Vice President Biden a lot like voluble Sen. Biden

WASHINGTON - As a veteran Democratic senator, Joe Biden was an opinionated guy. As vice president, he is still an opinionated guy.

Which leads us to our latest installment of “Biden watch,” in which the vice president says he likes the idea of including a “Buy American” provision in the economic stimulus plan. Some lawmakers see the provision as steering U.S. trade policy into protectionist territory.

Not Biden.

“I don’t view that as some of the pure free traders view it, as a harbinger of protectionism. I don’t buy that at all. So I think it’s legitimate to have some portions of ‘Buy American’ in it,” Biden told CNBC on Thursday.

The House of Representatives approved the measure this week as part of an $825 billion bill to revive the U.S. economy. In the House version of the bill, the “Buy American” measure would require all public works projects funded by the stimulus package to use only U.S.-made iron and steel.

At the White House on Friday, spokesman Robert Gibbs was asked about the buy American provision and had a wait-and-see answer. Senate debate on the stimulus bill starts next week.

Gibbs said the Obama administration was examining the measure to see whether it violates U.S. trade obligations.

”The administration will review that particular provision and will make a determination of it … . It understands all of the concerns,” Gibbs said.
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Obama says will reverse Bush labor policies

U.S. President Barack Obama pledged on Friday to reverse labor policies from his Republican predecessor, George W. Bush, that unions have long contended favored employers over workers.

Obama, who won significant backing from trade unions in his Democratic presidential campaign, said there could not be a strong middle class, the focus of his economic recovery plan, without a strong labor movement.

He signed three executive orders to bolster unions in the workplace and strengthen workers' rights.

"I believe we have to reverse many of the policies toward organized labor that we have seen over the past eight years, policies with which I have sharply disagreed," Obama told a gathering at the White House.

"Labor is not part of the problem, it is part of the solution," he said to loud applause from an audience that included representatives of labor unions and business groups.

On Thursday, Obama denounced as "shameless" lavish Wall Street bonuses for senior financial executives at a time when taxpayers' money was shoring up a financial system in crisis.

His spokesman, Robert Gibbs, told a news conference the president planned to address the issue of executive compensation, with meetings scheduled at the White House next week to discuss tighter regulation of the financial industry.

Obama discussed the economic crisis in a phone call with Chinese leader Hu Jintao, telling him the two countries needed to correct global trade imbalances and get credit markets flowing, the White House said.

The Chinese news agency Xinhua said Hu told Obama that China opposed trade or investment protectionism as part of settling the crisis and said Beijing would join Washington in promoting stable development at an economic summit in London in April.

ROLLING BACK BUSH'S POLICIES

Obama has spent much of his first 11 days in office rolling back some of his predecessor's policies. He has ordered the closure of Guantanamo Bay prison, begun reversing Bush's climate policies and lifted restrictions on U.S. government funding for groups that provide abortion services abroad.

The president spoke as new data showed the U.S. economy shrinking at its fastest rate in nearly 27 years and a day after the number of Americans seeking jobless benefits hit a record high.

"The recession is deepening and the urgency of our economic crisis is growing," Obama said. "This is a continuing disaster for America's families."

He announced the creation of a task force under Vice President Joe Biden to look at ways of raising middle-class living standards, a signature campaign promise.

Biden said his group would travel across the United States to canvass the views of ordinary Americans, holding meetings in different towns and cities each month.

The first of the three executive orders will prevent taxpayer funds being used to reimburse federal contractors who spend money "trying to influence the formation of unions."

A second will require federal contractors to inform employees of their rights under the National Labor Relations Act. A third will ensure that qualified workers keep their jobs even when a federal contract changes hands.

The Teamsters, one of the most influential U.S. unions, called Obama's action a "new day for workers."

"We finally have a White House that is dedicated to working with us to rebuild our middle class. Hope for the American Dream is being restored," said Teamster President Jim Hoffa.

The American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal employee union, welcomed "the dedication of this administration to reverse the anti-labor and anti-worker policies that have been in place the last eight years."

Obama, who was sworn in on January 20, has said that fixing the economy is his top priority. He is pushing Congress to approve a $900 billion stimulus package to jolt the economy out of its worst crisis in decades.

Christina Romer, a top Obama economic adviser, said Friday's figures showing a 3.8 percent drop in gross domestic product in the fourth quarter made clear the financial crisis had spread to the whole economy.

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Obama, Congress seek deal on economic stimulus

Republicans in the U.S. Senate accepted on Thursday President Barack Obama's offer to search for a compromise on an economic stimulus bill that could end up costing around $900 billion, as long as tax cuts play a large role.

The Senate is expected to start considering the massive bill next week, following passage on Wednesday in the House of Representatives of a slightly smaller bill, without the support of a single Republican.

Vice President Joe Biden, in a possible bow to Republicans, said there could be changes in some of the bill's spending and tax provisions once House and Senate negotiators meet to work out a compromise bill next month.

If the U.S. fiscal picture was not bad enough, with budget deficits running rampant, there was yet another dark cloud on the horizon.

Sen. Charles Schumer, a senior member of the Senate Banking Committee, said that if Washington undertakes an effort to buy up bad assets from struggling U.S. banks, it could cost taxpayers up to $4 trillion.

