Obama: "If you love me, you've got to help me pass this bill!"

[Bluebear]

WASHINGTON — President Obama anticipated Republican resistance to his jobs program, but he is now meeting increasing pushback from his own party. Many Congressional Democrats, smarting from the fallout over the 2009 stimulus bill, say there is little chance they will be able to support the bill as a single entity, citing an array of elements they cannot abide...

A small but vocal group dislikes the payroll tax cuts for employees and small businesses. “I have been very unequivocal,” said Representative Peter A. DeFazio, a Democrat from Oregon. “No more tax cuts.”

His voice rising to a near shriek, he added: “We have the economy that tax cuts give us. And it’s pretty pathetic, isn’t it? The president is in a box.”...

As he barnstormed again on Wednesday, Mr. Obama told voters in North Carolina, “If you love me, you’ve got to help me pass this bill,” but even some members of Congress from that state may prefer to stay just friends.



http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/15/us/politics/democrats-in-congress-balking-at-obamas-jobs-bill.html

[Poll_Blind]

1. DeFazio > Obama

PB

[Bluebear]

3. Don't you love him?

:silly:

[Poll_Blind]

6. LOL, I don't love either of them. My _trust_ goes in the politician that DELIVERS.

And Obama is apparently in the business of promising but not delivering. I have patience for it but that patience is long-gone. He needs to get his act together and start playing for the Democrats, for the People.

PB

[Pirate Smile]

4. Hardly

[Pirate Smile]

2. DeFazio will never miss a chance to slam this President and Obama said the thing about if you love

him in response to someone yelling that they did during his speech. It was a response to the crowd.

[one_voice]

9. Yes it was...

"I love you Barack!" one voice cried out in the crowd.

"I love you back," the president replied. "But if you love me, you've got to help me pass this bill!"

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20106206-503544.html

[Poll_Blind]

18. Maybe Obama needs to start thinking about changing his course of action.

Just a thought. I've been voting for DeFazio for 15 years before Obama came along and after Obama's out of office (whether he secures a second term or not), I'll still be voting for Pete.

Pete fights for his constituents. And he and my senator Ron Wyden have more Leftie in their toenail clippings than are in all of the President.

PB

[Pirate Smile]

25. He is the perfect Dem to go to for any story where you want Dems attacking Dems.

He's a go-to guy for that crap. He always delivers.

[ProSense]

26. DeFazio voted against the stimulus

Evidently, zero is better than $787 billion.

He'll vote against the President's jobs proposal too.

Fortunately, the other members of the Progressive Caucus support the proposal.

[Pirate Smile]

31. Quite the helper.

He'll wait for perfect.

[EFerrari]

43. He voted against the idea that $326 billion IN TAX CUTS

is the best way to use that potential revenue.

He was right, of course. The stimulus did not turn the economy around, just as Obama was warned that it wouldn't.

[Luminous Animal]

45. Horrors! Of course, if it had been Bush offering these tax cuts, Fazio would have been a hero.

And yes, the stimulus has not turned the economy around. But we are supposed to ignore that and cheer for the new tax cuts du jour.

[ProSense]

47. He voted against

this: New CBO Report Finds Up to 2.9 Million People Owe Their Jobs to the Recovery Act

and this: Poverty and income trends continue to paint a bleak picture for working families

<...>

A quick comment on the effect of ARRA

How did the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) affect the 2010 poverty and income numbers? Because ARRA was passed in February and was in the process of ramping up through the end of 2009, its full impact was felt in 2010. ARRA primarily affected these numbers by creating and saving jobs, the earnings from which otherwise would not have been there supporting family incomes. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the Recovery Act created or saved around one million full-time equivalent jobs in 2009, and 3.4 million jobs in 2010. Without these jobs, the decline in income and increase in poverty would have been much more dramatic. In other words, the new Census Bureau report is ugly, but without ARRA, it would have been much uglier. This underscores the growing impact of the end of ARRA—in the current quarter, ARRA is supporting only 2.3 million full-time equivalent jobs, and the number of jobs supported drops to half a million by the fourth quarter of 2012. This means that the loss of the boost from government action is—and without additional intervention will continue to be—a substantial drag on jobs and family income.

What about the direct income supports in ARRA? Of three major income supports in the stimulus—unemployment insurance, nutritional assistance (food stamps), and tax cuts—only unemployment insurance is counted in the income numbers just released; the income numbers include cash income received from programs such as unemployment insurance, but exclude noncash benefits like food stamps, and are measured before payments of taxes, so they do not reflect reductions in taxes. While unemployment insurance benefits replace a maximum of half of a worker’s prior earnings, these benefits went to workers who were laid off and who had low odds of quickly finding another job (in 2010, there were 5.3 unemployed workers per job opening on average). In other words, these unemployment benefits went to families that otherwise would likely have suffered even steeper income declines, and in some cases dropped below the poverty line. Census data show that 3.2 million people were kept out of poverty in 2010 by unemployment insurance benefits alone.

