Obama's Weekly Address Follows More Bad News on Home Sales, Starbucks & Toothpaste

The statistics get almost numbing after awhile:

Sales of new homes in the United States fell to the lowest levels on record.

Americans living on unemployment checks at highest level since tracking started in 1967.

Home foreclosures rose 81 percent in the United States from 2007 to 2008.

Just last week, companies announced they were laying off more than 100,000 people. Caterpillar laid off 20,000; Boeing 10,000; even Starbucks laid off 6,700. Starbucks? How is that possible?

And more bad news this morning: according to the Washington Post, although not as grim as expected, the U.S. economy contracted 3.8 percent. Hey! We're supposed to be going the other way. But hard-pressed consumers are apparently cutting back on even the most basic of items: "Yesterday, Procter & Gamble, the giant consumer products company, cut its profit forecast in a sign that Americans are scrimping even on staples like Crest toothpaste and Tide detergent."

As if he needed more ammunition, President Barack Obama again used his weekly radio/YouTube address to underscore the need to pass his economic recovery and investment proposal. In his address, he hearkened back to several familiar themes: recovery will take years, not months. He will not put up with the excesses or greed of Wall Street or others. Partisan politics is a thing of the past. We must work together to overcome this very serious crisis. Obama's plan now moves to the Senate, where it will undergo changes, but is expected to have a better chance of receiving bipartisan support if his team handles things well.

NDN has long argued for the type of short-term jolt to and long-term investments in our economy that President Obama is arguing for. NDN also has made a strong case that we must aggressively address the root cause of the current financial disaster -- the collapse of the housing mkarket -- by keeping people in their homes. In this weekly address, President Obama does announce that his Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner will be making an announcement about helping people do just that, so stay tuned.

In the meantime, read NDN commentary and papers on the stimulus and how to revive and modernize our economy here. Also check out New York Times' columnist David Leonhardt's thought-provoking piece in tomorrow's Sunday magazine on how to get the economy going again, "The Big Fix." It asks some tough questions. 

And now, watch President Obama's address here: