奥巴马每日发言In Arnold, Missouri Town Hall(2009-4-29)

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REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT
IN ARNOLD, MISSOURI TOWN HALL

Fox Senior High School
Arnold, Missouri

10:25 A.M. CDT

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you so much.  Thank you.  Everybody please have a seat.  Have a seat.  Thank you so much.  What a wonderful introduction.  It's good to be out of Washington, good to be back in the Midwest.

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  We love you!

THE PRESIDENT:  Love you back.  (Applause.)

Let me, first of all, ask everybody to give a huge round of applause to Linda for the great introduction and everything that she's been doing in the community.  Thank you so much.  (Applause.)

I've got a few other friends who are here -- you may know them, I want to make sure that I acknowledge them.  One of, I think, the finest members of Congress that we have and somebody who's just been a great friend of mine, she is somebody you want in the foxhole with you when you got a tough fight -- please give a huge round of applause to Claire McCaskill.  (Applause.)

We've got one of the finest new governors in the country, Jay Nixon.  (Applause.)  Where did Jay go?  There he is.  An outstanding Secretary of State and somebody who I think may turn out to be pretty good in Washington if she just so decides -- Robin Carnahan.  (Applause.)  We've got Attorney General Chris Koster here.  (Applause.)  State Treasurer Clint Zweifel.  (Applause.)  A great friend who was with me from the start -- Susan Montee, your State Auditor.  (Applause.)  We have our outstanding host today, Mayor Ron Counts, of Arnold.  (Applause.)

We've got Congressman Russ Carnahan, who is voting on the budget today, but I want everybody to give him a big round of applause anyway.  (Applause.)

I want to thank everybody here at Fox High School for their hospitality.  (Applause.)  I want to thank your lovely school superintendent, who is just doing an outstanding job. Please stand up.  (Applause.)  I want to thank the Warriors for the basketball jersey -- (applause) -- which I will wear with pride -- yeah!  (Applause.)  If I ever get to play basketball again -- (laughter) -- they've been keeping me a little busy.

It is great to be back in the middle of America, where common sense often reigns.  (Applause.)  And this reminds me of why I like to get out of Washington now and again.     

The last time I was in Missouri was just under six months ago, at a high school a lot like this one.  We were in Springfield; it was two days before the election, and I was making my final case to the American people.  And it was just an unbelievable crowd, bigger than anything anybody had expected.  And so we're here in Missouri to -- we were here in Missouri at the end of a long journey to the White House, and so now I want to come back and speak to you at the beginning of another long journey.  Today marks 100 days since I took the oath of office to be your President.  (Applause.)  One hundred days.  It's a good thing.  Thank you.  Thank you.  (Applause.)

Now, back in November, some folks were surprised that we showed up in Springfield at the end of our campaign.  But then again, some folks were surprised that we even started our campaign in the first place.  (Laughter.)  They didn't give us much of a chance.  They didn't think we could do things differently.  They didn't know if this country was ready to move in a new direction.

But here's the thing -- my campaign wasn't born in Washington.  My campaign was rooted in neighborhoods just like this one, in towns and cities all across America; rooted in folks who work hard and look after their families and seek a brighter children -- future for their children and for their communities and for their country.

It was driven by workers who were tired of seeing their jobs shipped overseas, their health care costs go up, their dreams slip out of reach.  (Applause.)  It was grounded in a sense of unity and common purpose with every single American, whether they voted for me on Election Day or voted for somebody else.  It was energized by every citizen who believed that the size of our challenges had outgrown the smallness of our politics.  My campaign was possible because the American people wanted change.

I ran for President because I wanted to carry those voices -- your voices -- with me to Washington.  (Applause.)  And so I just want everybody to understand:  You're who I'm working for every single day in the White House.  I've heard your stories; I know you sent me to Washington because you believed in the promise of a better day.  And I don't want to let you down.

