Date: 2010-05-18
Speaker: WASSERMAN SCHULTZ (democrat)
Chamber: H

Mr. Speaker. tonight and beginning each week. we will begin the week talking about the accomplishments of both President Obama. as well as the Democratic leadership in the legislature. The efforts of the Democratic Caucus over the last year and a half. particularly since President Obama was sworn in have truly been remarkable. The efforts have been remarkable. but also the accomplishments. And I think its important that we continue to talk to the American people about those accomplishments. particularly when compared to some of the commentary thats out there in the media because. from watching some news programs. one would think that we were all here in the Chamber sitting in our chairs. fast asleep. as opposed to working and keeping our heads down and being very focused and working under the leadership of President Obama to make sure that we can turn the absolute nightmare that we were handed by the former Bush administration into the new direction that we talked about and that the American people elected us to take this country in. And so tonight my colleagues and I are going to spend some time outlining those accomplishments. But I think its important and instructive to first look at where we were. and then talk about where we are now. So thats some of what were going to do this evening. If you look back to January of 2009. which was the month. Mr. TONKO. that President Obama was sworn in. during that month the economy was yet again bleeding 700.000plus jobs. And I think we have a chart here that I can use to illustrate that. But I think the most illustrative example of where we were. versus where we are today is this chart. If you look back. this chart begins in December of 07. and you can see through the end of the Bush administration. Mr. Speaker. that the economy was steadily getting worse. We were bleeding jobs. By the time President Obama took office in January of 09. we literally were at 700.000plus jobs lost. and that continued all the way up until February of 09 with the passage of the American Economic Recovery Act. Now. Ive heard a lot of malarkey in the news media out there. and particularly quite a lot from our friends on the other side of the aisle. about the supposed absence of job creation that the Recovery Act generated. Well. the numbers dont lie. Mr. Speaker. If you look at the direction that job creation has gone in. and our economic recovery has begun. you look at the blue line beginning in February of 09 with the passage of the Recovery Act. and you progress all the way up where we were losing month by month fewer and fewer jobs. and we talked about how. obviously. any job losses are unacceptable. until we reached this most recent month in April. And I think actually this chartit doesnt even. the numbers are even better. Mr. ALTMIRE. than we have on this chart. But this chart shows it up through March where we added 167.000 jobs. In April. Mrs. DAHLKEMPER. we actually added 290.000 jobs in April. The vast majority of those were private sector jobs. We do know that we have some Census jobs that are temporary. But the point is that. as a direct result of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. we are moving in the right direction and beginning to turn the economy around. And I think its incredibly important that we show the American people the results of our policies. And. Mr. ALTMIRE. Id be happy to yield to you.