But for now, the economic stimulus was center stage on Capitol Hill. "We look forward to offering amendments to improve this critical legislation," Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said.

For example, Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa told reporters: "We're going to try to make a case for more investment" while aiming to delete what he and fellow Republicans think would be wasteful spending.

Democratic amendments are expected as well. Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd said he might try to insert a 90-day moratorium on home foreclosures, which have been skyrocketing.

Another senior Democrat, Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, told reporters, "I would have a very hard time voting for this package as it is." Among changes he'd like is a broader tax credit to encourage homebuyers.

Congress is rushing to meet a mid-February deadline set by Obama for enacting the legislation aimed at lifting the economy out of a 13-month-long recession.

Obama said the economic stimulus bill will not be his only salve for the sick economy. He said he will soon move to thaw credit markets and overhaul financial regulations.

Despite talk of the two parties working together, tensions were obvious.

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid said he was "confident that we are going to get Republican support on the bill," but added that Republicans could "sit back and nit-pick" the legislation. If there is not a bipartisan vote, "it's not our fault," he said.

One top Senate Republican left the door open to slowing down the bill next week.

"Whatever we can do -- whether that is offer an amendment, whether it's voting against the bill because it could not be amended, whatever parliamentary opportunities are available to us, we will explore," said Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, the number-two Republican.

The House bill was touted as costing $825 billion, but might be closer to $819 billion when accounting for its future impact on the deficit. The Senate bill, with different tax components, would come close to $900 billion.

Obama says he wants to work with Republicans not only as he promotes the stimulus package but looks ahead to other major initiatives, such as expanding health care, stemming global warming and revamping the Social Security retirement program.

MORE TAX CUTS

McConnell said a main goal for the Senate Republicans will be to increase the amount of tax cuts in the package so they amount to 40 percent of the overall measure, with the rest emergency spending.

The House-passed bill is closer to 33 percent being devoted to tax cuts -- not hugely different from McConnell's goal.

The Senate Republican leader's formula contrasted with what many House Republicans sought: only tax cuts and no new spending at all.

The Senate will begin its debate next week with fresh statistics that likely will underscore the dire shape of the U.S. economy.

On Friday, the government will issue its latest estimate of U.S. gross domestic product. Many economists think it will show that the economy suffered a 5.4 percent contraction last year, which would be the worst performance since 1982.

Data released on Thursday showed the number of U.S. jobless claiming benefits jumped to a record in mid-January, and new orders for durable goods fell for a fifth straight month in December, while sales of newly built single-family homes slumped to their lowest levels since records started in 1963.

U.S. stocks fell on Thursday on the bleak economic news.

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Blagojevich ousted as Illinois governor

Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was removed from office on Thursday after the state Senate unanimously convicted him on impeachment charges, including an accusation he tried to sell the U.S. Senate seat once held by President Barack Obama.

The Illinois Senate, acting as a jury, voted 59-0 to oust the second-term Democrat immediately. The lawmakers also voted by the same margin to bar him from ever holding public office again in America's fifth most populous state.

Before the vote, members of the Senate, where Democrats outnumber Republicans 37-22, called Blagojevich "devious," "cynical," "crass," "corrupt," "inept," "a liar," "a hypocrite" and "irresponsible."

Blagojevich had pleaded with the body hours earlier, asking, "How can you throw a governor out of office who is clamoring and begging and pleading with you to give him a chance to bring witnesses in to prove his innocence? ... A crime has not been proven here."

He later told reporters outside his Chicago home he was "saddened and disappointed but not at all surprised" by what happened. "It was a fixed deal from the beginning."

He skipped the chance to make a formal defense during the proceedings because, he said, the rules restricted him from calling the witnesses he needed or playing in full the federal government wiretapped conversations that led to charges involving Obama's Senate seat.

Democratic Lieutenant Governor Patrick Quinn was sworn in almost immediately, saying, "The ordeal is over" and urging people to "to make the sacrifices necessary to address the serious challenges we have before us: The integrity challenge, the challenge of our economy, the challenge of making sure that we pay our bills."

Quinn has expressed concerns about the state's budget ills, about which he says he has been told little, and a 7.6 percent unemployment rate that is above the national average.

Blagojevich has not been indicted on criminal charges. The security detail assigned to him as governor left his Chicago home immediately after he became an ex-governor.

PATTERN OF CORRUPTION

Blagojevich's arrest drew attention to a pattern of political corruption in Illinois, becoming a distraction for the incoming Obama administration, which operated its presidential transition office in Obama's home state.

The governor's impeachment was unprecedented in Illinois and he joined only seven other state chief executives to be convicted after impeachment. Arizona's Evan Mecham in 1988 became the first governor impeached since the 1920s and, like Blagojevich, the Republican said his accusers were politically motivated.

Blagojevich was among four of Illinois' past eight governors hit by criminal charges. His immediate predecessor. Republican George Ryan, is in prison after being convicted of corruption charges.

Illinois' senior U.S. senator, Democrat Dick Durbin, said the state needed a fresh start after Blagojevich, by not resigning, put Illinois through "weeks of turmoil at a time when many Illinoisans wanted to share in the joy of having just elected one of our own to the Presidency. Today, the Illinois Senate came to the only reasonable conclusion: Blagojevich can not continue to serve as our governor."

