Official Discussion Thread for President Obama's Jobs Speech

[J. J.]

NBC just reported a "national security" development will be in the speech. 

[J. J.]

Now they are saying homeland security.

[J. J.]

Now they are saying homeland security.

He should call for more Border Patrol just to watch Republican (and Democrat) heads explode.

I'd support that plan.

[J. J.]

The Democrats don't even seem enthusiastic for much of this.

[J. J.]

Purple tie, nice bipartisan touch. 

[J. J.]

Yep, definitely the best speech he's given in a long time, both in delivery and tactic.

Actually, I thought it was his worst speeches.  The last five minutes were good, but is substance, more of the same.  A few things might get passed, but it is DOA.

Obama has lost the magic.

Homeland Security now talking about a plot to plant car bombs in NYC and DC.

[J. J.]

Yep, definitely the best speech he's given in a long time, both in delivery and tactic.

Actually, I thought it was his worst speeches.  The last five minutes were good, but is substance, more of the same.  A few things might get passed, but it is DOA.

Obama has lost the magic.

Homeland Security now talking about a plot to plant car bombs in NYC and DC.

Respectfully, that's rubbish (albeit your view)

If you don't see the political tactic in this and HOW badly this could backfire on the GOP then...

Respectfully, it is recycled failure tactic.  Too much emphasis on construction, and "Shovel ready wasn't as shovel ready as they thought."

It sold in 2009, but nobody will buy it in 2012.  Nothing fails like failure.

[J. J.]

Yep, definitely the best speech he's given in a long time, both in delivery and tactic.

Actually, I thought it was his worst speeches.  The last five minutes were good, but is substance, more of the same.  A few things might get passed, but it is DOA.

Obama has lost the magic.

Homeland Security now talking about a plot to plant car bombs in NYC and DC.

Respectfully, that's rubbish (albeit your view)

If you don't see the political tactic in this and HOW badly this could backfire on the GOP then...

Respectfully, it is recycled failure tactic.  Too much emphasis on construction, and "Shovel ready wasn't as shovel ready as they thought."

It sold in 2009, but nobody will buy it in 2012.  Nothing fails like failure.

My view is that there wasn't enough emphasis on infrastructure spending in the last package.

In Obama's view, it was not speedy enough to stimulate the economy, hence the quote, though I he said "we."  I didn't say it; Obama did.

[J. J.]

I wasn't making comment on the speech, I have always thought that.

The problem is, he tried that, and for whatever reason, it failed to stimulate the economy.  Some of that is that construction only stimulates a small section of the economy directly, and only for a short amount of time.

The problem with leading off with that is the simple reason that it was tried, Obama was for it, Congress passed it, and it was implemented, and the economy is worse off.

The 2009 Stimulis Act was passed in February 2009.  Unemployment was 8.20%  2 1/2 years later, what is the unemployment rate?

About the only thing it did was prevent deflation (which was an economic positive, but I'd hate to run on it).  We have no problem with deflation today.

[J. J.]

Now Obama has to hope the GOP doesn't play ball and pass this.  Because this isn't a job maker, it might not even stave a recession off at all.  If that happens, Obama's ass is in a sling.

I think that is the problem for Obama.  Cantor was just on Fox and said that he could embrace some of it.

I'm think about a "half a loaf" situation.  The R's adopt some of it, it gets passed.  Okay, it doesn't work.  Here is the R's line:

"1.  Obama and Pelosi gave us stimulus (Porkulus).  It failed.

2.  Obama insisted that stimulus II (Son of Porkulus).  He got most of what he wanted.  It failed.

Obama failed."

[J. J.]

"He acknowledged that Congress had little appetite for spending that isn’t eventually paid for and pledged to provide a plan on Sept. 19 that would pay for his jobs package. "


Is this a joke?

I'll give a chance and wait for it.  It certainly doesn't add to the supposed urgency argument, however.

[J. J.]

