Obama To Take His Plan To The People

Robert Preston, as con man par excellence “Professor Harold Hill” plays on the fears of naive and righteous midwestern Americans in order to line his own pockets.

Obama to take his plan to the people
Financial Times
By Andrew Ward and Alan Beattie in Washington
Barack Obama will make the case for his economic recovery plans direct to the Ameri­can people next week with campaign-style roadshows in states hard-hit by the economic downturn.
Mr Obama’s travel plans were announced on Friday before Senate Democrats and moderate Republicans reached a tentative agreement on a $780bn fiscal stimulus plan and ahead of the Treasury department’s expected announcement of a fresh financial rescue package on Monday.
Mr Obama will hold town hall-style meetings in Indiana on Monday, and Florida on Tuesday, in his first public events outside Washington since taking office.
The president will conduct his first White House press conference on Monday eve­ning as he adopts an in­creasingly combative ap­proach to selling his plans in the face of persistent Republican opposition.
Democratic leaders hoped to pass the Senate stimulus last night or over the weekend. Further negotiations will be needed to agree on final legislation with the House of Representatives before it can be signed into law by Mr Obama.
The White House faces another tough battle to win support for the financial package due for announcement on Monday, including an overhaul of the troubled asset relief programme and measures to clean up “toxic assets” on Wall Street.
Next week’s public relations blitz reflects some concern within the administration that Republicans have been winning the message war with their calls for more tax cuts and less spending in the stimulus.
Mr Obama waged a charm offensive on congressional Republicans during his first two weeks in office, but his patience has worn thin in recent days as opposition has hardened.
In a fiery speech to a meeting of congressional Democrats on Thursday, the president lashed out at the “phoney arguments” and “false theories of the past” that Republicans were using to resist his economic plans.
The protracted and bitterly partisan negotiations have raised questions over Mr Obama’s ability to im­pose his will on Congress, in spite of Democrats holding strong majorities in both chambers.

Harry Reid, Senate majority leader, told his colleagues that the eyes of the world were on Capitol Hill on Friday as they scrambled to reach agreement over the stimulus.

“If we succeed, there will be plenty of credit to go around. But if we fail, our entire country will suffer the consequences,” he said.

Both parties claim to have public support for their positions, with Democrats accusing their opponents of holding up economic recovery, while Republicans accuse Democrats of trying to force through a “big government” social agenda under the guise of job creation.
Democrats say they have already made concessions by making tax cuts about a third of the overall value of the bill, and accepting Re­publican amendments to increase tax relief.
Moderate Republicans had been pushing for something close to the $819bn package approved by the House.
A sub-plot of the debate has focused on speculation about which variation of the plan Mr Obama supports, an issue complicated by the fact that the White House has spoken only in general terms about the bill.
On Thursday Mr Obama told reporters he would back a bill “roughly in the $800bn range”.
Mr Obama wants to sign a final bill into law by the end of next week.

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And there is this………….
Monday Night Political Football: Obama Demanding Lots of Prime Time from Whining TV Networks
Politico

Washington Post TV writer Lisa de Moraes reported Friday that Team Obama is demanding a lot of free TV space in prime time in the next few weeks: a Monday night press conference, a “stimulus” push on the Monday night after that, the 16th, and the State of the Union on Tuesday, February 24. (What about House, and The Bachelor?)

Network suits are already whining, but are too afraid of pulling out the Just Say No card:

President Obama’s desire to talk — and talk, and talk — to the American public could cost broadcast networks millions, and millions, and millions of prime-time TV dollars.

Broadcasters are bracing themselves for the likelihood of three prime-time interruptions in three weeks, totaling at least three hours of prime time — and ad breaks — yanked.

“His economic stimulus package apparently does not extend to the TV networks,” one network exec noted.

Obama’s reps have alerted broadcasters that the president will hold a news conference Monday, according to network execs. It’s expected to eat up the first hour of prime time; that alone could cost broadcasters more than $9 million in lost ad revenue….

“Notice they’re not going on Friday or Saturday,” one network exec complained. “They’re . . . preempting our better shows. You’re not happy to lose a ‘House’ if you are Fox, or two of the better comedies at CBS, or ‘The Bachelor’ at ABC — we’re all going to take a bath.”

The networks were not afraid to tell President Bush that his political salesmanship wasn’t worth pre-empting in prime time. But none want to “incur the wrath” of Obama .

“As we’re meeting this guy, from a network perspective, it’s like, ‘Is this part of the plan for him?’ ” the network exec said. “Is this what it’s going to be: Is he going to take to the airwaves every time he has something to say?”

Such a strategy, of course, could backfire.

“Do people really want to come home after looking for a job, or after being at a job they hate, sit down to veg out in front of their favorite show — and he’s on again?” said one TV suit, who suspects/hopes the Average Joe’s reaction to too much Obamavision might be “nothing he’s going to say is going to help me get a job, or put food on the table.”

Said the TV suit: “He could lose a lot of goodwill doing this.”

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Wild Thing’s comment……..
Between his TV speeches every other day and his press secretary every day … saturation point has been reached. Heck I was sick of his face when he said he was going to run for President.