system.
President Obama concluded:
In the end, a budget is more than simply numbers on a page. It is a measure of how well we are living up to our obligations to ourselves and one another. It is a test for our commitment to making America what it was always meant to be — a place where all things are possible for all people. That is a commitment we are making in this, my first budget, and it is a commitment I will work every day to uphold in the months and years ahead.
To learn more, you can visit the revamped Office of Management and Budget (OMB) site. You can also download the full 140 page budget outline that was submitted to Congress this morning.
Read the President’s full remarks on the new budget. . .
President Obama Submits Budget Outline to Congress
Front Page: The President’s Address to Congress
February 25, 2009
From the Columbus Dispatch:
Appearing before a joint session of Congress just five weeks after taking office, Obama offered Americans a sharp break from what he called an "era where too often, short-term gains were prized over long-term prosperity," declaring the "day of reckoning has arrived and the time to take charge of our future is here."
During his nationally televised address, Obama said that "now is the time to act boldly" to build a "new foundation for lasting prosperity." He called for new initiatives to develop cleaner alternative energies, improve education and reform the nation’s health-care system to provide insurance to most Americans.
"None of this will come without cost, nor will it be easy," Obama said. "But this is America. We don’t do what’s easy. We do what is necessary to move this country forward."
From the Washington Post:
The 52-minute speech was greeted with sustained applause in the House chamber, which he had helped populate with more members of his party. Republican and Democratic lawmakers alike rose repeatedly to offer their approval of the president’s rhetoric and his promise of recovery.
Obama received a standing ovation when he vowed that corporate chief executives would no longer travel on private jets at the same time they laid off thousands of workers. "Those days are over," he said. Lawmakers leapt to their feet again when he declared that "health-care reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year."
… [Obama] made it clear that he is not prepared to retreat from his own ambitious agenda. The president called on Congress to pass a market-based cap on carbon pollution. He vowed a renewed effort to provide health care to all Americans. And he called on Americans to attend at least one year of college or vocational training, pledging that by 2020, the country will again lead the world in the proportion of college graduates.
Obama did seek to temper expectations in his address, acknowledging that he cannot "solve every problem or address every issue." But he promised to deliver a budget tomorrow that will serve as a new "vision for America — as a blueprint for our future."
And from the Washington Post’s Steven Perlstein’s analysis of the speech:
"Action, and action now," is how FDR put it in his time. In Obama’s translation, "that day of reckoning has arrived, and the time to take charge of our future is here."
… While the economic challenge facing Obama resembles the one faced by FDR, there is one important difference. By the time Roosevelt became president in March 1933, the stock market had long since collapsed and the economy was already well into depression. He had nowhere to go but up.
Obama, by contrast, arrived in Washington just as the effects of the financial crisis had begun to hit Main Street and the economy was beginning its precipitous decline. Whatever he might do to slow or moderate the downturn, things will inevitably get worse before they get better.
For that reason, his speech was carefully crafted to prepare the country for a deep and nasty recession while reassuring us that we’ll pull through it if we pull together behind his program.
…. He sought to give voice to the incredible anger that Americans feel toward Wall Street while reminding them of their own culpability and convincing them that the only way to avoid economic calamity may be to commit even more government money to rescue some of Wall Street’s biggest players.
He acknowledged the failure of government to balance its accounts, regulate financial markets and spend money wisely, even as he called on Americans to reaffirm their faith in government and expand its scope and powers.
He aimed to satisfy the demands of investors and consumers and business executives for greater clarity and certainty in government policies, even as he was forced to acknowledge that many of the details are still to be worked out.
Last night, Obama tried to walk each of these fine lines, delivering his message with the same sense of confidence in himself, in his ideas and in his country that won him the presidency in the first place.
Front Page: The President’s Address to Congress
Libertarian State Leadership Alliance Info — Click here!
February 25, 2009
The 2009 Libertarian State Leadership Alliance kicks off Friday in beautiful Charleston, South Carolina. There are still slots available, so go to http://statechairsconference.org/ and reserve yours today!
Not only will you get to spend a weekend in historic downtown Charleston, you can be a part of:
* " Why I Moved from GOP to the LP," from Indianapolis City-County Councilor Ed Coleman
Libertarian State Leadership Alliance Info — Click here!
