House bill adds to jobless benefits in 27 states

With no end in sight to the country’s job market woes, the House has agreed to give the jobless in a majority of states another 13 weeks of unemployment insurance benefits.

The bill, which passed the House 331-83 , approves the extra three months of benefits for those jobless living in 27 states, plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, with unemployment rates topping 8.5 percent. Similar legislation is pending in the Senate. The longtime unemployed in states with lower levels of joblessness would not get the extension.

The job market appears to be the last to recover from a recession that officially began in December 2007. Jobless benefits have already been extended to record lengths through federal intervention.

States offer 26 weeks of benefits, with the average payment about $300 a week. But with federal help, including provisions from the economic stimulus bill, the unemployed in states hardest hit by the recession can receive up to 79 weeks of assistance.

About 5 million of those unemployed, about one-third of the total, have been out of work for six months, another figure that far outpaces recent recessions. There are about six people looking for every job available.

“Providing these Americans with a modest economic lifeline is not only the humane thing to do but it’s in the economic interest of the country,” said the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Wash., noting that every unemployment insurance dollar has $1.64 in positive economic impact by supporting existing jobs and the housing market.

He said the immediate effect of the bill would to keep assistance flowing to about 300,000 people, three-fourths of those expected to exhaust their benefits in September. Through the end of the year, it would protect more than 1 million from losing their benefits, he said.

One of the 17 Democrats to vote against the bill, Rep. Charlie Melancon of Louisiana, said he did so because the unemployed in his state, with its lower unemployment rate, did not qualify. The jobless in neighboring Mississippi are eligible.

“Unemployment knows no borders or boundaries, and is just as painful if you live in Natchez, Miss., or just a few miles away in Vidalia, La.,” Melancon said.

Democrats stressed that their economic policies were pulling the nation out of a recession and the legislation was needed because of the lingering problems in the job market.

“The headlines may say that our recession is over, but for those who remain out of work, this is still a time of hardship and struggle,” said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md.

GOP Rep. Geoff Davis of Kentucky, one of the 27 states qualifying for the additional benefits, saw it in a different light, saying the need for the legislation was “yet another sign of the failure of this administration’s stimulus plan to create jobs.”

The unemployment rate now is 9.7 percent and economists see it topping 10 percent in 2010.

McDermott said his bill would cost $1.4 billion but does not add to the deficit because it raises money from extension for a year of a federal unemployment tax, costing about $14 an employee per year. That tax, which brings in about $7.2 billion in a year, has been on the books for 30 years, with the money going into the federal unemployment insurance trust fund. The bill would also require better reporting on new employees to reduce unemployment insurance overpayments.

The stimulus act passed last February added $25 to people’s unemployment checks. It also expanded several federal programs to help cash-strapped states, increasing the maximum level of benefits for the hardest-hit states to 79 weeks.

Because the recession officially began in December 2007, people getting the full 79 weeks could be running out of benefits and would be entitled to the 13-week extension.

The bill is H.R. 3548.

Palin emerges in Asia with speech to investors

Former vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, criticized for her lack of foreign policy experience, emerged in Asia on Wednesday to give a speech that could boost her credentials for a possible bid for the presidency in 2012.

In her first trip to the region, the former Alaska governor addressed an annual conference of global investers in Hong Kong and was to discuss everything from governance to economics and U.S and Asian affairs, according to the event’s organizer.

Palin started off her speech — which was closed to reporters — with a light talk about the links between her state and the southern Chinese territory, then touched later on economic issues.

One attendee said she criticized the U.S. Federal Reserve’s massive intervention in the economy over the last year, arguing its actions only exacerbated the crisis. She also praised the conservative economic policies of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan and former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher

Earlier, she talked of Alaska’s salmon exports and complimented Hong Kong as a “beautiful city,” according to a second attendee. Both people spoke on condition of anonymity.

Former President Bill Clinton, former Vice President Al Gore and former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan have spoken in the past at the conference, hosted by brokerage and investment group CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets.

“She was chosen because she’s a woman of news value and presents an opinion that we feel would be of value to our fund managers,” said CLSA spokeswoman Simone Wheeler.

Palin, who burst on the U.S. political scene last year when she was chosen as Republican Sen. John McCain’s running mate, was ridiculed during the campaign after contending her state’s proximity to Russia gave her foreign policy experience.

“You can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska,” she said.

Palin received her first passport in 2007, to visit Alaska National Guard members serving in Kuwait and Germany.

The Hong Kong speech marks her first major appearance since she vanished from public view after she resigned as governor in July.

Since then, she’s signed with the prestigious Washington Speakers Bureau and reportedly been flooded with over a thousand offers.

