President Barrack Obama’s remarks at the Johnson Controls Inc. battery facility on Thursday afternoon touched on fuel efficiency standards and the role of manufacturing in the United States economy, repeated allusions to Congressional struggles on the deficit-reduction bill indicated that past partisanship preoccupied the President’s thoughts.
“what we’ve seen in Washington the last few months has been the worst kind of partisanship, the worst kind of gridlock –- and that gridlock has undermined public confidence and impeded our efforts to take the steps we need for our economy,” Obama said. “It’s made things worse instead of better.
The president did not go after Republicans specifically in some scathing remarks yesterday, but instead focused on "partisanship" and "gridlock" in Washington as barriers to economic recovery, and a big issue in his 2012 re-election bid.
"When I ran in 2008, I think that a lot of folks believed we elect Obama and suddenly we're going to fix politics in Washington," Obama told campaign donors last night in New York City.
But now, facing a Republican House since the 2010 elections, Obama has dealt with a near-shutdown of the government, the debt ceiling standoff and near-default, the credit rating downgrade, and continuing public frustration over unemployment and the economy generally.
"Democracy is messy, and it's tough, and our system is broken to a large degree," Obama said. "And that makes this election more important than 2008."
Obama said his election "put us in a position to do some extraordinary things, and I can't be prouder of what we did. But in 2008, I also think everybody figured, we get through this one election and then it's all done."
Earlier in the day, in a speech about clean energy in Michigan, the president criticized what he called "the refusal of some folks in Congress to put the country ahead of party."
"There are some in Congress right now who would rather see their opponents lose than see America win," Obama said. "And that has to stop. It's got to stop. We're supposed to all be on the same team, especially when we're going through tough times."
Of course, some Republicans think Obama himself is part of the problem.
House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said Obama spending programs, particularly the heath care plan, are hampering the economy. He also said Obama created the debt ceiling impasse by insisting on tax increases to reduce the debt, saying that would cost jobs.
President Barack Obama sought to reassert economic leadership on Thursday by pledging to deliver new ideas every week to create jobs, and he slammed Congress for ‘bickering’ that hurts economic recovery,” Reuters adds. “In a passionate speech to auto industry workers aimed at deflecting public anger over policy gridlock in Washington, Obama said the refusal to put country ahead of party ‘has got to stop.’”
The AP: “Obama aired his frustration with the ways of Washington just before pivoting to his reelection campaign and a pair of big-money fund-raisers in New York City.”
“President Barack Obama collected some big bucks Thursday night at a star-studded fund-raiser in the New York home of movie mogul Harvey Weinstein,” the New York Post says. “Among the guests: actress Gwyneth Paltrow and her husband, Coldplay singer Chris Martin; comedian Jimmy Fallon, designer Vera Wang, singer Alicia Keys, and Vogue editor Anna Wintour, who co-hosted the event. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo was also there as the guests packed around five tables in a basement room.
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