<...>

[Broderick]

56. Divide 787 billion by 2.9 million

And that number of jobs is also touted as 1 million created. The highest I have seen is 2.9, but many say it is much lower.

Nevertheless, it's so great that millions and millions and millions of people are kept out of poverty according to them by unemployment benefits! :sarcasm: Seriously, unemployment benefits is touted as keeping people out of poverty? On whose standards?? People on unemployment suffer! The poverty scales used for 5 decades is obsolete.

[Broderick]

54. Maybe DeFazio recognizes that trickle down economics

doesn't work and trickle down stimulus is not the answer. Between the 787 and 480 billion, 12000 could have been sent to every household in America because that is what it costs. Twelve thousand dollars to each household! Now they have to pay that 12K back but where is the reward? Nope, we run it through the robber baron thieves and reduce tax rates on the wealthiest or give them more tax breaks and filter it through the machine wherein a job created at the lowest level costs us 200-300 thousand dollars. Maybe that McJob pays 10 bucks an hour, or 20800 or so a year in income. Where is the other 180-280K? Maybe he knows more about what is going on then we do.

[young but wise]

55. He's worthless.

[ProSense]

5. From the transcript

<...>

AUDIENCE MEMBER: I love you, Barack!

THE PRESIDENT: I love you back. (Applause.) But first -- but if you love me -- if you love me, you got to help me pass this bill. (Applause.) If you love me, you got to help me pass this bill. (Applause.) It starts with your help. Democrats and Republicans have supported every kind of proposal that’s in the American Jobs Act in the past. Well, we got to tell them, support it now. That’s where you come in.

link

Now for the title of the OP article: Some Democrats Are Balking at Obama’s Jobs Bill

<...>

“I think the American people are very skeptical of big pieces of legislation,” Senator Bob Casey, a Democrat from Pennsylvania, said in an interview Wednesday, joining a growing chorus of Democrats who prefer an à la carte version of the bill despite White House resistance to that approach. “For that reason alone I think we should break it up.”

<...>

Some are unhappy about the specific types of companies, particularly the oil industry, that would lose tax benefits. “I have said for months that I am not supporting a repeal of tax cuts for the oil industry unless there are other industries that contribute,” said Senator Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana.

<...>

[Bluebear]

10. Go to LBN if you want to become the editor in chief lol

[ProSense]

17. You misunderstood

"Go to LBN if you want to become the editor in chief lol"

...I have no problem with the title of the OP.

[Luminous Animal]

15. Ugh. Still pathetic.

[ProSense]

21. Outrage:

Obama said what!!!

Oh brother!

[Luminous Animal]

27. Yes. Outrage. You really need to broaden your vocabulary.

[Pirate Smile]

Anything to make this President look bad. Out of context? Doesn't matter.

Anything to hurt or damage him or Just as good - do everything you can to alienate as many Dems as possible from him. How productive.

[Bobbie Jo]

24. LOL

Context, Schmontext.....Meh.

:rofl:

Fox News has nothing on the OP.

[Pirate Smile]

28. Every day, all day - for years now.

[blue neen]

39. Yep.

Years now. This one and plenty of others.

Oh well...whatever makes them happy.

[Luminous Animal]

30. So, tell me. What does love for OBAMA got to do with whether this is a good bill or not?

What does love for OBAMA got to do with whether or not it is worth fighting for.

[Bobbie Jo]

35. Nothing.

My comment had to do with the incredibly ridiculous spin the OP is putting on this out of context quote, of course.

Now, if you want to talk about whether it's worth fighting for, that's another matter. Personally, I think it is, as does my third generation union pipefitter husband who just went back to work after 6 long months of no work.

[phleshdef]

59. You are embarassing yourself by even asking such a dumb question.

For years, someone from the crowd always does the "I love you" bit. This time, PRESIDENT OBAMA made a fucking joke and thats painfully obvious to anyone with an ounce of common sense. It requires no discussion or thought beyond that.

[Tx4obama]

7. The article left out the part where the supporter yelled 'I love you, Barack' and

Obama hollered back 'I love you back' -- then Obama said: “If you love me, you’ve got to help me pass this bill,”

---

Shame on the reporter that wrote the article for not putting Obama's quote into context!

[mmonk]

23. You are correct. Watched it live.

My son is on campus but I don't know if he was in the crowd.

