The Speech I Want to Hear

[Bulletin Justin]

President Obama's Speech from the Oval Office


Good Evening.

Last Tuesday American voters across the country exercised their right to chose their representatives and leadership for congress for the next congress. Those who voted spoke loud and clear. The American people still want change. They want more change. They want congress to do its job. That is what I want as well.

There will be many new faces coming to the Capitol to do the people's work and I look forward to meeting them and working with them. There will be leadership by familiar faces that have been in congress for many years. I want to congratulate Congressman Boehner and Senator McConnell. Their experience over the years gives them exceptional insight into how to go about moving our country forward, bring jobs back and growing a twenty-first economy for the United States.

Since they took part in creating the last administration's policies they should understand better than almost anyone else what brought our country to the brink of economic disaster. They should not want to repeat the mistakes that were made which caused millions of Americans to lose their jobs, watch their annual incomes decrease, and turn a budget surplus into a frightening budget deficit to be paid by future generations. In other words, they helped make the mess and I am glad to welcome them back to help clean it up.

Good leaders learn from their mistakes. That is what I am trying to do as your president. There has been a lot of post election rhetoric about compromise from both parties. As you know, I am all about compromise. But I have a different way of defining compromise. Compromise is about finding common ground and meeting the person with a different opinion than yours somewhere in the middle.
So far all I have heard from the other side regarding compromise is that they want it all their way. They are still offering the same old things. Tax cuts for the rich, do away with Social Security and cut Medicare. They look at these programs as discretionary spending. They are well off and will probably never need either of these programs. But to millions of you across America these programs are not discretionary spending. They are what makes possible for you to have food to eat, a roof over your head and stay alive by letting you get to the doctor when you need to. As your president I will never sign any piece of legislation that diminishes or does away with either of these programs. If they want to expand Medicare to include every American, I would gladly sign that into law.

Social Security is not in trouble and has a surplus right now. To continue to make sure it is there for all Americans when they retire we only need to do one thing. Right now Social Security tax is withheld up to $90,000 of income. Those making less than that pay tax on 100 percent of their income. Depending on how much someone makes over $90,000 they might only be paying tax on 50 percent of their income. That doesn't make sense when the lower income people are being taxed on 100 percent of their earnings. As president I would be happy to sign tax reform legislation to remove the withholding ceiling and insure the future of Social Security. But I will not sign any legislation that attempts to privatize Social Security and put it in the hands of those on Wall Street that nearly brought down our economy and made millions of Americans lose substantial, and in some cases, all of their retirement savings held in their 401K or pensions.

During the eight years of the Bush administration the tax cuts for the rich added $700 billion per year to our deficit. During that same time jobs were not created. Instead Americans lost millions of jobs. In addition, that same amount of money was invested in offshore bank accounts to avoid paying taxes. It should be obvious that those tax cuts never created jobs for you. And if we don't restore these taxes the deficit will go up another three trillion dollars over the next ten years. Who is going to pay for that? The people who can well afford to go without that money or you? When those who do not have a job now get a job why should we have to raise their taxes a few years down the road to cover the taxes the rich were able to pay now? I won't sign any legislation that puts off restoring the taxes on those who can well afford to pay them. They need to be as patriotic as those people who get up everyday and go to work and pay taxes on every dime they make. There are no tax shelters for you. You are the real patriots.

During the recent campaign we all heard a lot of rhetoric about jobs, health care, the deficit and of course tax cuts for the rich. One thing I did not hear was specific new policy proposals for job creation, budget reduction, enhancing health care legislation or tax reform. In the two word sound culture I never once heard the phrase “middle class” from the other side. All I heard about was tax cuts for business, corporations and wealthy Americans. The trickle down theory has been proven to be a failure. These tax cuts trickled down to offshore bank accounts and into overseas economies providing jobs in other countries, not ours. I will not take our country in the direction of more trickle down failure. That is how we got here.
That is why you are in so much pain right now, America.

I welcome the incoming congress and new leadership. I look forward to moving our country forward. If I get any legislation that is not focused on the needs of the middle class and majority of Americans, and further enhances those who need no help and are living in comfort, I promise you I will not sign it. We have had thirty years of trickle down. Trickle up worked during the Clinton administration and it is time to return to that philosophy.

I still haven't heard a plan for the middle class. So far I have heard plans to impeach me and waste your tax dollars on investigation after investigation. And it would be a waste. You will get the chance to impeach me at the voting booth in two years. It will take them months and perhaps years to do these investigations while millions of you will continue to be unemployed, struggling to survive and continue to be faced with the uncertainty of the future of our country.

You need to stay engaged. You need to call your congressman often and hold their feet to the fire. You have a choice to make. Do you want to find solutions to take us to a brighter future? Or do you want to waste precious time and money on investigations which will not provide one single job to the average American?

When Nancy Pelosi took over as Speaker of the House she declared that impeachment of President Bush was off the table. Many Americans at that time were very upset with the state of our union and were in favor of impeachment and investigations. Because Speaker Pelosi recognized that impeachment would do nothing to help average Americans in a time of crisis for the American people caused by the failed policies and two wars of the Bush administration, in her wisdom she rightly chose to work for the American people. She knew seeking impeachment of President Bush would do nothing to help the plight and struggles of millions of Americans. Seemingly Congressman Boehner and Leader McConnell do not have the same wisdom and vision for America.

There will be plenty of time in the future to judge both me and my presidency. But as I stated many times in my campaign we are faced with the fierce urgency of now. The urgency of finding every American a good job, good education and good health care. It is up to you, America, do you want to move forward to a bright future? Or get mired in the mud of even more hate and divisiveness that investigations and impeachment proceedings will bring? America, we have no time to waste. Impeachment will not stop one more foreclosure, feed one more child or find new ways to grow our economy.

We must pull together to find new solutions to the myriad of problems we face.
Reverting back to the failed policies of the past will keep us treading water or falling backward. I look forward to all of the new and exciting ideas the new congress will be bringing to the country. It is time to implement new changes and a new direction for America, reduce our deficit, balance the budget and most important, get Americans back to work to guarantee them a more prosperous future.

Good night. God bless America and God bless all Americans.

[AnOhioan]

1. That speech would be better than what I have heard so far....

Calling out the right and stating flatly that a veto would occur on any bill not in the best interest of the average American would be great. Unfortunately, he does not have it in him.