Obama: Economy Worse Before It Gets Better

Pledges A Recovery Plan "That Is Equal To The Task Ahead"

(AP)  President-elect Barack Obama said the U.S. economy seems destined to get worse before it gets better and he pledged a recovery plan "that is equal to the task ahead."

Obama also said in an interview broadcast Sunday that the survival of the domestic car-making capacity is important, yet any bailout must be "conditioned on an auto industry emerging at the end of the process that actually works."

Less than six weeks before he takes office, Obama said that help for homeowners facing foreclosure is an option as part of his plan. He sidestepped a question about when he plans to raise taxes on wealthy Americans.

Obama's interview on NBC television's "Meet the Press" was his most extensive since winning the White House more than a month ago.

In the intervening weeks, the economy has showed clear signs of worsening. Employers said they eliminated more than 500,000 jobs in November alone and retailers reported disappointing holiday-season sales.

"The economy is going to get worse before it gets better," he said twice in the early moments of the interview, taped Saturday in Chicago.

The president-elect announced on Saturday he would call for the most massive spending on public works since the creation of the interstate highway system a half-century ago. In a word of caution to powerful lawmakers, he said the first priority would be "shovel-ready" projects - those that could create jobs rights away.

"The days of just pork coming out of Congress as a strategy, those days are over," he added.

Obama said repeatedly that his economic advisers are at work on an economic aid package, but he has largely stayed out of the public debate over bailout aid to the Detroit automakers. Congress and the Bush administration are at work on a plan for roughly $15 billion for General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler LLC. Congressional leader hope to pass the measure this week.

Obama suggested he would support such a plan, so long as it was accompanied by conditions to "keep the automakers' feet to the fire in making the changes that are necessary" for longer-term survival. He also indicated he did not believe bankruptcy is an acceptable course of action for any of the companies.

The president-elect sidestepped a question about the pace of a troop withdrawal from Iraq, saying he would direct U.S. generals to come up with a plan "for a responsible drawdown." He said in the campaign he wanted most U.S. troops withdrawn within 16 months, but did not say then, nor has he now, how large a deployment should be left behind.

Obama also spoke about his latest Cabinet selection, retired Gen. Eric Shinseki to head the Veterans Affairs Department. Shinseki was forced into retirement by the Bush administration after he said the original invasion plan for Iraq did not include enough troops.

"He was right," Obama said.

The president-elect declined to comment on the possible appointment of Caroline Kennedy to New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's seat in the Senate. Obama tapped Clinton recently as his secretary of state.

[a_nother2002]

The important thing is to make sure you don''t just give them cash without pre condition. A point Obama makes. There needs to be provision for the money to be returned in the end. No more free cash for fat cats.

[a_nother2002]

The important thing is to make sure you don''t just give them cash without pre condition. A point Obama makes. There needs to be provision for the money to be returned in the end. No more free cash for fat cats.

[reaganitegop]

Obama hasn''t the slightest clue how an entrepeneurial market economy functions... and he doesn'' want to, because he detests it.

He isn''t even looking for the best possible proven solution, he''s using the economic crisis as an excuse to ram-through his socialist agenda.

And this is not a spend-money program, because we don''t have it.... it''s a PRINT-money program, with all the associated evils. What happened to the lessons of the last 20 yrs regarding keeping a lid on inflation as a priority?

Any Democrats have the courage to stand up and tell Obama that this sort of big-government spending will put the budget deficit over $1 Trillion?

To quote that accomplished job-creator Ronald Reagan:

"Entrepeneurs and small businesses are responsible for almost all the economic growth in the United States"

What a shame then that Obama''s economic plans go completely against the grain of the proven methods of the Reagan Recovery (+16M jobs)... with huge government-managed programs, higher taxes, higher spending, and more regulation. And Reagan brought us back from catastrophic 11% unemployment... not today''s 6-point-something.

Instead of tested and true proposals, we get to be guinea pigs in Obama''s misguided, Neo-Bolshevik experiments... great. I''m sure his "Marxist professor" mentors would be very proud.


http://reaganiterepublicanresistance.blogspot.com/

[moxford0]

Republican-Just another name for the n-word.

[papabc]

At least George Walker Bush waited till he was President before he started lying to us!!!

Posted by DaVicar1
-------------

Did you really thing Obama was for Change?
He just has different puppet masters pulling his strings. His change is towards socialist along with the left.

[papabc]

You might want to go read some real FACTS instead of promoting myths from the democrapic pig trough of lies and propaganda.

Posted by RowdynTex
------------------

You want to use facts? We need no stinking Facts. We can make up our own....

Haaa Haaa.

In the mid to late 1990s the industry here shipped jobs to Singapore, Mexica, China, Hungry. Rember the new layoff phrase "Down Size". There were lots of them and the company I work at down sized over 50% of the workforce by 1998-1999. Now look, most of our jobs are in China, India, Thialand and so no. No end in site yet.

9/11 just seemed to make it worse yets.

[papabc]

The thing with congress (Both party problem) is theye is not accountability for the money spent.

Where has that $700B gone? Heard this morning that a few solvent banks were give $5-10B at 5% interest. No conditions on how it will be used and there was not time limit for its return to the people.

Congress has either thrown or allowed use of that $700+B with little accountability. What is wrong with them. It is not helping this financial problem. Is will make it deeper.

If you or I were to run our personal finances like the government does we would be broke and on the street.

When congress does this they say " Oh! Well! .... We need more money from the tax payers."

[freedomobama]

LEGALIZE MARIJUANA FOR THE ECONOMY!

[petro49l]

The economy was greatly mismanaged on the state level. Fiscal incompetents like Ed Rendell in Pennsylvania practically bankrupted the State. Barack Obama needs a clean sweep. The political parasites from the Clinton Administration must be terminated from their positions. Barack should use his own people.

[stloubill]

People like Tex don''t want to talk about Bush borrowing HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS from Mideast and Chinese banks. Or how we are over 10 TRILLION in debt. All these morons hear is "tax cuts" and they waddle away smiling.