Vice President Joseph Biden to Lead Middle Class Task Force

Link to the MIDDLECLASS TASK FORCE Page at the White House

Link to the White House Blog statement by Vice President Joseph Biden: “Time to put middle class front and center”

President Obama, today announced the formation of a middle class task force that will be headed by Vice President Joseph Biden. He also signed several executive orders that are intended to strengthen labor unions.

In choosing Mr. Biden to head up the new task force, the president remarked that he had chosen Biden because: "He has never forgotten his roots as a working class kid from Scranton."

In referring to the almost 4% drop in GDP during the final quarter of 2008, Mr. Obama remarked that the drop in GDP: "...isn't just an economic concept,... This is a continuing disaster for America's families."

The president continued: "The recession is deepening, and the urgency of our economic crisis is growing,... Every day it seems there is another round of layoffs, and another round of families' lives turned upside down."

In stating his opinion on the role of unions in the economic downturn, Obama added: "I also believe that we have to reverse some of the policies" toward organized labor. I don't see organized labor as part of the problem,... To me, it's part of the solution."

Reflecting on the poor health of the economy that mentioned growing unemployment and the downward slope of the economy, Obama said: "This is a difficult moment. But I believe ... if we act swiftly ... it can be an American moment."

Mr. Obama painfully referred to the state of the current American economy as "the American dream in reverse."

Urging support for his economic agenda, Obama said the American people "...need us to pass the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan." In order to create jobs that Obama vowed will last "for years to come." Including as the Los Angeles Times reports to: "rebuild crumbling roads, renovate schools, double the nation's capacity for alternative energy generation and "bring healthcare into the 21st century."

Obama concluded his remarks on the stimulus plan by adding: "I'm pleased that the House has acted. ... I'm hoping we can strengthen it further in the Senate,... What we can't do is drag our feet."

Turning his attention back to the creation of the "White House Task Force on Middle Class Working Families" Obama related that "When I talk about the middle class, I am talking about folks who are currently in the middle class, but also folks who are aspiring to be in the middle class,... You cannot have a strong middle class without a strong labor union."

Reporting on the executive orders signed by Obama, the Times explained: "One of the executive orders prevents federal contract dollars from going to companies that try to prevent the formation of unions. Another requires workers to be advised of their rights to organize."

Biden promised that the task force should be viewed by the American people as "a very, very clear signal to everybody who goes to work in this country every day."

The Times added that: "The administration has assigned it these goals: "Expanding education and lifelong training opportunities, improving work and family balance, restoring labor standards, including workplace safety, helping to protect middle-class and working-family incomes, protecting retirement security."

Biden, as head of the task force will also receive assistance from "...the secretaries of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Commerce, as well as the directors of the National Economic Council, the Office of Management and Budget and the Domestic Policy Council and the chair of the Council of Economic Advisors," the Times reported.

The first meeting of the task force was announced to take place in Philadelphia on February 27th and will focus on "Green Jobs: A Pathway to a Strong Middle Class."

Obama Slams Excessive Wall Street Executive Bonuses

President Obama criticized Wall Street Bank executives for having doled out nearly $20 billion in bonuses in 2008 at a time when severe recession has affecting America and the world. Mr. Obama expressed his scorn that the bonuses came at a time when the U.S. taxpayer was providing billions of dollars to keep America's most important financial giants afloat.

The president continued his attack: “That is the height of irresponsibility,... It is shameful. And part of what we’re going to need is for the folks on Wall Street who are asking for help to show some restraint and show some discipline and show some sense of responsibility.”

Mr. Obama issued a challenge to Wall Street: "Part of what we are going to need is for folks on Wall Street, who are asking for help, to show some restraint and show some discipline and show some sense of responsibility."

President Obama concluded by appealing directly to the American peoples' sense of fair play and honesty by explaining that Wall Street executives had chosen the wrong time to demonstrate greed when he remarked: "The American people understand that we've got a big hole that we've got to dig ourselves out of,... But they don't like that people are digging a bigger hole even as they are being asked to fill it up."

Mr Obama made his remarks in the Oval Office in the presence of Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner and Vice President Joseph Biden. Mr. Obama angrily declared: “There will be time for them to make profits, and there will be time for them to get bonuses,... Now’s not that time. And that’s a message that I intend to send directly to them, I expect Secretary Geithner to send to them.”

The president based his pointed reactions to the dispersal of the executive bonuses on media reports that explained that the size of the bonuses paid out in 2008, were, incredibly, equal in size to the the monies paid out during a much more successful and bullish period back in 2004.

During a later interview on the cable network, CNBC, Vice President Biden pledged that the remaining $350 billion in TARP funds would be distributed by the Obama administration “wisely and prudently and transparently.”

But Mr. Biden followed his reassuring remarks by echoing the president's disdain for Wall Street's top authorities having taken such excessively large bonuses when the country, and the world are facing severe financial disarray and possible ruin.

Mr. Biden saltily declared: “I’d like to throw these guys in the brig,... They’re thinking the same old thing that got us here, greed. They’re thinking, ‘Take care of me.’ ”

In a related development that demonstrated Democratic solidarity against the Wall Street executives' actions; Senator Christopher J. Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee "threatened to bring before his committee any Wall Street executives who take big bonuses after their firms are propped up with public money."

Mr. Dodd expressed his displeasure by continuing his remarks: “Whether it was used directly or indirectly, this infuriates the American people and rightly so,... So I say to anyone else who does it, if you do it, I’m going to bring you before the committee.”