Palin aides refused to disclose her fee for the appearance, which has been rumored to be in the low six figures.

While she’s thought to be considering a bid for the GOP presidential nomination in 2012, her Hong Kong trip bore no political overtones, said Fred Malek, a friend and Palin adviser.

“You can read a lot of things into it, ‘Is she trying to burnish her foreign policy credentials?’ and the like. But really, it’s a trip that will be beneficial to her knowledge base and will defray some legal and other bills that she has,” Malek said.

CLSA requested Palin’s speech be closed to reporters so she could make an “unfettered” presentation to investors, according to spokeswoman Wheeler. And Palin, whose supporters have long accussed the media of bias and harsh treatment, agreed. Since resigning, Palin has ducked mainstream news outlets and communicated with supporters largely via her popular Facebook page.

Hari Sevugan, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee, said Tuesday the group knew little about Palin’s speech.

“We’re curious as to what she’s willing to say in private but not in public,” Sevugan said. “Are there other countries that she can see from her window that she doesn’t want us to know about?”

Class sizes grow as school budgets shrink

Like a seesaw on the school playground, falling state budgets are pushing class sizes higher.

The recession is forcing districts to lay off teachers even as the economic stimulus pumps billions of dollars into schools. As a result, classrooms across the country will be more crowded when school starts in the fall.

Patti Hathorn, a fifth-grade teacher in rural Pinson, Ala., is expecting 29 or 30 students, making it the biggest class she’s taught. Many of her students at Kermit Johnson Elementary are learning English or are in special education.

“You may have a child that needs you, that needs that adult figure, to spend the extra five minutes with them. If you have five or six extra kids, that five minutes is gone,” Hathorn said.

It’s the same story in small communities such as Pinson and Wapakoneta, Ohio, and urban areas including Los Angeles and Broward County, Fla. In many places, classes will have well over 30 kids.

There is no official data on class sizes for the upcoming year; many states and districts have not finalized their budgets. A survey this year by the American Association of School Administrators found that 44% of school districts expected to increase class size.

Educators and parents worry the larger classes will keep kids from learning.

“The issue is how this affects kids and what price this generation is going to have to pay,” said John White, principal of Mulholland Middle School in Los Angeles, where the district has laid off more than 2,000 teachers.

Classes in Los Angeles are expected to grow by two kids in fourth through 12th grades. Middle school classes will have 35 kids on average; juniors and seniors will have about 43 kids in each class. Kindergarten through third-grade classes will rise by four kids to 24.

Very large classes can keep teachers from teaching because their time is spent keeping order. Crowded classrooms also increase the chance that struggling students may fall through the cracks.

“I certainly won’t say there’s a magic number because it depends on the nature of the student group,” said Jeremy Finn, education professor at University at Buffalo-SUNY. “But in the elementary grades especially, there’s a certain point at which teachers can’t do what they were trained to do.”

Just as there’s a downside to bigger classes, there’s an upside to smaller ones, he said.

Research has shown that younger children, those in kindergarten through third grade, perform and behave better in smaller classes. Benefits are strongest for minority and poor children, Finn said.

There is evidence that being in small classes early on improves a student’s chance of graduating from high school or taking the SAT or ACT college entrance exams.

Most often cited is a large-scale, four-year study of smaller class sizes in Tennessee in the 1980s. The study found that by eighth grade, children who had had smaller classes in kindergarten through third grade had substantial advantages in all subjects over their peers who had been in larger classes.

Others dispute the importance of smaller classes; the debate is far from settled.

Researcher Eric Hanushek called it “kind of silly” that advocates still rely on 20-year-old data from Tennessee. He pointed to other studies that showed small to negligible benefits for kids in small classes.

“All the research suggests the number of kids is much less important than who is teaching the class,” said Hanushek, a senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution. “In the face of budget problems, allowing class size to move a little bit makes all the sense in the world.”

“In fact, to the extent you put ineffective teachers into classrooms, you’re much better off by keeping larger classes with effective teachers,” he said.

The trouble with this recession is that kids may wind up with larger classes and ineffective teachers.

Mass layoffs are reshuffling teachers into grades or subjects they may never have taught, or taught long ago. Administrators are being pushed back into the classroom after years away from teaching.

At Coweeman Middle School in rural Kelso, Wash., one teacher who has taught math for 30 years has been reassigned to special education, principal Randy Heath said. In fact, every teacher who is endorsed to teach special education is being switched to those classes, regardless of whether he or she actually has taught it, he said.

“We’re being forced to make decisions that we know are not good for kids,” Heath said.