"Clearing this up may give the state some room to focus on its pressing financial and economic challenges," said Ted Hampton, a Moody's Investors Service analyst.

Those challenges included underfunded pensions, a large employee benefit burden, cash-flow troubles and an ailing economy, he said.

"Whoever is governor needs to get together with the Legislature to fix the budget," said John Kenward, an analyst at Standard & Poor's Ratings Services, which has the state's "AA" rating on a watch list for a possible downgrade.

On Monday, a spokesman for the governor's budget office said the state's current deficit was $2.5 billion. But the state comptroller's office said the situation was likely worse as Illinois' unpaid bill backlog stands at $2.1 billion.

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Obama wins House passage of economic stimulus

President Barack Obama scored his first major legislative victory on Wednesday with passage of an $825 billion economic stimulus package by a sharply divided U.S. House of Representatives on a 244-188 vote.

Obama, who took office eight days ago, was denied, at least for now, his goal of bipartisanship. Every Republican who voted opposed the landmark bill, complaining it contained too much new spending and not enough tax cuts.

All but 11 of Obama's fellow Democrats in the House supported the bill to combat the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. The Senate begins debate next week.

Obama, seeking to build support, said, "I hope that we can continue to strengthen this plan before it gets to my desk" to be signed into law.

"But what we can't do is drag our feet or allow the same partisan differences to get in our way," Obama added in a statement issued by the White House. "We must move swiftly and boldly to put Americans back to work, and that is exactly what this plan begins to do."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, said Obama sought bold and swift action and "that is exactly what action we are taking today."

On his first visit to the Capitol as president on Tuesday, Obama failed to ease Republican concerns the package included too little in tax cuts, $275 billion, and too much in spending, $550 billion.

They at least agreed to keep talking to each other.

The Democratic-led Senate is expected to approve a similar version of the bill, one costing $887 billion. It includes a one-year fix to insulate middle-class taxpayers from the Alternative Minimum Tax, which originally was aimed at the wealthy but is affecting a growing number of middle-class taxpayers because of inflation.

Once the Senate passes its bill, House and Senate negotiators must resolve differences and approve a final measure that can be sent to Obama.

'SITUATION IS DIRE'

During a daylong debate, House Democrats rejected Republican efforts to strip out the new spending -- which includes money to rebuild crumbling roads and bridges and upgrade healthcare and schools -- and instead approve a package essentially restricted to about $478 billion in tax cuts.

House Republican leader John Boehner said his party's approach would create an estimated 6.2 million jobs.

"That's twice as many as the (Democratic) bill that is on the (House) floor now for about half the price," Boehner told reporters.

Earlier in the day at the White House, Obama got a boost from corporate heads.

"The message has to be that the situation is dire," David Cote, chief executive of Honeywell, said after a meeting with Obama and other business leaders. "Everybody is being touched by this."

Ending the 13-month U.S. recession will be difficult and economists disagree over how to do it.

In a full-page ad in Wednesday's New York Times, a group of economists said they "do not believe that more government spending is a way to improve economic performance." The ad was paid for by the Cato Institute, which supports policies to limit government.

On Friday, the federal government is due to release an estimate of economic performance that economists expect will show the economy contracted at an annual rate of 5.4 percent last year. That would put the U.S. economy closer to the 6.4 percent contraction in 1931, which was followed by 13 percent in 1932, during the Great Depression.

The House-passed bill would spend $825 billion over the next few years with a combination of emergency spending and tax cuts to create and save up to 4 million jobs.

"This $825 billion package is not too large ... in fact it's probably smaller than it ought to be," House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey said.

U.S. stocks rose on Wednesday on optimism the new administration was moving quickly to stabilize banking and on hopes for a stimulus package soon.

Fed says prepared to buy debt to aid economy

The Federal Reserve on Wednesday inched closer to buying U.S. government bonds in a new front in its fight against the credit crisis and signaled unease over the risk of deflation with the economy weakening.

The U.S. central bank, battling the worst recession since World War Two, held its main interest rate in a range from zero to 0.25 percent and said it could stay unusually low for some time.

With no room to cut short-term rates, the Fed said it stood ready to buy long-term government debt if it felt it would help ease credit more broadly. Bond purchases could lower mortgage rates, helping to curb the housing downturn at the root of the global economy's ills.

Treasury debt investors were disappointed the Fed did not make a firm commitment to buy government bonds. U.S. government debt prices fell sharply, pushing the yield on the 30-year bond above 3.46 percent, the highest level since December 1.

"The committee ... is prepared to purchase longer-term Treasury securities if evolving circumstances indicate that such transactions would be particularly effective in improving conditions in private credit markets," the Fed said.

In December, the central bank said only that it was studying that option.

"The market may have been looking for more concrete confirmation that the Fed would buy Treasuries," said Gary Thayer, a senior economist at Wachovia Securities.

Stock prices added to gains and the Dow Jones industrial average closed up more than 2.4 percent. The dollar also rose against major currencies.