President Obama’s Address: "In our hands lies the ability to shape our world for good or for ill"
February 25, 2009
Some of the highlights from President Obama’s first address to a joint session of Congress tonight:
I know that for many Americans watching right now, the state of our economy is a concern that rises above all others… The impact of this recession is real, and it is everywhere.
But while our economy may be weakened and our confidence shaken; though we are living through difficult and uncertain times, tonight I want every American to know this:
We will rebuild, we will recover, and the United States of America will emerge stronger than before.
…The fact is, our economy did not fall into decline overnight. Nor did all of our problems begin when the housing market collapsed or the stock market sank. We have known for decades that our survival depends on finding new sources of energy. Yet we import more oil today than ever before. The cost of health care eats up more and more of our savings each year, yet we keep delaying reform. Our children will compete for jobs in a global economy that too many of our schools do not prepare them for. And though all these challenges went unsolved, we still managed to spend more money and pile up more debt, both as individuals and through our government, than ever before.
In other words, we have lived through an era where too often, short-term gains were prized over long-term prosperity; where we failed to look beyond the next payment, the next quarter, or the next election. A surplus became an excuse to transfer wealth to the wealthy instead of an opportunity to invest in our future. Regulations were gutted for the sake of a quick profit at the expense of a healthy market. People bought homes they knew they couldn’t afford from banks and lenders who pushed those bad loans anyway. And all the while, critical debates and difficult decisions were put off for some other time on some other day.
Well that day of reckoning has arrived, and the time to take charge of our future is here.
Now is the time to act boldly and wisely – to not only revive this economy, but to build a new foundation for lasting prosperity. Now is the time to jumpstart job creation, re-start lending, and invest in areas like energy, health care, and education that will grow our economy, even as we make hard choices to bring our deficit down.
…The recovery plan and the financial stability plan are the immediate steps we’re taking to revive our economy in the short-term. But the only way to fully restore America’s economic strength is to make the long-term investments that will lead to new jobs, new industries, and a renewed ability to compete with the rest of the world. The only way this century will be another American century is if we confront at last the price of our dependence on oil and the high cost of health care; the schools that aren’t preparing our children and the mountain of debt they stand to inherit. That is our responsibility.
In the next few days, I will submit a budget to Congress. So often, we have come to view these documents as simply numbers on a page or laundry lists of programs. I see this document differently. I see it as a vision for America – as a blueprint for our future.
…Those of us gathered here tonight have been called to govern in extraordinary times. It is a tremendous burden, but also a great privilege – one that has been entrusted to few generations of Americans. For in our hands lies the ability to shape our world for good or for ill.
I know that it is easy to lose sight of this truth – to become cynical and doubtful; consumed with the petty and the trivial.
But in my life, I have also learned that hope is found in unlikely places; that inspiration often comes not from those with the most power or celebrity, but from the dreams and aspirations of Americans who are anything but ordinary.
… And I think about Ty’Sheoma Bethea, the young girl from that school I visited in Dillon, South Carolina – a place where the ceilings leak, the paint peels off the walls, and they have to stop teaching six times a day because the train barrels by their classroom. She has been told that her school is hopeless, but the other day after class she went to the public library and typed up a letter to the people sitting in this room. She even asked her principal for the money to buy a stamp. The letter asks us for help, and says, “We are just students trying to become lawyers, doctors, congressmen like yourself and one day president, so we can make a change to not just the state of South Carolina but also the world. We are not quitters.”
We are not quitters.
These words and these stories tell us something about the spirit of the people who sent us here. They tell us that even in the most trying times, amid the most difficult circumstances, there is a generosity, a resilience, a decency, and a determination that perseveres; a willingness to take responsibility for our future and for posterity.
Their resolve must be our inspiration. Their concerns must be our cause. And we must show them and all our people that we are equal to the task before us.
… And if we do – if we come together and lift this nation from the depths of this crisis; if we put our people back to work and restart the engine of our prosperity; if we confront without fear the challenges of our time and summon that enduring spirit of an America that does not quit, then someday years from now our children can tell their children that this was the time when we performed, in the words that are carved into this very chamber, “something worthy to be remembered.”
Read the President’s full remarks, as prepared for delivery . . .
President Obama’s Address: "In our hands lies the ability to shape our world for good or for ill"
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