Money from the economic stimulus has reduced the number of teacher layoffs, but job losses are still widespread. Although the stimulus provided an unprecedented $100 billion for education, that’s not enough to cover state and local budget shortfalls.

The stimulus boosted federal spending and helped restore cuts in state budgets, sources that together provide about 56% of school dollars. It did not make up for local tax revenues, which give schools the rest of their money.

Local revenues have been socked by the recession and may dip even lower because property assessments tend to lag behind a recession.

“It’s a little hard to tell whether this upcoming school year or the one after is going to be more difficult,” said Mike Casserly, executive director of the Council of the Great City Schools, a coalition of the biggest urban public school systems.

This school year, Cheryl James of Sacramento, plans to volunteer in her 12-year-old son’s school to help teachers facing bigger class sizes at his middle school.

James expects his classes to get bigger because of teacher layoffs and retirements, but she doesn’t yet know by how much.

“If you have more people in the room — trying to get their hand up, trying to get their question answered, trying to get someone to stop kicking the back of their chair — there are going to be more problems,” James said.

Obama says recovery depends on healthcare

President Barack Obama said on Wednesday he realized Americans were skeptical about his healthcare overhaul, but that the country’s economic recovery depended on implementing the $1 trillion plan.

Obama, insisting the “stars are aligned” for approval this year despite discord in Congress over the plan, warned inaction would undermine the economy, worsen the deficit and cripple millions of Americans financially.

“I understand people are feeling uncertain about this. They are feeling anxious,” he said in a prime-time televised news conference.

But he said he was confident people would support it when they looked “at the cost of doing nothing.”

The healthcare debate is reaching a critical juncture in the Democratic-controlled Congress. Obama wants both the House of Representatives and Senate to vote by early August but many lawmakers want more time to consider such an expansive set of proposals.

With the effort in danger of flagging and spilling into the autumn months where momentum could fade, Obama made his case for the overhaul and took on his critics.

Several polls show Obama’s job approval rating dropping and that Americans are having doubts about his prescriptions for the economy and healthcare.

Obama said people were “understandably queasy” about government spending and the debt piling up, but argued the health of the economy depended on stemming healthcare costs, which account for 17.6 percent of gross domestic product.

“That is why I’ve said that even as we rescue this economy from a full-blown crisis, we must rebuild it stronger than before. And health insurance reform is central to that effort.”

He also cited the ballooning costs of spending on government health programs for the poor and elderly, Medicare and Medicaid. He said that without a healthcare revamp, those costs would explode the budget deficit.

“So let me be clear: If we do not control these costs, we will not be able to control our deficit,” he said.

He is to make his case for the revamp on Thursday in Cleveland, Ohio, a manufacturing state where a recent Quinnipiac University poll said his job approval rating had dropped from 62 percent to 49 percent.

Obama promoted a key goal of the overhaul: creation of a government health insurance option, an idea deeply opposed by Republicans who feel it would unfairly compete with private insurers.

He said competition from the government insurance plan can prevent private insurers from passing on health costs to By Steve Holland and David Alexander

WASHINGTON, July 22 (Reuters) – President Barack Obama said on Wednesday he realized Americans were skeptical about his healthcare overhaul, but that the country’s economic recovery depended on implementing the $1 trillion plan.

Obama, insisting the “stars are aligned” for approval this year despite discord in Congress over the plan, warned inaction would undermine the economy, worsen the deficit and cripple millions of Americans financially.

“I understand people are feeling uncertain about this. They are feeling anxious,” he said in a prime-time televised news conference.

But he said he was confident people would support it when they looked “at the cost of doing nothing.”

The healthcare debate is reaching a critical juncture in the Democratic-controlled Congress. Obama wants both the House of Representatives and Senate to vote by early August but many lawmakers want more time to consider such an expansive set of proposals.

With the effort in danger of flagging and spilling into the autumn months where momentum could fade, Obama made his case for the overhaul and took on his critics.

Several polls show Obama’s job approval rating dropping and that Americans are having doubts about his prescriptions for the economy and healthcare.

Obama said people were “understandably queasy” about government spending and the debt piling up, but argued the health of the economy depended on stemming healthcare costs, which account for 17.6 percent of gross domestic product.

“That is why I’ve said that even as we rescue this economy from a full-blown crisis, we must rebuild it stronger than before. And health insurance reform is central to that effort.”

He also cited the ballooning costs of spending on government health programs for the poor and elderly, Medicare and Medicaid. He said that without a healthcare revamp, those costs would explode the budget deficit.

“So let me be clear: If we do not control these costs, we will not be able to control our deficit,” he said.