SOLE DISSENT

After a two-day meeting, the Fed's monetary policy panel backed the decision 8-1. Richmond Federal Reserve Bank President Jeffrey Lacker dissented, saying the Fed should immediately move to a program to purchase government bonds.

Lacker, who has frequently dissented in the past, has voiced concern about the Fed's interventions in private credit markets, suggesting his vote was more about tactics than how much money the central bank is pumping into the economy.

Since lowering overnight rates to virtually zero in December, the Fed has turned its focus to what Chairman Ben Bernanke has dubbed a "credit easing" approach of buying specific assets in the hope of restoring normal lending.

The central bank wants to prevent a year-long recession from turning into a prolonged period of falling prices that could devastate investment and cripple the economy.

"The committee continues to anticipate that a gradual recovery in economic activity will begin later this year, but the downside risks to that outlook are significant," it said.

It added that it "sees some risk that inflation could persist for a time below rates that best foster economic growth and price stability in the longer term," -- a nod to growing concerns over the risk of deflation.

A Reuters poll of top Wall Street banks found 11 of 13 respondents expect the Fed to hold rates near zero until at least 2010 while 9 of 12 said the central bank would step in at some point to buy U.S. government bonds.

READY TO RAMP UP PROGRAMS

The Fed reiterated that, if needed, it would expand an existing program of buying large quantities of mortgage-related debt, and that it was about to launch another program to shore up auto, credit card and small-business lending.

The Fed's measures are part of broader U.S. efforts to combat the recession which has spread around the globe.

It has cut its key interest rate from 5.25 percent in 10 steps dating back to September 2007 and pumped billions of dollars into the economy to try to restore credit markets shattered by a bursting housing bubble and a wave of mortgage failures.

At the same time, President Barack Obama, who swept to victory in November in part because of the deepening economic gloom, is pushing for an $825 billion package of tax cuts and government spending. His administration is also wrestling with steps it can take to prop up the ailing banking system.

The outlook, however, remains almost uniformly grim.

A report on Friday is expected to show the economy contracted at a 5.4 percent annual rate in the final three months of last year, which would be the steepest falloff in activity for any quarter since 1982.

That was when former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker effectively brought the U.S. economy to a halt to kill high inflation.

FACTBOX: The first 100 days of a U.S. presidency

Assessing a new U.S. president's first 100 days in office has become an American media tradition which historians trace to the initial burst of activity at the start of Democrat Franklin Roosevelt's tenure in 1933.

- Roosevelt's "First 100 Days" -- described as a "Defining Moment" for America by author Jonathan Alter -- was a time of struggle and renewal. Some analysts say President-elect Barack Obama faces such a time in the worst financial crisis since.

- The two men, both Democrats, took office promising change at a time of crisis. Both had strong majorities in both houses of Congress. Like Roosevelt, Obama's presidency will begin after years of bitter partisan politics.

- Obama's stated goals include the protection or creation of 3 to 4 million jobs with a combination of middle-class tax cuts, money for public works programs and money to bolster national health and other social programs.

- Harvard academic John Stauffer says differences have already emerged with Obama far more active, at least in his statements, than Roosevelt was in the months before taking office.

One term or two? Economy is key, experts say

Whether President Barack Obama enjoys one term or two in the White House will depend overwhelmingly on the state of U.S. pocketbooks.

With a daily stream of gloomy economic data, Obama has said he must act quickly to rescue the economy from the worst turmoil in decades. But the new president has plenty of time to help brighten the financial outlook before the next presidential election in November 2012, experts say.

"The truth is it's rare for someone who runs for re-election to get defeated in the absence of economic turmoil," said Jeremy Mayer, professor of public policy at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. "There are tremendous advantages to incumbency."

The key is what happens in the months before voters head to the polls, experts said.

"The one thing you want to avoid if you want to be re-elected is a bad election-year economy," said Allan Lichtman, presidential historian at American University in Washington.

Only 12 presidents have served a single elected term -- and just two have failed to win a second term since the Great Depression -- Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush.

Further back was Herbert Hoover, whose lone term ended in 1933 as the country was locked in the Depression.

"What they had in common, among other things, was a bad economy," said Lichtman.

One-term presidents also tend to lack vision, be poor communicators and fail to inspire voters, Lichtman said.

So far, Obama seems to most observers not to suffer from those particular failings.

INSPIRING COMMUNICATORS

In fact, U.S. presidents considered to be the most inspiring communicators used an ailing economy to win their presidencies in the first place.

Bill Clinton's campaign in 1992 coined the phrase "It's the economy, stupid," and Ronald Reagan in 1980 wooed voters by asking if they were better off than they were four years earlier.

Although Obama's keeping his job may depend on how many Americans lose theirs, Lichtman cautioned that his role steering the financial ship can be quite limited.

"People expect the president, rightly or wrongly, to guide the economy in such a way as to provide prosperity," he said. "But the president does not control the economy. He can only influence the economy."

Less significant factors in determining a one- or two-term presidency include an intraparty challenge. Democratic challenger Edward Kennedy damaged fellow Democrat Carter's shot at re-election, and Republican challenger Pat Buchanan hurt fellow Republican George H.W. Bush.

"If you want to look for signs of trouble, if Obama loses an important wing of his party, the left, the center, .... then he could face an intraparty challenge," Mayer said.

