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President Obama roused union members behind supporting his re-election bid in a speech Monday to labor leaders, a core Democratic constituency with which his administration has had differences in his first term.
Pablo Martinez Monsivais / AP
President Barack Obama speaks April 30 at the Building and Construction Trades Department Legislative Conference.
"These have been some tough years we’ve been in," Obama said to members of the Building and Construction Trade Department, an AFL-CIO-affiliated group. “I know a lot of your membership can get discouraged. They can feel like nobody’s looking out for them. They can get frustrated and it sure is easy to give up on Washington.”
Among those labor members who have expressed their frustration with Washington -– including the president –- is AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, who in January criticized the administration’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness for focusing on reforming regulations and the tax system.
There are varied other instances in which unions that supported Obama during the 2008 election felted jilted by the president. Labor leaders pushed for a more robust stimulus and jobs program, and were generally disappointed deeply by Obama's decision to jettison the so-called "public option" as part of health care reform. The Employee Free Choice Act, a priority of organized labor that had enjoyed administration support, also died in Congress amid heavy business opposition.
Unions have also been generally supportive of a plan to build the TransCanada Keystone Oil pipeline, development of which the administration has mostly blocked.
Obama told the group Monday that, while he has not always been “a perfect president,” he has kept his promise to labor unions –- and, by extension, all voters.
“I made a promise I’d always tell you where I stood, I’d always tell you what I thought, what I believed in. And most importantly, I would wake up every single day working as hard as I know how to make your lives a little bit better," he said. "And for all that we’ve gone through these three-and-a-half or four years, I have kept that promise."
While not mentioning presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney by name, Obama also contrasted his views on labor with those of Republicans, saying that the party wants to weaken labor unions.
“If you asked them what's their big economic plan in addition to tax cuts for rich folks, it's dismantling your unions,” Obama said.
He criticized Republicans for advocating so-called “right to work” laws, which bar unions from requiring prospective employees to join as a precondition for being hired. Twenty-three U.S. states currently have such laws.
“I believe when folks try and take collective bargaining rights away by passing so-called ‘right to work’ laws that might as well be called ‘the right to work for less and less,’ that's not about economics -- it's about politics," Obama said.
He said that his support for labor unions was evident in his belief in strong collective-bargaining rights.
“The right to organize and negotiate a fair pay for hard work should be the right of every American -- from the CEO in the corner office to the worker who built that office,” he said.
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"That Mitt Romney, he is a master campaigner. This week he was introducing his wife, and he said, ‘She is the heavyweight champion of my life.” Which may explain why on the ride home, he was strapped to the roof of the car." –Bill Maher
"Mitt Romney has come under fire for his pledge to eliminate federal funding for PBS. Romney said, 'When I'm president, the only operated puppet speaking to kids will be me." –Conan O'Brien
Why not share the funny jokes about obama eating dog. Did you not think those where funny, too?
GM will tout their mega profits and thank obama. But will they tell the people they did not have to pay any income tax.
They don't call hin "Obama Bin Lyin" for nothing......
The Washington Establishment is made up of two corrupt political groups, the Democrats and Republicans, and it will remain as such as long as their Elite financial supporters continue to support them, or we, the people, remove them and the chokehold they have around our throats.
Either we, the people, form a third political Party that represents us, or we remain victims to their escalating oppression and tyranny. Chit chat doesn't cut it. We want control of our government! Period!
Right to work laws DO NOT infringe on collective bargaining rights. Pres Obama either intentially lied or he can't take the time to read a one page state law before he criticizes it. I'm not sure which is worse.
There is nothing about promises that yield a great a Nation when delivered by one with a forked tongue. The past 3 1/2 years have been horrible. Obama's manifesto has yielded nothing but anger, stress, anxiety and a total disrespect and regard for that which should be extraordinary. He is too much a man wanting to be mediocre and "loved". The office of President is suppose to be a high honor. One of extraordinary statesmanly character. From the fast and the furious to the Corzine non punishment, Obama has shown those who are not fooled easily what a totally corrupt person he truly is. None of his slam through policies has ever been designed to bring about a Nation of united spirit. NOthing but volatile rabid uber liberalism spewing forth from his lips. This Nation is a mess not because of long business cycles in the trenches, but because of his lack of ability to read the truth in both qualitative and quantitative analysis. I have never seen such bitterness and misery in so many people. Withdrawn and worried. Doubtful and edgy. America means so little to him. His ideals are not the ideals of a balanced and happy country.