He is to make his case for the revamp on Thursday in Cleveland, Ohio, a manufacturing state where a recent Quinnipiac University poll said his job approval rating had dropped from 62 percent to 49 percent.

Obama promoted a key goal of the overhaul: creation of a government health insurance option, an idea deeply opposed by Republicans who feel it would unfairly compete with private insurers.

He said competition from the government insurance plan can prevent private insurers from passing on health costs to consumers. “Part of the reason we want to have a public option is just to help keep the insurance companies honest,” he said.

Obama, who had been careful not to comment on various proposals on Capitol Hill on how to pay for the overhaul, did offer support for a Democratic proposal to tax the rich.

He said a surcharge on families making more than $1 million a year “meets my principle” of not putting the burden of paying for healthcare reform on middle-class families.

He insisted there was momentum behind the healthcare effort, despite strains on Capitol Hill, and that lawmakers are closer to agreement on cost savings to the plan.

“We are now seeing broad agreement thanks to the work that was done over the last few days. So even though we still have a few issues to work out, what’s remarkable at this point is not how far we have left to go — it’s how far we have already come,” he said.

Obama promised he would not sign into law any healthcare legislation that would drive up the budget deficit, or fail to rein in rising healthcare costs.

Legislation pushed by House Democrats would increase budget deficits by more than $240 billion over 10 years, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimated last week.

Although fellow Democrats are raising many questions about the plan, Obama went on the attack against Republicans, accusing them of wanting to kill his healthcare plans.

“The politics may dictate that they don’t vote for healthcare reform because they think it makes Obama more vulnerable,” he said. “But if they’ve got a good idea we’ll still take it.”

(Additional reporting by Matt Spetalnick and Richard Cowan; Editing by Simon Denyer and Chris Wilson) consumers. “Part of the reason we want to have a public option is just to help keep the insurance companies honest,” he said.

Obama, who had been careful not to comment on various proposals on Capitol Hill on how to pay for the overhaul, did offer support for a Democratic proposal to tax the rich.

He said a surcharge on families making more than $1 million a year “meets my principle” of not putting the burden of paying for healthcare reform on middle-class families.

He insisted there was momentum behind the healthcare effort, despite strains on Capitol Hill, and that lawmakers are closer to agreement on cost savings to the plan.

“We are now seeing broad agreement thanks to the work that was done over the last few days. So even though we still have a few issues to work out, what’s remarkable at this point is not how far we have left to go — it’s how far we have already come,” he said.

Obama promised he would not sign into law any healthcare legislation that would drive up the budget deficit, or fail to rein in rising healthcare costs.

Legislation pushed by House Democrats would increase budget deficits by more than $240 billion over 10 years, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimated last week.

Although fellow Democrats are raising many questions about the plan, Obama went on the attack against Republicans, accusing them of wanting to kill his healthcare plans.

“The politics may dictate that they don’t vote for healthcare reform because they think it makes Obama more vulnerable,” he said. “But if they’ve got a good idea we’ll still take it.”

Pets paying the price as economy goes to the dogs Shelters all over state filling up as owners decide to give up animals

The number of pets being turned over to shelters or abandoned across Hawai’i is rising as the economy takes its toll on their owners.

A check of the nearly 30 no-kill shelters around the state shows that many are full and continually receive requests to accept new animals.

“It’s the economy. If you can’t feed yourself or your family, how can you feed your pets,” said Lynnette Fluaitt, director of operations at Hawai’i Island Humane Society on the Big Island.

“People are moving away or into smaller places and can’t keep their pets. The bulk of our animals are strays or formerly adopted animals that people are abandoning,” Fluaitt said.

Shelters report they are also searching for new sources of revenue to keep up with the increase in returned pets.

The Hawaii Animal Sanctuary, a no-kill shelter in Hawai’i Kai, said it used to get by with a fundraiser every quarter; now it has to do one every six weeks. Gina Lay, president of the sanctuary, said it is at capacity with about 300 animals.

Lay said four sickly kittens were found abandoned in Kawai Nui Marsh in Kailua. “The pets were microchipped and when we called the owners, they refused to take the cats back,” said Lay.

On the Big Island, a construction worker turned over nine dogs to a shelter recently, saying he had to put them up for adoption because he couldn’t afford to feed them anymore.

More animals than ever before are being housed at the three shelters operated by the Hawai’i Island Humane Society, said Fluaitt. The shelters, in Kea’au, Kona and Waimea, usually have about 1,150 animals, but now have more than 1,400.

“We do have an increase in dumped dogs,” said Kale Lyman of the Hawai’i Dog Foundation, a nonprofit, no-kill dog shelter that works through foster homes on O’ahu. “We see a lot of people trying to re-home their dogs.”