The first test at the polls for Obama will come in 2010, when all seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, one-third of the U.S. Senate and many state governors' mansions will be up for grabs.

"If things get a lot worse in '09 and '10, Democrats will take a hit in the midterms. But if we start to see a recovery in 2011, Obama will get the credit for that," said Mayer. "It's when the pain comes and who's to blame."

Obama to push for stimulus package on Capitol Hill

U.S. President Barack Obama will visit Capitol Hill on Tuesday to try to build momentum for an $825 billion package he says is urgently needed to keep the U.S. economy from sinking into an even deeper recession.

A week after taking office, Obama is grappling with an economic crisis that seems to worsen by the day. U.S. companies such as the heavy-equipment maker Caterpillar Inc. are announcing huge layoffs as troubles in the housing and financial sectors mount.

But Obama's meeting with lawmakers comes after the president achieved one victory on the economic front: the confirmation of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

With his economic team in place, Obama hopes he can win passage of the stimulus plan by mid-February.

The Capitol Hill meeting is somewhat unusual. Obama's predecessor, former President George W. Bush rarely visited Congress, preferring to send aides and sometimes his vice president, Dick Cheney.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Obama's meetings with House of Representatives and Senate lawmakers would be less negotiating sessions than a chance to gather input.

"He wants to hear their ideas. If there are good ideas -- and I think he assumes there will be -- that we will look at those ideas," Gibbs told reporters.

The House may begin debate on the stimulus bill on Tuesday, though any votes would not take place until Wednesday.

While there is broad support in the Democratic-led U.S. Congress for bold measures to jump-start the economy, Republicans and some moderate Democrats are worried about the measure's huge price tag at a time when U.S. budget deficits are already projected to stretch into the trillions.

REPUBLICANS QUESTION CONTRACEPTIVE, TUITION SPENDING

Some $275 billion of the package would go toward tax cuts. The other $550 billion would pay for public works projects, alternative energy initiatives and the bolstering of unemployment benefits and other safety-net programs.

Obama hopes to win bipartisan support for the plan, but some Republicans disagree with Obama on how the tax cuts should be structured and have questioned whether some spending elements in the plan, including money for contraceptive programs and college tuition assistance, would provide any kind of short-term jolt to the economy.

Responding to criticism that the package contained too little immediate help, Obama's aides have said three-quarters of the spending would work its way into the economy within the first 18 months.

According to a report issued late on Monday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, about 64 percent of the stimulus package would be poured into the economy within 19 months.

Obama has sought to emphasize that he wants to listen to Republican and Democratic ideas.

The Democratic tax cut plan would direct benefits more toward lower-income workers, even those who do not pay income taxes, while the House Republicans would help all taxpayers.

When some Republicans pressed Obama on Friday to change that part of the plan, he replied that he won the election and was sticking to the plan he had campaigned on.

Gibbs said the comment was meant to be light-hearted and was not an attempt to pursue "cowboy diplomacy" in the negotiations.

In addition to the stimulus package, another issue that could come up at the Capitol Hill meeting is the shaky condition of the U.S. financial system.

As the credit crunch worsens, Obama's aides are looking at various proposals for helping struggling homeowners and stemming the turmoil in the banking sector.

White House aides have not ruled out the possibility that Obama might seek addition funds to help the financial sector beyond the $700 billion approved by Congress last fall.

Obama seeks Republican support for stimulus plans

Democratic President Barack Obama struggled on Tuesday to placate Republicans in Congress who insist his $825 billion plan for reviving the troubled U.S. economy should include bigger tax cuts and less spending.

"The key right now is to make sure that we keep politics to a minimum," said the president, who met Republicans in both houses of Congress a week after taking office on a promise to seek consensus and end partisan gridlock.

Republicans described the meetings as cordial and said they appreciated Obama's willingness to listen but there was scant evidence he had persuaded many of them to back the measure.

Shortly before Obama arrived, House Minority Leader John Boehner told fellow Republicans that in its current form, he could not vote for the stimulus and encouraged fellow House Republicans to vote against it, his spokesman said.

The House of Representatives plans to vote on the stimulus on Wednesday.

Pressed on whether Obama expected to get more than a dozen or so Republican votes in the House, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said: "We'll take what we can get."

Obama told the legislators he understood that some of them might not support the measure but he said it still was important to have the discussion.

"He said ... I understand that some of you aren't going to vote for this," Gibbs said. "That's fine. But what ... he wants people to do is have an exchange of those ideas."

CONSERVATIVE DEMOCRATS' CONCERNS

Meanwhile, a bloc of conservative Democrats won a commitment from the White House for efforts to balance the budget, enabling many of them to support the stimulus plan.

In a letter to Congress, Obama budget director Peter Orszag said the government must eventually get back to paying for non-emergency spending without boosting the deficit. The letter appeared to win over many of the conservative Democrats.

Regardless of how many Republicans embrace it, the stimulus package is expected to clear both the Democratic-led House and Senate by the middle of February.

Even so, Obama wants the political cover that some support from the opposition party would bring for an unproven plan that will hugely increase America's budget deficit and may or may not halt the economy's downward slide.