Obama family vacations on the taxpayer since taking office, thank you.
Here is a full list of the 16 vacations, first compiled by The Washington Examiner:
-- President's Day 2012, Michelle and the girls go to Aspen to ski.
-- Christmas 2011, the first family goes to Hawaii for an extended vacation.
-- Summer 2011, the family visits Martha's Vineyard, Mass., for the annual beach break.
-- June 2011, the first lady, her mother and daughters travel to South Africa and Botswana.
-- President's Day 2011, the first lady and first daughters travel to Vail to ski.
-- Christmas 2010, the first family goes to Hawaii.
-- August 2010, post-BP oil spill beach trip to Panama City Beach, Fla.
-- August 2010, Obama travels to Chicago alone for a weekend 49th birthday bash (and fundraiser).
-- August 2010, the first lady and daughter Sasha travel to Spain for a mother-daughter vacation.
-- August 2010, the family spends summer vacation in Martha's Vineyard.
-- July 2010, the first family goes to Mount Desert Island, Maine.
-- May 2010, the first family takes a four-day trip to Chicago.
-- March 2010, first lady and daughters spend spring break in New York City.
-- Christmas 2009, the family goes to Hawaii for the winter break.
-- August 2009, everyone heads to Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Canyon for a short vacation.
-- August 2009, the first family takes its first vacation from the White House at Martha's Vineyard.
We need to tax those evil rich people more so we can pay for this.
Little Stevie - again with the vacation bull@!$%#? Eh?
Now go sit down - you are dismissed!
Feisty its pretty narrow minded of you to assume that Steve wasn't equally upset when Pres Bush spent taxpayer money to take vacations as well.
If Steve was so upset - why didn't he include it instead of singling out President Obama?
Sorry, my original observation stands... thanks for askin!
Just think about all the trips Bush made to Crawford TX. On average he made 1 trip there every 5 weeks on the tax payer’s dime. Then consider all the people that had to travel there for meetings with him again at tax payer’s expense.
Fiesty
Here, in Obama own words why you shouldn't support him.
From Sen. Obama’s Floor Speech, March 20, 2006:
The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can’t pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies. … Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that “the buck stops here.” Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.
At the time, Senator Obama was urging Congress not to tolerate an increase that would bring the debt ceiling to $9 trillion.
Unless you are a moron, Obama is proclaiming he is a failure as a leader and his never ending ever growing debt crises is a dange to our economy and our nation.
He's telling all you supporters not to support him. Only a moron would go against Obama's own words.
Did you bother to compare the vacations of other Presidents? In the same time frame, Bush beat that by a significant number. Reagan was even worse.
Poor Alex,
That is precisely the point. I worked for 35 years paying for health insurance that covered myself and my family. My wife also was required to pay for the same type coverage, even though we had no children. Neither of us could opt out, we both had to pay for insurance that we were not really using.
Under Obamacare everyone will be helping to pay the cost, oneway or another !! and we will cover almost all citizens !!!!!!!!!
obama reminds union people of the bribes he threw their way......obama is a liar, a distorter, and a divider.......GONE IN NOVEMBER!
Obama has no real interest in inproving the economy other than what improvement is needed to get reelected. The truth of the matter is that he wants a poor economy so that more and more citizens become dependent on the government. His goal is to get more than 50% of the citizens to become dependent on the government. Once that is done, the US will be a socialist country. Come on people, open your eyes. This guy wants to be a dictator. Go to the polls in November and vote Obama out of office. This will be the last chance for us to save the US as we know it!
Go ahead Union morons, vote for this dumb son of a bitch.