People who tend to cat colonies say they, too, sometimes find someone’s pet now trying to get a bite of kibble at the communal feeding tray. Jennifer Kishimori of Cat Friends, a nonprofit shelter, said it’s easy to spot an animal who was formerly a pet. They don’t know how to get along in the cat colony.

“We’re noticing friendly cats being introduced to cat colonies. The economy has affected pet ownership,” Kishimori said. “I see a lot of e-mails and get calls from people asking about how to give away their cat, but many shelters are full.”

Bucking the trend, the Hawaiian Humane Society hasn’t seen an increase in its numbers. It reports a 21 percent drop in the number of animals surrendered in the first six months of the year, compared with the same period last year, said Kawehi Yim, Humane Society spokeswoman.

That decline, some say, is because the group charges a $25 fee for surrendering animals and $100 to put your pet up for consignment, and other shelters don’t.

Lay said she hopes pet owners understand the responsibility they take on and find a way to care for their pet even when money is tight.

“We need a shift in attitude,” Lay said. “Pets need to be viewed as family members and just because things are difficult doesn’t mean that you can leave them behind. Pets don’t know how to fend for themselves. They depend upon the humans in their family.”

Rather than work out solutions separately, Lay said, a collection of animal shelters have banded together to form the Aloha Animal Alliance. They plan to lobby lawmakers next year to change laws governing renters’ rights to keep pets.

At the Hawai’i Dog Foundation, Lyman said every day she’s preaching that people need to be smart about finding the right home for their pets. Screening needs to be done before the animals are placed in a new home, Lyman said.

“People don’t understand what it takes to be a serious, lifetime dog owner,” Lyman said. “People re-home the dog without checking the new home. We try to help with the cost of dog food and the screening. It is very sad what humans can do to a helpless being that wants nothing more than food, water, safety and a friend.”

Obama, GOP trade barbs in health care fight

The battle to overhaul health care intensified Monday, with President Obama accusing GOP critics of putting politics ahead of policy and a top Republican saying Democrats’ plans would undermine the country’s economic future.

President Obama visits the Children’s National Medical Center in Washington on Monday.

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Meanwhile, Max Baucus, D-Montana, the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said Monday that closed-door talks involving Democratic and Republican members resulted in a tentative agreement on several substantive issues as part of what is considered the first possible bipartisan health care bill.

Also Monday, an aide to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she was willing to limit a proposed tax increase in a House health care bill after some Democrats threatened a revolt on the issue.

Monday's developments came as Democrats struggled to regain much-needed political momentum on the high-priority issue before the August congressional recess.

Obama and other Democratic leaders are seeking an overhaul to ensure that health insurance is available to 46 million uninsured Americans while preventing costs to the government and individuals from climbing.

In a visit to the Children's National Medical Center in Washington, the president seized on recent remarks by Sen. Jim DeMint, R-South Carolina. In reference to the health care debate, DeMint said, "If we're able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him."

Obama said, "Think about that. This isn't about me. This isn't about politics."

He said, "This is about a health care system that is breaking America's families, breaking America's businesses and breaking America's economy. And we can't afford the politics of delay and defeat when it comes to health care. Not this time, not now."

Obama's critique came a few hours after Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele blasted the president for pushing "a risky multitrillion-dollar experiment with our health care."

The plan "not only risks our economy, it risks every American's health, too," Steele said during an appearance at the National Press Club.

"Under [the Democratic] plan, costs are going up, and you, the American people, are going to pay.”

Steele also criticized congressional Democrats for attempting to pass a health care bill without reaching out to the GOP minority or “permitting any meaningful scrutiny.”

Top administration officials, while defending their efforts with congressional Republicans, have conceded that more work is needed to ensure that whatever bill eventually gets passed is budget neutral.

To pay for reform, the House Democrats’ current health care bill would impose a 5.4 percent surtax on individuals making $280,000 or more and families making $350,000 or more.

Pelosi, however, is now suggesting the surtax start with individuals making $500,000 and families making $1 million, according to a Pelosi aide. Pelosi first raised the idea in an interview with Politico.

“The speaker has said several times she would like to squeeze more savings out of the system, and if we can do that, we can reduce the number of people affected by the surcharge,” said Brendan Daly, a spokesman for Pelosi.

Last week, 22 freshmen House Democrats sent a letter to Pelosi saying they were “extremely concerned” about what the taxes in the bill might do to small businesses.

House Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence, R-Indiana, slammed the surtax in any form.

“It almost boggles the mind that the majority in Congress would continue headlong down a pathway toward increasing the tax burden on anyone at a time when our economy is shedding hundreds of thousands of jobs per month,” Pence said.

