At a town hall in Elkhart, Obama says the bill is not perfect -- it comes out of Washington. Laughter. But the bill is the right size and it's necessary.
Obama said no one was screened for the questions asked. There are some people who like me in the audience, some people who don't.
With that, here comes the Q&A portion and I guess I'm live blogging. All paraphrased, of course.
Helen: When the money comes to Elkhart, will the money come directly into Elkhart?
O: There will be an independent bipartisan board that will review how the money's being spent. Recovery.gov will tell you where your money is going. If you see a project that's not being spent wisely, you can give a call.
The people in Elkhart seem to be with Obama, contrary to the legislators who have been saying that the stimulus has no support.
An Elkhartian (is that right?) reminds Obama that Obama's serving the people not the fat cats, so tax cuts need to go to the people.
mic out. mic back.
O: Tax cuts targeted to working people has more impact on the economy.
Obama takes this opportunity to talk about getting the banks lending again. Many people seem to be confused between the stimulus and the bank bailout.
An audience member, who clearly opposes Obama (she listens to Sean Hannity and apparently Hannity invited Obama out for beer - as if), says his cabinet is not trustworthy. The audience boos the woman. Obama says it's okay. It's a legitimate concern.
I know the individuals at issue personally and they made honest mistakes. If you're not going to appoint anyone who's not made a mistake you won't have anyone taking a job, he said. I don't want to send the signal that there are two sets of rules. I set up unprecedented ethics rules in my White House, the highest standard ever.
We are changing the culture in Washington and it's taking some time. Of Sean Hannity, Obama said he didn't realize Hannity invited him for a beer. But said Hannity isn't his largest fan.
Hannity is a goober and it's too bad people are sucked up by goobers. (That's my comment. Obama didn't call Hannity a goober).
An audience member asks about green technology in the stimulus.
Obama says clean energy has a multiplier effect. It puts people to work and has the long-term effect of creating more jobs and producing clean energy. We need to use this crisis as an opportunity, he said.
Q: Home foreclosures.
A: Home foreclosures is both a cause and effect of the downturn. We will unveil a series of plans for those on the brink and those whose mortgages are more than the value of their home, which makes getting financing difficult.
Obama said they're going to make it so that if you just own one house, you can get your house loan modified, whereas now, if you have multiple houses, you have that advantage.
Obama reminds people that the house in DC is the people's house, a house that I'm borrowing.
Q: A man said he opted to keep his friends and neighbors employed by keeping his business in Elkhart and not going to China. Loud cheers.
He asks about renewable energy rebates for companies such as his.
A: We need to pass a renewable energy standard, which says to utilities they need to get 15% of energy from renewables, which will attract investors. We need tax credits for renewable energy. The third thing is to do what California utilities are doing, making money on how much energy customers save. If you install a solar panel, you can sell some of that energy back when you're not using it. Most utilities are making money on how much energy you use. The fourth thing, improve science research and development. The price is still high for renewables, so we need to keep developing to bring down the price. The country that figures out how to make cheap clean energy will come out ahead in the future.
Obama moves on to education. The senate cut some of the education dollars and we need to talk about that moving forward.
Last question from James, 9: What are you going to do to help our schools?
O: We need to rebuild them to make sure they're state of the art. We need teacher retraining and need to reform how we do business at schools. We need to assess performance at schools.
That's it folks. I'll post video when it's up, which will be more coherent than my speed typing.
The people of Elkhart didn't ask the question I wanted answered: How will the money be doled out? How do mayors, governors tap this money?
Apparently, this kind of thing will be made available at Recovery.gov.
Obama's 15 minute intro. I'll post the Q&A part when it's available.
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Update: Of all the important things Obama said today, this is the most popular, turns out. Apparently, the woman who told Obama that his cabinet is not to be trusted also was on Sean Hannity's show to tell him she was booed. This reminds me of the good ol' Palin rallies.
