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Biden Sets the Record Straight!
July 26, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
What You Might Not Know About the Recovery
By JOE BIDEN
Washington
SIX months ago, when President Obama and I took office, we were confronted with an economic crisis unparalleled in our lifetime. The nation was hemorrhaging more than 700,000 jobs a month, the housing market was in free fall, and the fate of the financial system hung in the balance. Credible economists were handicapping the probability of a depression. The actions we took — passing the Recovery Act, stabilizing the banking system, pressing to get credit flowing again and helping responsible homeowners — brought us back from the precipice. Monthly job losses are down, financial markets are improved, and economic contraction has slowed. We still have a long way to go, but clearly we are closer to recovery today than we were in January. The Recovery Act has been critical to that progress.
Notwithstanding this progress, the nature of the Recovery Act remains misunderstood by many, and misconstrued by others: critics have suggested that the entire $787 billion is being spent on pet programs. As the person leading the administration’s efforts to put the Recovery Act into effect, I want to set the record straight.
The single largest part of the Recovery Act — more than one-third of it — is tax cuts: 95 percent of working Americans have seen their taxes go down as a result of the act. The second-largest part — just under a third — is direct relief to state governments and individuals. The money is allowing state governments to avoid laying off teachers (14,000 in New York City alone), firefighters and police officers and preventing states’ budget gaps from growing wider.
And those hardest hit by the recession are getting extended unemployment insurance, health coverage and other help to get through these tough times. The bottom line is that two-thirds of the Recovery Act doesn’t finance “programs,” but goes directly to tax cuts, state governments and families in need, without red tape or delays.
As for the final third, the act is financing the largest investment in roads since the creation of the Interstate highway system; construction projects at military bases, ports, bridges and tunnels; long overdue Superfund cleanups; the creation of clean energy jobs of the future; improvements in badly outdated rural water systems; upgrades to overtaxed mass transit and rail systems; and much more. These investments create jobs today — and support economic growth for years to come. Far from being a negative, the wide array of these investments is needed given the incredible diversity of the American economy.
Projects are being chosen without earmarks or political consideration, and many contracts have come in under budget. More than 30,000 projects have been approved, and thousands are already posted on recovery.gov — providing a high level of transparency and accountability. Taxpayers should know that we have not hesitated to reject proposals that have failed to meet our merit-based standards.
The care with which we are carrying out the provisions of the Recovery Act has led some people to ask whether we are moving too slowly. But the act was intended to provide steady support for our economy over an extended period — not a jolt that would last only a few months. Instead of quick-hit rebates, we are giving Americans a tax cut in each paycheck. Instead of pumping out all the state aid immediately, we are spreading it over the two years that it will be needed. Road projects, energy projects and construction projects are being started as soon as they pass review, contracts are competitively bid and reporting systems are in place.
Even with such care being taken, we have already committed more than one-fourth of the Recovery Act’s total funds, and we are on track to meet the deadline set when the act was passed in February — spending 70 percent by the end of September 2010.
The Recovery Act is not the cure for all our economic ills — no single piece of legislation could be. But how many government initiatives can point to both large numbers of projects coming in under budget and a Government Accountability Office finding that we are ahead of schedule in key areas?
It is true that the act’s effort to address multiple problems simultaneously makes it an easy target for second-guessing. Critics have argued that the tax cuts are too small (or too large); that too much (or not enough) aid is going to rural areas; that too little (or too much) is being spent on roads. Recently, some have even criticized the act for helping support soup kitchens and food banks.
But the way I see it, our balanced approach recognizes that there is no silver bullet, no single thing, that can address the many and complex needs of America’s vast economy. We need relief, recovery and reinvestment to cope with our multifaceted crisis — and only 159 days after it was signed by President Obama, the Recovery Act is already at work providing all three.
Joe Biden is the vice president of the United States.
Op-Ed Contributor
What You Might Not Know About the Recovery
By JOE BIDEN
Washington
SIX months ago, when President Obama and I took office, we were confronted with an economic crisis unparalleled in our lifetime. The nation was hemorrhaging more than 700,000 jobs a month, the housing market was in free fall, and the fate of the financial system hung in the balance. Credible economists were handicapping the probability of a depression. The actions we took — passing the Recovery Act, stabilizing the banking system, pressing to get credit flowing again and helping responsible homeowners — brought us back from the precipice. Monthly job losses are down, financial markets are improved, and economic contraction has slowed. We still have a long way to go, but clearly we are closer to recovery today than we were in January. The Recovery Act has been critical to that progress.
Notwithstanding this progress, the nature of the Recovery Act remains misunderstood by many, and misconstrued by others: critics have suggested that the entire $787 billion is being spent on pet programs. As the person leading the administration’s efforts to put the Recovery Act into effect, I want to set the record straight.
The single largest part of the Recovery Act — more than one-third of it — is tax cuts: 95 percent of working Americans have seen their taxes go down as a result of the act. The second-largest part — just under a third — is direct relief to state governments and individuals. The money is allowing state governments to avoid laying off teachers (14,000 in New York City alone), firefighters and police officers and preventing states’ budget gaps from growing wider.