Appearing Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said an additional tax on wealthy Americans is “a legitimate way to go forward” in the debate over how to overhaul the ailing health system.

A final bill “will be paid for — it will not add to the deficit,” Sebelius said.

The House and Senate are working on Democratic proposals that would create a government-funded public health insurance option intended to drive down costs of private coverage.

However, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported last week that the measures under consideration in both chambers would fail to pay for themselves, increasing the budget deficit.

Republican opponents were quick to seize on the CBO report as ammunition against Obama’s push to have a bill from each chamber approved by the time Congress begins recess on August 7.

Democrats argued the CBO analysis failed to take into account the financial impact of cost-cutting measures under discussion as well as how stronger preventive care programs will reduce demand and costs.

The White House has so far resisted another idea for raising revenue — creating a tax on the medical benefits provided by employers. Baucus said he likes the idea, but Obama said it could be too disruptive to a system in which 180 million Americans have health coverage provided by their employers.

“Essentially employers would stop providing health care,” the president said Monday in an interview with the PBS program “Newshour.”

Baucus said he would meet again with Finance Committee leaders on Tuesday to try to work out a compromise palatable to both parties. He refused to provide details of issues agreed to already, only describing them as “major significant issues that have been in the health care reform public domain.”

The skirmishing over health care comes as a new national poll indicates Obama’s ratings are slipping on the issue.

Forty-nine percent of people questioned in an ABC News/Washington Post survey released Monday approve of the way Obama is handling health care. That approval is down 4 percentage points from June and 9 points from April. Forty-four percent disapprove, up 5 percentage points from June and 15 points from April.

The ABC News/Washington Post poll is the third national survey to suggest the president’s approval rating on overhauling health care is under 50 percent, joining a CBS News poll and a Quinnipiac University survey.At the same time, the new poll also indicates Obama still has a large advantage over Republicans on the issue. Fifty-four percent of those questioned say they trust Obama to do a better job handling health care than Republicans in Congress, with 34 percent putting more faith in the latter than the president.

POLL: Obama Faces Trouble with Stimulus and Deficit ABC News-Washington Post Poll: Confidence in Obama’s Economic Plan Down

Rising doubts about the economic stimulus program, broad concern about the federal deficit and tepid support for President Obama’s health care efforts are softening his popularity – and giving the still-struggling Republicans a glimmer of hope ahead.

Doubts about the stimulus and the deficit are softening Obama’s popularity.

(Getty Images)

While 56 percent of Americans still think Obama’s approach will improve the economy, that’s down sharply from a peak of 72 percent when he took office. With the deficit in mind, six in 10 oppose the additional stimulus spending the administration has mooted. And views of Obama as a “tax-and-spend Democrat” – the perception that dogged Bill Clinton in his early days – have gained 11 points since March.More than Clinton, though, Obama is following the early course charted by Ronald Reagan, the last president to take office in the teeth of a recession. Reagan’s job approval rating fell to 57 percent near his six-month mark; Obama’s is nearly the same, 59 percent in this ABC News/Washington Post poll, down 10 points from his springtime peak. The bigger concern for Obama is what came next: Reagan weakened further as the economy struggled, bottoming out at 48 percent approval after his first year in office and 42 percent at the end of his second year, shortly after unemployment hit 10.8 percent, its highest since the 1940s. It’s 9.5 percent now.

That history explains the urgency with which Obama’s pushing a range of issues, notably health care; until the economy heads up, his popularity is likely to continue down.

One measure of what may lie ahead is a shift toward political neutrality: In this survey the number of Americans identifying themselves as independents, as opposed to either Democrats or Republicans, has tied its record high in ABC/Post polling since 1981.

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ISSUES – Obama remains popular personally and far ahead of the Republicans in trust to handle specific issues, but it’s his own ratings for handling those issues where his challenges show best. Barely over half, 52 percent, now approve of his work on the economy, down 8 points from its peak. Just under half, 49 percent, approve of his handling of health care, also down 8. And fewer, 43 percent, approve of his handling of the deficit, with 49 percent disapproving – only the second issue on which more have disapproved than approved of Obama’s work. (The first was the automaker bailout.)

Intensity is running against the president on these issues as well. For the first time more people “strongly” disapprove of his work on the economy than strongly approve, 35 percent vs. 29 percent. Ditto on health care, 33 percent vs. 25 percent. And on the deficit, strong disapprovers now outnumber strong approvers by 2-1, 38 percent vs. 19 percent.