And not to be topped by Panetta flying home pretty much every weekend on our dime. That is why I DO NOT. Want to pay more in taxes. There is enough money to provide help to those who need it,provide great services to the rest of us, provide security and pay down the debt. I am sick of the Feds wasting money. Ships, planes, tanks that even the military says it does not want.
How about these promises? I am waiting for him to keep the first one especially!
"I'll resign if I don't cut the deficit in half by the end of four years."
"I'll unite the people of this great country."
"I'll put the Health Care negotiations on CSPAN so everyone can see who is at the table!"
"I'll have no lobbyists in my administration."
"I promise 100% transparency in my administration.".
"I promise NO NEW TAXES on a family making less than $250K a year.".
"I will allow 5 days of public comment before I sign any bills.".
"I will remove earmarks from PORK projects before I sign any bill.".
"I will end Income Tax for seniors making less than $50K a year.".
"I'll close Guantanamo."
Mort,
"I'll resign if I don't cut the deficit in half by the end of four years." He did not say he would reign.
"I'll unite the people of this great country." Actually it was Bush that ran on being the “Great Uniter”.
"I'll put the Health Care negotiations on CSPAN so everyone can see who is at the table!" CSPAN is not under his control it is a Congressional decision.
"I promise NO NEW TAXES on a family making less than $250K a year." Federal taxes are lower on everyone under this President than they were under Bush.
"I will remove earmarks from PORK projects before I sign any bill." The President cannot remove or add anything from/to a bill – he can only veto it.
Well, it looks as though I am batting .500 with my comment, and to be fair, so are you with your rebuttal.
Thanks for playing and have a nice day!
So everybody is againist unions that are Republicans???!!! You don't know a grandfather, an uncle, or brother that worked for a union and now they're retired and enjoying the benefits of being in a union for thirty years ladies and gentlemen from the right??!!! I mean this is a tough sell to just be againist something that was used to benefit all employees from the first step in the door, to the last day walking out. So forgive me if I'm a little mystified why you're so againist them.
Not for union members. Only for taxpayers that have been forced to support these low productivity parasites by President Obama.
Let us reason,
[Not for union members.]
You generalize – the majority of unions accepted pay cuts. Paid more toward their pensions and a larger share of their health care plans – so that companies, States and local governments could afford to keep them employed.
I didn't realize that they never existed before 2008. The lowest increases in history to contracts have been over the past four years. Under the Bush administration, the increases were 200 to 300 percent better.
YOU LIE!!! That will be an honest assessment of obama performance.
I'm done with obama. It may be himself or he may be a victim of really sinister and vicious republican strategy, but either way his time is up.
He was doomed pretty much from his half-ass health care reform. He showed he was willing to give ground in his experimentation in diplomacy, perhaps he was naive to think the republican will ever play fair. So be it....
Then on immigration he promised one thing during his campaign, instead once in office he simply just round up a whole lot more of innocent people than ever in the history of this country and send them back to places where even they themselves never remembered ever setting foot on. Breaking up families in the name of the law..... you promised to fix the law before enforcing it, never happened..... what an a-hole, at least your predecessors (even the dumb republican one, yes that one) actually has the balls to look the other way even as they refused to deal with the problem.
Being a candidate who knew a thing or two about poker he was widely expected to clear up the sneaky and murky UIGEA and make it a fair law of either legalizing internet gaming (not gambling, not sports betting, not even horse tracking) or just plain outlaw it all if it suits your belief. Instead UIGEA in all its unclarity of how it is supposed to apply to anything shut down plenty of people's livelihood and take away a nation's liberty in the name of what??? some sh!tty immoral republican sneaking a little totally unrelated banks-doing-money-transfer law in late night vote for a port security bill so it can't be denied??? this is what you're enforcing????
As a self-proclaimed inhaler, there is a lot of hope that he will finally break up the mafia of the pharma industry in bed three-way with the cartels and the DEA (and congressmen and senators watching from bedside jerking off each other). He even said FACTUALLY not to pursue state freedom in such laws. Guess what, this one is a TOTAL LIE with him rounding up the Calif dispensary and is the straw that breaks the camel's back. He's just yet another hypocrite and a liar.
