keywords: president barack obama, democratic caucus campaign committee, fundraising dinner, st. regis hotel
Synopsis: President Barack Obama delivered remarks at the Democratic Caucus Campaign Committee fundraising dinner at the St. Regis Hotel in New York City on May 13, 2010... (read more)
....of the Oval Office and found a $1.3 trillion deficit after the previous administration had inherited a surplus, the last thing I wanted to do was spend money on a recovery package, or become involved in the auto industry, or prevent the collapse of Wall Street banks -- That wasn’t on my campaign to-do list. You don't remember me campaigning on those items. And they certainly weren’t popular. We knew that. But what I also knew was that if we wanted to break the back of our recession and get our economy moving again, then the steps we took were absolutely necessary. And while we still have a long road ahead of us, we’re beginning to see signs of progress all across America.
But here’s the thing: The steady progress we’re seeing -- it didn’t happen by accident. We're starting to see in public opinion surveys that people start thinking that the economy is getting better, but there seems to be a disconnect as to why it’s getting better. The reason the economy is getting better is because Nancy Pelosi and every Democrat here embraced the responsibility to lead. It happened because they embraced the responsibility to stand up to special interests, stand up even against the prevailing political winds, stand up for the American people’s interests. That’s what this Congress has been doing. And it hasn’t been easy. These guys have taken more tough votes in the last 16 months than Congress had taken in the previous 16 years. And that's the truth.
for nearly a century, we had been talking about the need for health insurance reform in America. And this was the Congress that delivered it for the American people. The bottom line is, is that I could not have gotten done any of the things we got done had it not been for this team right here. And they did it despite all the gridlock, despite all the partisanship. This has been one of the most productive legislative sessions in history -- in the midst of crisis.
You would have thought at a time of historic crisis that Republican leaders would have been more willing to help us find a way out of this mess -- particularly since they created the mess.We all have a stake in cleaning it up. We’re not Democrats or Republicans first –- we’re Americans first. I tell the story about -- you know sometimes you got a feeling Nancy and I are -- Charlie and Steve, everybody -- Jerry, we’re -- we got our mops and our brooms out, we’re cleaning stuff out, and they're sitting there saying, “Hold the broom better.” “That's not how you mop.”Don’t tell me how to mop. Pick up a mop! Do some work on behalf of the American people to solve some of these problems.
They’ve done their best to gum up the works; to make things look broken; to say no to every single thing. That was the attitude they had when it came to pulling our economy out of a crisis. That was the attitude they had when it came to making sure that families and businesses finally got the security of health care in this country. That’s been the attitude on any number of challenges that we faced. Their basic attitude has been: “If the Democrats lose, we win. So after they drove the car into the ditch, made it as difficult as possible for us to pull it back, now they want the keys back. No! You can’t drive! We don't want to have to go back into the ditch! We just got the car out! We just got the car out!
And the American people are going to have a clear choice when they head to the polls in November. They’re going to have a choice about whether they want somebody who has the courage to stand up in a time of need, or would prefer somebody who sits on the sidelines and tries to cast blame. They’re going to have a choice about whether you’re going to make decisions that strengthen our country for the long term –- or that just serve your short-term political purposes. The American people will have a choice about whether or not we’re going to keep rebuilding America that is stronger and more prosperous and more competitive than before –- and that means making some tough choices now for our children and our grandchildren -- or going back to the policies that got us into this mess in the first place.
And I am proud that for the past year and a half, under the leadership of the folks sitting in this room, the Democratic Party has taken the right path. It’s cut taxes for 95 percent of America’s working families; cut taxes for small businesses; for making college more affordable; for families buying their first home. Not just to reward those at the top, but instead to give a little bit of lift to folks on the bottom at a time when they were really in trouble. That’s what Democrats were for. And the other side was against it.
But the fact is the problems that we face are too great for us to be playing politics all the time. And all of us, Democrats and Republicans, need to come together to solve problems. And that is what Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic Caucus has done. They have not played politics.
But when these institutions operate irresponsibly, they don’t just threaten themselves. As we've seen, they threaten the entire economy, along with the dreams of millions of Americans who worked so hard to make a life for themselves. So we need reform that would ensure they operate in a honest, fair, open way.
All of us are going to have to tackle our exploding deficits. And I got to say, Washington has got a short-term memory, so people don’t remember that it wasn’t that long ago under a Democratic President that America enjoyed the hard-won budget surpluses. And yet, it only took a few years of Republican Congresses, these same budget hawks being in charge, to turn that surplus into a massive deficit -- passing a tax cut for the richest Americans, creating an expensive new entitlement program, and authorizing two wars without paying for a single dime of it. And now suddenly we’re in charge, and they say, hey, where did this deficit come from?
I remember the conversation Nancy and I had about health care at the beginning of the debate. And I told her, I said, I want to get this done even if it meant that I was going to be a one-term President. I think it’s that important. And Nancy -- when everybody got all nervous after Massachusetts, she said, you know what, we’re still going to get it done. And we did what was necessary to rescue our economy. We’ve done what’s necessary to resuscitate our economy and to rebuild it on a new foundation of growth, and to turn this country around and point it in the right direction. we’ve got a government that works and is competent, and has restored science to its rightful place and believes in civil liberties. And we have some folks on the Supreme Court who believe in the Constitution.
That is the future that is within our sight. We’ve gone through a stormy time. And I know sometimes it’s made you guys a little seasick -- (laughter) -- but right now the waters are calm -- right there at the horizon, we can see our destination. So now is not the time to lose heart. Now is not the time to get complacent. Now is the time to remind ourselves of what America is all about, and make sure we are working as hard as we can to return Democrats to the House of Representatives.
