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Photo: Gerald Herbert / Associated Press
President Obama talked about the stimulus package and his budget at a town hall in Costa Mesa, California.
COSTA MESA, Calif.—President Obama became Candidate Obama during his two-day visit to Southern California. He tried to sell his upcoming bank rescue plan and $3.55 trillion budget and quell the mounting public outrage over AIG. The president made brief opening remarks and took questions from a receptive audience, explaining his strategy to fix the economy and create long term growth.
The president spoke the same day Edward M. Liddy, CEO of American International Group, explained $165 million in executive bonuses before a House Committee in Washington. Obama acknowledged the growing public outrage over the bonuses and told the American people to blame him.
“For everybody in Washington who’s busy scrambling, trying to figure out how to blame somebody else, just go ahead and talk to me, because it’s my job to make sure that we fix these messes, even if I don’t make them,” Obama said at the beginning of his remarks.
Despite the problem with bonuses, Obama reassured the audience that it was appropriate to step in to save AIG and compared the suffering insurance company to a suicide bomber.
“It was the right thing to do to step in. Here’s the problem. It’s almost like they’ve got — they got a bomb strapped to them and they’ve got their hand on the trigger. You don’t want them to blow up, but you got to kind of talk them — ease that finger off the trigger.”
While there may be problems, he promised Americans that he would “rebuild our economy in a way that’s consistent with our values.”
Values that include rewarding “hard work and responsibility, not high-flying finance schemes; an economy that’s built on a strong foundation, but not one that’s propelled by overheated housing markets and maxed-out credit cards.”
California is one of the hardest hit states in the country with a 10.1 percent unemployment rate as of January and a 20 percent drop in housing prices in the last year. The stimulus, according to Obama, would help create and save 396,000 jobs in California’s ailing economy.
This town hall was part of the president’s larger public appeal for his agenda. There will be another town hall in Los Angeles tomorrow where Republican California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will introduce Obama. He will appear on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Thursday, and tape an interview with CBS’ 60 Minutes, Friday. Obama ends his campaign for political capital with a primetime press conference from the White House, Tuesday, March 24.
–Michael Szeto
blogs.jhunewsletter.com
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