Yep, definitely the best speech he's given in a long time, both in delivery and tactic.

Actually, I thought it was his worst speeches.  The last five minutes were good, but is substance, more of the same.  A few things might get passed, but it is DOA.

Obama has lost the magic.

Of course you do.

The man could get us all on renewable energy, get unemployment back to 3%, and solve the Israeli/Palestine conflict and you'd find something to be disappointed in or ticked off at.
 
I thought the speech was pretty good. One of his best in a while, and this is really the type of thing he should have been doing on September 8th, 2009.

You seem to forget that that I credited Obama with giving the best speech (in 2008) since the "I Have a Dream" speech.  His delivery was okay (B+), but he's off his game.

In organization, he should not have led with construction and teachers (especially since he didn't talk about hiring any new teachers).    Too much saying, "pass the act," instead of the details. (C-)

Delaying the cost report undercuts the premise that the act needs to be passed now. (D)

[J. J.]

Cantor has said he's going to strip the bill down to individual proposals to consider them one-by-one. Hence, here is what I think will happen:

- Some form of this Veteran's Employment tax credit thing will get passed.
- The payroll tax cut will get extended and cut some more and extended to 'job creators'.
- Unemployment Insurance will get extended for a year (but not until the GOP extracts tangible domestic spending cuts to for FY2012 to make it cost-neutral).
- I doubt there will be any significant infrastructure or education spending bills passed.
- Most everything else will fall by the wayside.   

I think  infrastructure or education are both DOA,  It goes back to his "shovel ready" remark.  I'm wondering if he didn't toss that in as a bone the GOP could reject while passing the rest.

BTW:  Anybody thing this actually will have an impact on unemployment?  The only thing might be regulation reform.  I'm also wondering if the "job creators" have to be corporations?

[J. J.]

I actually think it would have been more effective as a speech from the Oval Office.  The response, from both parties, did not seem enthusiastic.

[J. J.]

I didn't see him ever mention inheriting someone else's recession or mention Bush...which is always a big talking point on the pubbie message boards.  So, that's a plus.

2 1/2 years in, it would be a joke.  

Further, unemployment has risen under Obama.  On Election Day 2008, it was 6.60% (10/08).  On Election Day 2012 it will probably be around 9%.  I don't think he wants that comparison made.  And yes, it is a bit unfair since the economy was contracting and unemployment would rise.  Just looking at the raw numbers, however, Bush looks better able to handle the economy.

Ironically, Obama helped prevent deflation, which economically was good.  It was probably the worse problem in 2009.  I can't see any political mileage in him saying, "I kept prices up.  Vote for me!"

[J. J.]

Yep, definitely the best speech he's given in a long time, both in delivery and tactic.

Actually, I thought it was his worst speeches.  The last five minutes were good, but is substance, more of the same.  A few things might get passed, but it is DOA.

Obama has lost the magic.

Of course you do.

The man could get us all on renewable energy, get unemployment back to 3%, and solve the Israeli/Palestine conflict and you'd find something to be disappointed in or ticked off at.
 
I thought the speech was pretty good. One of his best in a while, and this is really the type of thing he should have been doing on September 8th, 2009.

You seem to forget that that I credited Obama with giving the best speech (in 2008) since the "I Have a Dream" speech.  His delivery was okay (B+), but he's off his game.

LOL

What you may or may not have said of him in 2008 has no bearing on what you have continuously spouted on this board in more recent times.

No, I think Obama is capable of delivering phenomenally good speeches.  This wasn't one of them.  "Pass this bill," isn't the best tag line.  It's no "I have a dream."    Even "This bill will create jobs, pass it" would have worked better. 

The last five minutes, Obama was back on his game, but the rest of it was a run of the mill speech.  In terms of substance, one of his worst speeches. 

As for the impact, it wasn't the cause of the Dow loss yesterday, but it didn't boost the markets either.  We'll see what, if any impact there was on the public opinion polls.