[Luminous Animal]

8. I have to ask. Is that an actual quote from Obama?

If so, it is pathetic. Any criticism that I've doled out to the Obama Admin has been based on policy alone. But really, "If you love me"... ? I know it includes quotes but please tell me that that is a paraphrase.

[Tx4obama]

12. Read the transcript excerpt in comment #5

comment #5 shows the quote in context.
The OP does not.

[Luminous Animal]

20. Still pathetic.

This is not about him. Jeesh.

[sufrommich]

32. Breitbart couldn't have spun Obama's remark any

better.

[Luminous Animal]

36. Even in context, he comes off as self-centered. Love him? He's got a secure job

and he'll make millions upon millions afterward.

Love him? What about loving your neighbors, your friends, your community, your country... Really, there are millions of good reasons (all those out of work) to exhort people to fight for a jobs bill. Loving Obama is not one of them.

Whether or not any one person or 100 million persons love Obama is besides the point.

[ProSense]

40. Well

"Love him? What about loving your neighbors, your friends, your community, your country... Really, there are millions of good reasons (all those out of work) to exhort people to fight for a jobs bill. Loving Obama is not one of them."

...maybe the person who yelled the comment is a neighbor or friend. If not, he is someone's neighbor and friend.

You're outraged that someone loves Obama, and he asked that person to help him passed a bill to create millions of jobs for Americans?

Life is too short!

[Luminous Animal]

44. There's that outrage again. You keep using words of which I'm pretty sure you don't

know the meaning.

[quinnox]

13. It would be creepy if it wasn't in response

to someone yelling they loved him, I agree. But in the context, I don't think its odd.

[Bluebear]

14. Sombody from the audience did shout that they love him, and it was part of his answer.

Still, it's an awkward thing to say.

[sufrommich]

16. That's the response the writer was shooting for. nt

[SidDithers]

11. Unrec for quote mining...nt

Sid

[TheDebbieDee]

19. If I wasn't already going to vote for him before............

I would definitely be voting for him now!

Candidate BARACK is back!

Nobody does it better.........it makes me feel sad for the repukes.......nobody does it half as good as him........Why'd he have to be so GOOOOOOOOD?

[JanMichael]

34. He "candidates" real good. nt.

[TheDebbieDee]

38. Well, at least he's not evil............

[JanMichael]

41. I consider those that create false images "evil". PS - I don't believe in "evil"

I consider that more of lying or misdirection. Those who do that a lot suck.

[unkachuck]

22. "If you love me, you've got to help me pass this bill,"

....he can't possibly be speaking or referring to the Progressive Base, we're irrelevant....

[jaxx]

48. You don't love him.

Why be worried about it.

[leeroysphitz]

29. When you consider the full exchange during Obama's speech the "love" comment is not very damning.

But I agree with congressman DeFazio. Enough with the tax cuts and enough with these B.S. tax holiday games. Leave social security alone.

[phleshdef]

60. Actually, its not just "not very damning". Its not damning at all, in the slightest, whatsoever.

[leeroysphitz]

62. Pfffff... Whatever. n/t

[phleshdef]

63. Whats damning about a harmless, off the cuff joke in response to a lively audience?

There isn't even a story here. Just a poorly thought out attempt by the OP to talk shit about the President.

[Divine Discontent]

33. the fact someone yelled "love you Barack" matters a ton for this. shame on NYT writer, really, in

this instance. Many writers do their best to write something that will make people think or say, "what!!!?"



http://www.zazzle.com/republicans_2012_keeping_millions_out_of_work_bumper_sticker-128002960205017719

[Pirate Smile]

42. Someone posted it here this way to get the same negative response.

[Bluebear]

49. I totally agree

This was certainly written out of context. Still an awkward reply but context would have helped here.

[sufrommich]

50. And yet you chose to use it as the title of your OP.

:crazy:

[Zax2me]

37. Well, pass the bill - yes. But this is not a reason. n/t

[Pirate Smile]

46. The OP & article omit the context to try to hurt the President. If you read through the thread,

you'll get the context.

[mfcorey1]

51. He responded to someone in the crowd that yelled, "I love you."

[LWolf]

52. DeFazio is my kind of Democrat. nt

[LWolf]

53. I've never loved any politician.

Some earn my respect. DeFazio is one.

Others just don't.

[phleshdef]

57. It was pretty much a joke in response to the "I love you" bit someone in the crowd always yells.

Its not a comment that deserves any analysis whatsoever. Grow the hell up.

[WinkyDink]

58. Context counts.

[Modern_Matthew]

61. Screw DeFazio. I stand with my President and I will enjoy the tax cuts for my impoverished ass... nt