And those hardest hit by the recession are getting extended unemployment insurance, health coverage and other help to get through these tough times. The bottom line is that two-thirds of the Recovery Act doesn’t finance “programs,” but goes directly to tax cuts, state governments and families in need, without red tape or delays.
As for the final third, the act is financing the largest investment in roads since the creation of the Interstate highway system; construction projects at military bases, ports, bridges and tunnels; long overdue Superfund cleanups; the creation of clean energy jobs of the future; improvements in badly outdated rural water systems; upgrades to overtaxed mass transit and rail systems; and much more. These investments create jobs today — and support economic growth for years to come. Far from being a negative, the wide array of these investments is needed given the incredible diversity of the American economy.
Projects are being chosen without earmarks or political consideration, and many contracts have come in under budget. More than 30,000 projects have been approved, and thousands are already posted on recovery.gov — providing a high level of transparency and accountability. Taxpayers should know that we have not hesitated to reject proposals that have failed to meet our merit-based standards.
The care with which we are carrying out the provisions of the Recovery Act has led some people to ask whether we are moving too slowly. But the act was intended to provide steady support for our economy over an extended period — not a jolt that would last only a few months. Instead of quick-hit rebates, we are giving Americans a tax cut in each paycheck. Instead of pumping out all the state aid immediately, we are spreading it over the two years that it will be needed. Road projects, energy projects and construction projects are being started as soon as they pass review, contracts are competitively bid and reporting systems are in place.
Even with such care being taken, we have already committed more than one-fourth of the Recovery Act’s total funds, and we are on track to meet the deadline set when the act was passed in February — spending 70 percent by the end of September 2010.
The Recovery Act is not the cure for all our economic ills — no single piece of legislation could be. But how many government initiatives can point to both large numbers of projects coming in under budget and a Government Accountability Office finding that we are ahead of schedule in key areas?
It is true that the act’s effort to address multiple problems simultaneously makes it an easy target for second-guessing. Critics have argued that the tax cuts are too small (or too large); that too much (or not enough) aid is going to rural areas; that too little (or too much) is being spent on roads. Recently, some have even criticized the act for helping support soup kitchens and food banks.
But the way I see it, our balanced approach recognizes that there is no silver bullet, no single thing, that can address the many and complex needs of America’s vast economy. We need relief, recovery and reinvestment to cope with our multifaceted crisis — and only 159 days after it was signed by President Obama, the Recovery Act is already at work providing all three.
Joe Biden is the vice president of the United States.
Also, Biden has a few words about Russia:
July 26, 2009
New Biden Criticism Surprises Russia
By ANDREW E. KRAMER
MOSCOW — Just weeks after a summit meeting intended to show a thawing in relations between the United States and Russia, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. made blistering references to Russia’s failing economy, loss of face and a leadership that is “clinging to something in the past,” in an interview published on Saturday.
Speaking on the heels of his trip to Georgia and Ukraine, Mr. Biden said flatly that the Obama administration would make no deals and accept no compromises with the Kremlin in exchange for better relations.
Russia itself, he said, should find it in its own interest to repair relations.
The Kremlin immediately responded to the comments, made in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, with a demand for a clarification of the administration’s intentions toward Russia, saying essentially that it was receiving a mixed message so soon after President Obama had visited Moscow for the summit meeting.
Calling the criticism “perplexing” in light of the diplomatic overtures initiated by the United States and described as “pressing the reset button,” the chief foreign policy adviser to President Dmitri A. Medvedev told the Interfax news agency, “The question is: who is shaping the U.S. foreign policy, the president or respectable members of his team?”
The adviser, Sergei Prikhodko, said the atmosphere between the countries had improved since Mr. Obama’s visit early this month.
“If some members of Obama’s team and government do not like this atmosphere, why don’t they say so?” Interfax reported him as saying. “If they disagree with the course of their president, we just need to know this.”
In the interview, Mr. Biden set aside diplomatic finesse and offered an unflinching analysis of the state of affairs in Russia.
With falling oil prices, a corruption-ridden banking system and failing courts, Russia has seen the steepest swing from growth to recession of any major economy in the financial crisis.
Mr. Biden has a reputation for speaking volubly, and sometimes going beyond official policy. It was not immediately clear if he was sending an officially sanctioned message.
The White House did not back away from the vice president’s remarks on Saturday, but attempted to smooth over the frayed relations with Russia.
“The president and vice president believe Russia will work with us not out of weakness but out of national interest,” Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, said in a statement on Saturday night.
“The president said in Moscow that the United States seeks a strong, peaceful and prosperous Russia — one that will be an even more effective partner in meeting common challenges, including reducing nuclear arsenals, securing vulnerable nuclear materials, contending with nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran, defeating violent extremism and advancing global security and economic growth,” Mr. Gibbs said.
Mr. Biden spoke after visits to Ukraine and Georgia intended to reassure those countries that American support for their independence would not be weakened by the administration’s efforts to improve ties with Russia.