Time is up Mr Obama. Mitt may be boring, and he'll flip faster than you can say flop, but maybe he'll have more backbone and balls than you do. In fact, by all these records, we could have just fooled ourselves and thought we have a republican in office right now. Well let's just get the real thing then. Just maybe, but it's the audacity of hope we are looking for, unfortunately we didnt find it in you.
Yep, Obama got the unions their payoffs, paybacks, and "exemptions", ALL of it at the expense of the taxpayers of the rest of the nation.
And of course he'll expect the unions to pay hundreds of millions for his re-election so he can use OUR money to pay them off again.
Bush couldn't get him with two trillion dollar wars. Obama gunned him down with a single surgical strike. End of story.
Ike it was the information gained by Bush's admin to track the carrier to Obama so as much as you hate Bush you give him credit.
Your buddy Obama is talking about what Romney would havedone but given the Obama history he would not only not taken action for an attack on our soil but bowed to them and told them how sorry we were their attackers died during the attacks. To the the curb with Obama and company in November!
I am a strong supporter of Obama, but am completely against any support of unions. They cripple our business and have been a big reason for outsourcing. They have served their purposes and it's time to end them. DEATH to the unions!!!!
So many comments about how the union created the middle class and without them the middle class will be gone and the rich will take over.
However do the unions not divide the middle class with higher paid union wages and benefits for the same job?
One thing about the greedy rich is they always want more money so they keep expanding and hiring unlike the unions that force them to do their hiring oversees.
So obama pays off the other people that help him destroy America. Supposed to be a surprise here?
We have been told that the rich need to have money they can invest in companies to create jobs. Well, ever since Reagan, the rich have been getting richer, they have been pocketing more and more money, but where is the investment? Where are the jobs? Trickle down economics has been an obvious failure. There is an economic term call the Marginal Propensity to Save. It has been proven repeatedly that the more you earn the more you save. In a nutshell it means the more times a dollar cycles through the economy and through a wealthy persons fingers, the more they keep. That Has Been Demonstrated quite clearly to be true! And now we hear that when they do invest it is in overseas jobs. The biggest voice working men and women have is Unions. Unions have been victims of their own success - once they got the 40 hr work week, overtime, paid vacations, health insurance, retirement benefits accepted as standard packages for workers, people now say why do we need Unions? After being one on the biggest supporters of Social security, Medicare, FMLA, minimum wage laws people ask what have Unions done for me? Companies hate Unions. They claim that Unions increase costs. Right now only 8% of America's private sector workforce is represented by Unions. Wow! I just didn't know that those 8% drove prices throughout the roof!!! THEY HAVEN"T!!! Rich f**king owners pocket the money instead.
8% because the Steel, Textile, and Manufacturering have gone overseas. Did you know that Honda and Toyota use more made in the USA parts then GM, Ford, and Chrysler? Yeah they are creating more jobs here because GM, Ford, and Chrysler are paying the UAW and importing parts from China. Yes that includes the F series truck! So bottomline China loves our unions!
Plain and simple,,,,,,,,,,Obama has already won this election
Which means America has "lost" any hope of a future.
The one thing you can count on is Obama's word. Yea right. Like his impassioned speech on the floor of the Senate in 2006 describing the dangers of raising the debt ceiling.
From Sen. Obama’s Floor Speech, March 20, 2006:
The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can’t pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies. … Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that “the buck stops here.” Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.
At the time, Senator Obama was urging Congress not to tolerate an increase that would bring the debt ceiling to $9 trillion.
Amazing how many times he's gone before Congress in the past year to get the debt ceiling raised. Its no wonder he's created a never ending ever growing debt crises.
I agree with Obama. Americans deserve better than what he is doing to them.
Here it is Obama telling all you Obama supporters in his own words not to support him because he is a failed leader and his never ending ever growing debt crises is a danger to the economy and our country.
Why would you want to give this self proclaimed failure four more years?