You believed that after an era of selfishness and greed, that we could reclaim a sense of responsibility on Wall Street and in Washington, as well as on Main Street.  You believed that instead of huge inequalities and an economy that's built on a bubble, we could restore a sense of fairness to our economy and build a new foundation for lasting growth and prosperity.  You believed that at a time of war, we could stand strong against our enemies and stand firmly for our ideals, and show a new face of American leadership to the world.

That's the change that you believed in.  That's the trust you placed in me.  It's something I will never forget, the fact that you made this possible.

So today, on my 100th day in office, I've come to report to you, the American people, that we have begun to pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off, and we've begun the work of remaking America.  (Applause.)  We're working to remake America.

Now, we've got a lot of work to do, because on our first day in office we found challenges of unprecedented size and scope.  Our economy was in the midst of the most serious downturn since the Great Depression.  Banks had stopped lending.  The housing market was crippled.  The deficit was at $1.3 trillion.  And meanwhile, families continued to struggle with health care costs, too many of our kids couldn't get the education they needed, the nation remained trapped by our dangerous dependence on foreign oil.

Now, these challenges could not be met with half-measures.  They couldn't be met with the same old formulas. They couldn't be confronted in isolation.  They demanded action that was bold and sustained.  They demand action that is bold and sustained.  They call on us to clear away the wreckage of a painful recession, but also, at the same time, lay the building blocks for a new prosperity.  And that's the work that we've begun over these first 100 days.

To jumpstart job creation and get our economy moving again, we passed the most ambitious economic recovery plan in our nation's history.  And already, we're beginning to see this change take hold.  In Jefferson City, over 2,500 jobs will be created on Missouri's largest wind farm, so that American workers are harnessing clean, American energy. (Applause.)  Across the state, roughly 20,000 transportation jobs will be supported by the Recovery Act, so that Missourians are rebuilding your roads, your bridges, your rails.

To restore fairness to our economy, we've taken several steps with Congress to strengthen the middle class.  We cut taxes for 95 percent of American households through a tax cut that will put $120 billion directly into your pockets.  (Applause.)  We finally signed a law long overdue that will protect equal pay for equal work for American women.  (Applause.)  We extended health care to millions of children across this country.  (Applause.)

We launched a housing plan that has already contributed to a spike in the number of homeowners who are refinancing their mortgages, which is the equivalent of another tax cut for them.  And if you haven't refinanced, you might want to take a look and see if it's possible, because that can save people a lot of money.  We've taken steps to unfreeze the market for auto loans and student loans and small business loans.  And we're acting with the full force of the federal government to ensure that our banks have the capital and the confidence to lend money to the families and business owners who keep this economy running.

Now, even as we cleared away the wreckage, I've also said that we can't go back to an economy that's built on a pile of sand -- on inflated home prices and maxed-out credit cards; on over-leveraged banks and outdated regulations that allowed the recklessness of just a few people to threaten the prosperity of all of us.

So that's why I introduced a budget and other measures that build on the Recovery Act to lay a new foundation for growth -- a foundation that's built on five pillars that will strengthen our economy and help us compete in the 21st century:  number one, new investments in education that will equip our workers with the right skills and training; number two, new investments in renewable energy that will create millions of jobs and new industries; number three, new investments in health care that will cut costs for families and businesses; number four, new savings that will bring down our deficit; and number five, new rules for Wall Street that reward drive and innovation.  (Applause.)

Now, I've got to say that some of the people in Washington have been surprised -- they said, boy, he's so ambitious; he's been trying to do so much.  Now, maybe they're not accustomed to this, but there's no mystery to what we've done.  The priorities that we've acted upon were the things that we said we'd do during the campaign.  (Applause.)  I mean, it's not like anybody should be surprised.  The policies we've proposed were plans we talked about for two years, in places like this, all across the country with ordinary Americans.  The changes that we've made are the changes we promised.  That's what you should expect from a President.  You may not always agree with me, but if you take a look at what I said I was going to do when I was running for office, and you now look at what we are in the middle of doing -- we're doing what we said we'd do.  (Applause.)