“The reality is the Russians are where they are,” Mr. Biden told The Wall Street Journal, according to excerpts posted on the newspaper’s Web site. “They have a shrinking population base, they have a withering economy, they have a banking sector and structure that is not likely to be able to withstand the next 15 years, they’re in a situation where the world is changing before them and they’re clinging to something in the past that is not sustainable.”
Mr. Biden rejected recent Russian assertions of a restored sphere of privileged interests in the former Soviet Union, made after the war in Georgia.
In the most frank discussion yet on Russian expectations of the new diplomatic exchanges, Mr. Biden said the Russians anticipated that the United States would enter into diplomatic bargaining.
Mr. Biden said: “They think we’ll be duplicitous and say, ‘Yeah, O.K., we got it. We’ll make a deal with you on something else we need in return.’ ”
He referred to the absence of strong American criticism of Russian military operations against separatists in the republic of Chechnya. “Some argued the last administration made a deal on Chechnya in return for no response on Iraq,” he said. “We’re not going to do that. It’s not necessary to do that.”
The Russian retort had its own reference to the previous administration, albeit an oblique one.
After noting the ambiguity of who was shaping policy for the administration, the president or his deputy, Mr. Prikhodko said, “We have been there already.”
Jeff Zeleny contributed reporting from Washington.
New Biden Criticism Surprises Russia
By ANDREW E. KRAMER
MOSCOW — Just weeks after a summit meeting intended to show a thawing in relations between the United States and Russia, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. made blistering references to Russia’s failing economy, loss of face and a leadership that is “clinging to something in the past,” in an interview published on Saturday.
Speaking on the heels of his trip to Georgia and Ukraine, Mr. Biden said flatly that the Obama administration would make no deals and accept no compromises with the Kremlin in exchange for better relations.
Russia itself, he said, should find it in its own interest to repair relations.
The Kremlin immediately responded to the comments, made in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, with a demand for a clarification of the administration’s intentions toward Russia, saying essentially that it was receiving a mixed message so soon after President Obama had visited Moscow for the summit meeting.
Calling the criticism “perplexing” in light of the diplomatic overtures initiated by the United States and described as “pressing the reset button,” the chief foreign policy adviser to President Dmitri A. Medvedev told the Interfax news agency, “The question is: who is shaping the U.S. foreign policy, the president or respectable members of his team?”
The adviser, Sergei Prikhodko, said the atmosphere between the countries had improved since Mr. Obama’s visit early this month.
“If some members of Obama’s team and government do not like this atmosphere, why don’t they say so?” Interfax reported him as saying. “If they disagree with the course of their president, we just need to know this.”
In the interview, Mr. Biden set aside diplomatic finesse and offered an unflinching analysis of the state of affairs in Russia.
With falling oil prices, a corruption-ridden banking system and failing courts, Russia has seen the steepest swing from growth to recession of any major economy in the financial crisis.
Mr. Biden has a reputation for speaking volubly, and sometimes going beyond official policy. It was not immediately clear if he was sending an officially sanctioned message.
The White House did not back away from the vice president’s remarks on Saturday, but attempted to smooth over the frayed relations with Russia.
“The president and vice president believe Russia will work with us not out of weakness but out of national interest,” Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, said in a statement on Saturday night.
“The president said in Moscow that the United States seeks a strong, peaceful and prosperous Russia — one that will be an even more effective partner in meeting common challenges, including reducing nuclear arsenals, securing vulnerable nuclear materials, contending with nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran, defeating violent extremism and advancing global security and economic growth,” Mr. Gibbs said.
Mr. Biden spoke after visits to Ukraine and Georgia intended to reassure those countries that American support for their independence would not be weakened by the administration’s efforts to improve ties with Russia.
“The reality is the Russians are where they are,” Mr. Biden told The Wall Street Journal, according to excerpts posted on the newspaper’s Web site. “They have a shrinking population base, they have a withering economy, they have a banking sector and structure that is not likely to be able to withstand the next 15 years, they’re in a situation where the world is changing before them and they’re clinging to something in the past that is not sustainable.”
Mr. Biden rejected recent Russian assertions of a restored sphere of privileged interests in the former Soviet Union, made after the war in Georgia.
In the most frank discussion yet on Russian expectations of the new diplomatic exchanges, Mr. Biden said the Russians anticipated that the United States would enter into diplomatic bargaining.
Mr. Biden said: “They think we’ll be duplicitous and say, ‘Yeah, O.K., we got it. We’ll make a deal with you on something else we need in return.’ ”
He referred to the absence of strong American criticism of Russian military operations against separatists in the republic of Chechnya. “Some argued the last administration made a deal on Chechnya in return for no response on Iraq,” he said. “We’re not going to do that. It’s not necessary to do that.”
The Russian retort had its own reference to the previous administration, albeit an oblique one.
After noting the ambiguity of who was shaping policy for the administration, the president or his deputy, Mr. Prikhodko said, “We have been there already.”
Jeff Zeleny contributed reporting from Washington.
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