The new president faces an economic crisis that seems to worsen by the day. Consumer confidence has slipped to a record low and major U.S. companies are cutting tens of thousands of jobs as troubles mount in the financial industry.

"The main message I have is that the statistics every day underscore the urgency of the economic situation," Obama said. "The American people expect action."

Republicans complain that Obama's plan would finance Democrats' pet projects -- such as $16 billion in grants for college students -- instead of creating jobs or stimulating consumer spending.

"I think the president is sincere," Boehner said. "We look forward to continue to work with him to improve this package."

Republicans agree the stumbling economy needs a rescue package. But they contend that the Democrats' $550 billion spending proposal is excessive while a proposal to cut taxes by about $275 billion does not go far enough.

GOOD COP, BAD COP

Some Republicans said their complaints were more about Democrats in Congress than with Obama.

"He's playing good cop and the Democratic leadership is playing bad cop," said Rep. Adam Putnam, a Florida Republican who described Obama as "very articulate, very candid" in the meeting.

"I thought he treated members with a great deal of respect. It was not your Rotary club treatment. He treated them as a former member of Congress would," Putnam told Reuters.

Another issue in the Capitol Hill meetings was the shaky condition of the U.S. financial system. Obama's aides are looking at ways to stem turmoil in the banking sector, which is worsening the credit crunch.

White House aides have not ruled out Obama seeking additional funds to help the financial sector beyond the $700 billion approved by Congress last October.

But the bailout program is unpopular with both parties so any request for more money could be a tough sell.

Putnam said Obama told the lawmakers that all tools needed to be used to help the economy and referred to a "broad consensus that we haven't stopped the bleeding in the banking sector yet."

Gibbs said Obama had not decided what additional steps might be needed to address the problem of bad assets held by banks. But he added, "The president will do what is necessary to ensure, first and foremost, that there's not an economic collapse."

(Additional reporting by Caren Bohan, Patrick Rucker, Donna Smith, Richard Cowan, Steve Holland, Susan Cornwell and Jeremy Pelofsky; Editing by Chris Wilson and Bill Trott)

House poised to pass economic stimulus bill

U.S. President Barack Obama's $825 billion package to stem the U.S. recession headed toward anticipated passage on Wednesday in a sharply divided House of Representatives.

Most House Republicans were expected to oppose the proposal, saying it needs more tax cuts and less spending, but Democrats were confident that they had the votes to push it through as they seek a final bill for Obama to sign into law by mid-February.

"Some of us have heard the voice of the American people and their call for change" in the November election, said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat.

The Democratic-led Senate is expected to pass a somewhat more costly version of the proposal, which would force the two chambers to work out differences.

But before the Senate votes, Republicans are hoping to win some modifications that would be supported by the Democratic president.

Obama met on Capitol Hill on Tuesday with House and Senate Republicans. While he again said he would listen to their ideas, Obama noted the urgency in passing legislation.

"The main message I have is that the statistics every day underscore the urgency of the economic situation. The American people expect action," Obama said.

Shortly before Obama arrived, House Minority Leader John Boehner told fellow Republicans he could not vote for the stimulus bill in its current form and encouraged them to vote against it, a Boehner spokesman said.

The bill the House will debate on Wednesday was written by Democrats, who control the chamber. It combines $275 billion in temporary tax cuts to spur spending and business investment, along with hundreds of billions of dollars for job-creating investment projects, health industry improvements, expanded aid for the poor and unemployed and improving education.

Republicans have questioned whether the money actually would create and maintain up to 4 million jobs and whether the money would be spent over too long a period to be effective.

Senate Democratic leaders hope they can debate and pass their version of the legislation next week.

Once that is done, negotiators in the House and Senate would have to work out their differences so the two chambers could pass one bill that would be sent to Obama for his signature.

While Obama wants a strong bipartisan vote on final passage, that will depend on whether Republicans think they have gotten at least some of what they want, such as more business tax breaks in the bill.

"I think the president is sincere," Boehner said after Tuesday's meeting with Obama. "We look forward to continue to work work with him to improve this package."

Barack Obama

U.S. President Barack Obama appeared on an Arabic satellite TV network on Tuesday (January 27th, 2009) for his first formal television interview as president. In an effort to repair relations with the Muslim world, Obama cited his Muslim background and relatives, and announced that one of his main tasks was to communicate to Muslims "that the Americans are not your enemy."

After dismissing Obama as too similar to America's former president, George W. Bush, officials from the Palestinian Hamas group softened their stance against the new president on Tuesday. "In the last couple of days there have been a lot of statements (from Obama), some of them very positive," said Ahmed Youssef, a senior Hamas official. "I think there are some positive things we have to count."

President Obama also said America was prepared to extend a peaceful hand to Iran if it "unclenched its fist." He also said the time was ripe for the Israelis and Palestinians to resume peace negotiations.

Biography: Barack Hussein Obama was born Aug. 4, 1961, in Honolulu, Hawaii. His father, Barack Obama, Sr., was born of Luo ethnicity in Nyanza Province, Kenya. He grew up herding goats with his own father, who was a domestic servant to the British. Although reared among Muslims, Obama, Sr., became an atheist at some point.