Another issue illustrates the president’s better possibilities: Despite rising casualties, 62 percent approve of his handling of the situation in Afghanistan, a far less partisan rating than his others, and with intensity running for him rather than against.

Specific to health care, this poll finds majority support for the chief elements of the proposal put forward by House Democrats last week, with 54 percent in favor, 43 percent opposed. But strong support and strong opposition are equal, at about a third each. And that’s without the pushback – concern about the impact on choice and quality of care – that long has been a counterweight to support for reform.

Obama has scheduled a prime-time news conference for Wednesday night, chiefly to address his health care efforts. A risk is that he may come to be seen as focused on other issues to the detriment of the economy.

GOP – The Republicans remain slow to capitalize on Obama’s challenges, but there are glimmers – or at least, a few measures that are less bad for them than they’ve been. For one, approval of the way the Republicans in Congress are handling their job is up 6 points since spring and up 11 points from a year ago, albeit just to 36 percent, with 58 percent disapproving. (The Democrats remain better rated; 47 percent approve. And even today just 46 percent of Republicans approve of their own party’s work in Congress; 79 percent of Democrats, by contrast, approve of their home team.)

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Obama leads the GOP by 23 points in trust to handle the economy, 56-33 percent, essentially unchanged from last month; nonetheless that’s the Republicans’ best number on this question this year, and up 9 points from their low in April. Moreover, while Obama leads by 54-34 percent on health care, the Republican score is up 7 points from last month; and Obama’s 54-35 percent lead on the deficit was 56-30 percent in June.

Basic partisanship fills out the picture. Thirty-three percent of Americans in this survey identify themselves as Democrats, slightly below the recent average and numerically the fewest in ABC/Post polls since September 2007. Just 22 percent identify themselves as Republicans, in line with their recent, extreme lows. Instead 41 percent now say they’re political independents – tying the mark set in January 1996 as the most on record since ABC/Post polling began 28 years ago.

Most of the president’s slippage is among Republicans; their approval of his work overall has dropped by 16 points since April, from 36 percent then to 20 percent now. (That honeymoon, such as it was, is over.) But he’s also lost 9 points among independents since April (to 58 percent approval), while holding about steady among Democrats (93 percent then, 90 percent now).

Obama is well off the top-tier of popularity at six months. In polls since Harry Truman, five presidents have been better-rated at about this point (Truman in the 80s; Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson and the first president Bush in the 70s.) Four have been similarly rated as Obama is now – Nixon, Carter, Reagan and George W. Bush; two lower, Ford and Clinton. Six-month marks clearly don’t predict long-term outcomes.

ECONOMY – The economy remains the 800-pound gorilla of national politics. Seventy-seven percent of Americans are worried about the economy’s direction in the next few years and 63 percent are worried about their own family’s finances – each below its peak, but still broadly negative. Moreover very few, 8 percent, say they’ve become better off financially (Reagan’s famous benchmark) under Obama’s presidency; 27 percent say they’re doing worse.

But on what to do about the economy, public, and the president, look to be in a bind. On one hand, as noted, confidence that Obama’s efforts in fact will improve the economy has lost 16 points since he took office. On the other, Americans by 55-40 percent now say it’s more important to avoid bigger deficits than to increase stimulus spending – with deficit priority up 11 points, stimulus priority down 11, since January.

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Indeed the public by 61-35 percent opposes increased stimulus spending beyond the nearly $790 billion already committed – a dramatic turnaround from 70 percent support for the initial stimulus in January. And “strong” supporters then outnumbered strong opponents by more than 2-1; now it’s strong opponents who predominate, 43 percent vs. 18 percent.

In another example of deficit fallout, barely over half, 52 percent, now see Obama as a “new-style Democrat who will be careful with the public’s money,” down from 62 percent in March. Forty-three percent instead see him as “an old-style, tax-and-spend Democrat,” up from 32 percent; his 30-point advantage has shrunk to 9. (Clinton, similarly, went from a 26-point to a 5-point advantage on this question in roughly his first six months.)

It all matters: Among people who say they’re worse off financially, 66 percent disapprove of Obama’s job performance overall, while just 29 percent approve. And among those still confident his efforts will improve the economy, 92 percent approve of his work in office; among those who lack such confidence, 78 percent disapprove.

That’s why, where confidence in his economic efforts goes, the president’s overall approval is very likely to follow. (Reagan’s not the only example – nor the most dire, since he had time to recover. The first President Bush saw his approval rating plummet by 36 points as result of the 1990-91 recession, costing him re-election.)

It’s telling, too, that Obama’s approval rating for handling the economy has declined not only by 12 points from its peak among Republicans and 11 points among independents, but also by 9 points from its peak among Democrats. And on the deficit, he’s lost 12 points from his peak approval among Democrats, as well as 9 points among Republicans and independents.