Obama’s mother, Ann Dunham, grew up in Wichita, Kansas. Her father worked on oil rigs during the Depression. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, he signed up for service in World War II and marched across Europe in Patton’s army. Dunham’s mother went to work on a bomber assembly line. After the war, they studied on the G. I. Bill, bought a house through the Federal Housing Program, and moved to Hawaii.

Meantime, Barack’s father had won a scholarship that allowed him to leave Kenya pursue his dreams in Hawaii. At the time of his birth, Obama’s parents were students at the East–West Center of the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

Obama’s parents separated when he was two years old and later divorced. Obama’s father went to Harvard to pursue Ph. D. studies and then returned to Kenya.

His mother married Lolo Soetoro, another East–West Center student from Indonesia. In 1967, the family moved to Jakarta, where Obama’s half-sister Maya Soetoro–Ng was born. Obama attended schools in Jakarta, where classes were taught in the Indonesian language.

Four years later when Barack (commonly known throughout his early years as "Barry") was ten, he returned to Hawaii to live with his maternal grandparents, Madelyn and Stanley Dunham, and later his mother (who died of ovarian cancer in 1995).

He was enrolled in the fifth grade at the esteemed Punahou Academy, graduating with honors in 1979. He was only one of three black students at the school. This is where Obama first became conscious of racism and what it meant to be an African–American.

In his memoir, Obama described how he struggled to reconcile social perceptions of his multiracial heritage. He saw his biological father (who died in a 1982 car accident) only once (in 1971) after his parents divorced. And he admitted using alcohol, marijuana and cocaine during his teenage years.

After high school, Obama studied at Occidental College in Los Angeles for two years. He then transferred to Columbia University in New York, graduating in 1983 with a degree in political science.

After working at Business International Corporation (a company that provided international business information to corporate clients) and NYPIRG, Obama moved to Chicago in 1985. There, he worked as a community organizer with low-income residents in Chicago’s Roseland community and the Altgeld Gardens public housing development on the city’s South Side.

It was during this time that Obama, who said he "was not raised in a religious household," joined the Trinity United Church of Christ. He also visited relatives in Kenya, which included an emotional visit to the graves of his father and paternal grandfather.

Obama entered Harvard Law School in 1988. In February 1990, he was elected the first African–American editor of the Harvard Law Review. Obama graduated magna cum laude in 1991.

After law school, Obama returned to Chicago to practice as a civil rights lawyer, joining the firm of Miner, Barnhill & Galland. He also taught at the University of Chicago Law School. And he helped organize voter registration drives during Bill Clinton’s 1992 presidential campaign.

Obama published an autobiography in 1995 Dreams From My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance. And he won a Grammy for the audio version of the book.

Obama’s advocacy work led him to run for the Illinois State Senate as a Democrat. He was elected in 1996 from the south side neighborhood of Hyde Park.

During these years, Obama worked with both Democrats and Republicans in drafting legislation on ethics, expanded health care services and early childhood education programs for the poor. He also created a state earned-income tax credit for the working poor. And after a number of inmates on death row were found innocent, Obama worked with law enforcement officials to require the videotaping of interrogations and confessions in all capital cases.

In 2000, Obama made an unsuccessful Democratic primary run for the U. S. House of Representatives seat held by four-term incumbent candidate Bobby Rush.

Following the 9/11 attacks, Obama was an early opponent of President George W. Bush’s push to war with Iraq. Obama was still a state senator when he spoke against a resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq during a rally at Chicago’s Federal Plaza in October 2002.

"I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars," he said. "What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz and other arm-chair, weekend warriors in this Administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne."

"He's a bad guy," Obama said, referring to Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. "The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him. But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history."

"I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a U. S. occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences," Obama continued. "I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al-Qaeda."

The war with Iraq began in 2003 and Obama decided to run for the U.S. Senate open seat vacated by Republican Peter Fitzgerald. In the 2004 Democratic primary, he won 52 percent of the vote, defeating multimillionaire businessman Blair Hull and Illinois Comptroller Daniel Hynes.

That summer, he was invited to deliver the keynote speech in support of John Kerry at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston. Obama emphasized the importance of unity, and made veiled jabs at the Bush administration and the diversionary use of wedge issues.

"We worship an awesome God in the blue states, and we don't like federal agents poking around our libraries in the red states," he said. "We coach Little League in the blue states, and yes, we've got some gay friends in the red states. There are patriots who opposed the war in Iraq, and there are patriots who supported the war in Iraq. We are one people, all of us pledging allegiance to the Stars and Stripes, all of us defending the United States of America."

After the convention, Obama returned to his U.S. Senate bid in Illinois. His opponent in the general election was suppose to be Republican primary winner Jack Ryan, a wealthy former investment banker. However, Ryan withdrew from the race in June 2004, following public disclosure of unsubstantiated sexual allegations by Ryan's ex wife, actress Jeri Ryan.

In August 2004, diplomat and former presidential candidate Alan Keyes, who was also an African-American, accepted the Republican nomination to replace Ryan. In three televised debates, Obama and Keyes expressed opposing views on stem cell research, abortion, gun control, school vouchers and tax cuts.

In the November 2004 general election, Obama received 70% of the vote to Keyes's 27%, the largest electoral victory in Illinois history. Obama became only the third African-American elected to the U.S. Senate since Reconstruction.

Sworn into office January 4, 2005, Obama partnered with Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana on a bill that expanded efforts to destroy weapons of mass destruction in Eastern Europe and Russia. Then with Republican Sen. Tom Corburn of Oklahoma, he created a website that tracks all federal spending.

Obama was also the first to raise the threat of avian flu on the Senate floor, spoke out for victims of Hurricane Katrina, pushed for alternative energy development and championed improved veterans´ benefits. He also worked with Democrat Russ Feingold of Wisconsin to eliminate gifts of travel on corporate jets by lobbyists to members of Congress.

His second book, The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream, was published in October 2006.

In February 2007, Obama made headlines when he announced his candidacy for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination. He was locked in a tight battle with former first lady and current U.S. Senator from New York, Hillary Rodham Clinton until he became the presumptive nominee on June 3, 2008. On November 4th, 2008, Obama defeated Republican presidential nominee John McCain for the position of U.S. President. He is now the 44th president of the United States.

Obama met his wife, Michelle, in 1988 when he was a summer associate at the Chicago law firm of Sidley & Austin. They were married in October 1992 and live in Kenwood on Chicago's South Side with their daughters, Malia (born 1998) and Sasha (born 2001).

http://www.biography.com

McCain notes history in the making

Obama congratulated his opponent, Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, for his “unimaginable” service to the United States, first as a prisoner of war for 5½ years in North Vietnam and then for nearly three decades in Congress.

McCain called Obama to offer his congratulations at 11 p.m. ET, Obama’s chief spokesman, Robert Gibbs, told NBC News. Obama thanked McCain for his “class and honor” during the campaign and said he was eager to sit down and talk about how the two of them could work together.

“The American people have spoken, and they have spoken clearly,” McCain told supporters in Phoenix, saying that he “recognized the special significance” Obama’s victory had for African-Americans.

“We both recognize that though we have come a long way from the old injustices that once stained our nation’s reputation and denied some Americans the full blessings of American citizenship, the memory of them still have the power to wound,” McCain said.

“Let there be no reason for any American to fail to cherish their citizenship in this, the greatest nation on Earth,” said McCain, who pledged his support and help for the new president.

President Bush called to congratulate Obama and promise a smooth transition of power on Jan. 20, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

“Mr. President-elect, congratulations to you. What an awesome night for you, your family and your supporters,” said Bush, who invited Obama and his family to visit the White House as soon as it was convenient.

The president also called McCain to say that he was proud of the senator’s efforts and that he was “sorry it didn’t work out.”

“You didn’t leave anything on the playing field,” Bush said.

Broad, deep victory
Campaigning as a technocratic agent of change and not a pathbreaking civil rights figure, Obama swept to victory over McCain, whose running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, was seeking to become the nation’s first female vice president.

Obama beat McCain by 52 percent to 46 percent, and he could realistically claim a mandate with nearly two-thirds of the Electoral College. As of Wednesday afternoon, he had 349 electoral votes compared to 173 for McCain, with only North Carolina and Nebraska’s 2nd Congressional District left to declare.

And Obama should have a strongly supportive Congress to work with. Not since 1993 has an incoming president had such strong majorities in both houses of Congress.

Democrats will hold 258 of the 435 seats in the House and at least 54 of the 100 seats in the Senate, where t wo independents also caucus with the party. Four seats remained undecided, meaning the party mathematically could reach a procedurally important “supermajority” of 60 or more votes in the Senate, but NBC News projected that it would not reach that threshold.

Surveys of voters as they left polling places nationwide encapsulated the historic nature of the victory by Obama, the son of a Kenyan father and a white mother from Kansas. As expected, he won overwhelmingly among African-American voters, but he also won among women and Latino voters. And he won by more than 2-to-1 among voters of all races 30 years old and younger.

That dynamic was telling in Ohio and in Pennsylvania, where McCain poured in millions of dollars of scarce resources. Obama won both, along with Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey and New York, all states with hefty electoral vote hauls, NBC News projected.

McCain countered with Texas and numerous smaller states, primarily in the South and the Great Plains.

In interviews with NBC News, aides to McCain said they were proud that they had put up a good fight in “historically difficult times.”

A senior adviser said McCain himself was “fine” but that he felt “he let his staff and supporters down.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com

Barack Obama elected 44th president

‘Change has come to America,’ first African-American leader tells country'

"President-elect Barack Obama walks on stage at his victory celebration in Chicago with his wife, Michelle, and daughters Malia and Sasha"
Barack Obama, a 47-year-old first-term senator from Illinois, shattered more than 200 years of history Tuesday night by winning election as the first African-American president of the United States.

A crowd of nearly a quarter-million jammed Grant Park and the surrounding area in Chicago, where Obama addressed the nation for the first time as its president-elect at midnight ET. Hundreds of thousands more — Mayor Richard Daley said he would not be surprised if a million Chicagoans jammed the streets — watched on a large television screen outside the park.

“If there is anyone out there who doubts that America is a place where anything is possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer,” Obama declared.

“Young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled, Americans have sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of red states and blue states,” he said. “We have been and always will be the United States of America.

“It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America,” he said to a long roar.

msnbc.com