Confidence that Obama’s efforts will improve the economy, further, has not only lost 26 points among Republicans since January, but also 20 points among independents. Among Democrats that’s down by a milder 7 points.

One better bit for Obama is that he still escapes main blame for the economy’s condition in the first place – albeit a bit less so. Sixty-two percent assign the Bush administration a great deal or good amount of blame “for inadequate regulation of the financial industry,” down 8 points from March. Separately, 32 percent assign blame to the Obama administration “for not doing enough to turn the economy around” – up by 6 points.

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While the president doesn’t currently come in for heavy criticism for his focus on top issues, 29 percent do say he’s placing “too little” priority on the economy and more, 39 percent, say he’s underfocused on the deficit. A quarter say he’s spending too much time on health care, but nearly as many say too little.

ATTRIBUTES – For all the challenges on issues, personal appeal can provide the political cartilage that keeps a president popular – as both Reagan and Clinton demonstrated in their presidencies. That Obama retains in good measure – although, again, to a lessened degree.

Sixty-three percent say he “understands the problems of people like you,” more than ever said so about George W. Bush, albeit down significantly from 73 percent in April. Sixty-two percent say Obama’s brought needed change to Washington – steady from April, but down from the 76 percent who expected him to do so at the start of his term. And 71 percent see him as a strong leader, slightly off its peak, 77 percent, three months ago.

Some of these changes represent the inevitable return to Earth of a president who took office with such high expectations, particularly in comparison to his deeply unpopular predecessor. But others – chiefly, declining confidence in his approach to the economy – hold the portent of difficulties ahead.

METHODOLOGY — This ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by telephone July 15-18, 2009, among a random national sample of 1,001adults, including landline and cell-phone-only respondents. Results for the full sample have a 3.5-point error margin; click here for a detailed description of sampling error. Sampling, data collection and tabulation by TNS of Horsham, Pa.

http://abcnews.go.com/images/PollingUnit/1092a1ObamaatSixMonths.pdf

future of American Health Care Survey

Do you believe that the state of America’s health care system is in crisis?

yes

What is your biggest concern regarding health care in America as it is today?

Cost and Quality

Do you believe that your health care decisions should be made by you and your doctor, and not government bureaucrats in Washington, D.C.?

yes

Do you believe it is right for the federal government to use age and life expectancy as criteria for determining access to health care?

No

Estimates show that the Democrats’ plan could cost more than $1.7 trillion dollars. Do you believe that America can afford this added debt when the deficit has already reached record levels?

No

If you have private health insurance, please rate your level of satisfaction with your coverage

N/A

Rationing of health care in countries with socialized medicine has led to patients dying because they were forced to wait too long to receive treatment. How concerned are you that this would be inevitable in the U.S. under the Democrats’ plan?

Extremely Concerned

Do you approve of the Republican plan to give small businesses tax breaks to cover the cost of their employees’ heath care insurance?

Don’t know enough about it yet

Do you believe the federal Government can provide better health insurance than your current plan?

No

Over 120 million Americans currently receive health care insurance through their employment. Should this private sector health coverage be preserved in any health care reform plan?

Yes

Does it concern you that the Democrats are trying to ram health care legislation through Congress THIS MONTH to limit the American people’s opportunity to evaluate it?

Mildly Concerned

Does it concern you that the liberal media has gone to unprecedented levels to only give Obama’s views on health care reform and no one else’s?

Extremely Concerned

Obama on burden of fixing economy: ‘Give it to me’

Conceding unemployment will get worse before it shrinks, President Barack Obama on Tuesday unveiled a $12 billion plan to help community colleges prepare millions of people for a new generation of jobs. Challenging critics, he said he welcomed the task of turning around the economy.

“I love the folks who helped get us in this mess and then suddenly say, ‘Well, this is Obama’s economy,’” the president told an outdoor crowd at Macomb Community College, veering off his scripted words. “That’s fine. Give it to me. My job is to solve problems, not to stand on the sidelines and harp and gripe.”

Obama did not identify his target for those comments, but he has been under increasing fire from Republicans over the pace of the economic recovery and the soaring deficit. He brought his message to a state reeling from the loss of auto jobs. Michigan’s unemployment rate is 14.1 percent, the nation’s worst.

“The hard truth is that some of the jobs that have been lost in the auto industry and elsewhere won’t be coming back,” Obama said. “They are the casualties of a changing economy.”

To that end, he proposed an “American Graduation Initiative” to bolster the two-year community college field that serves millions of students as a launching point for careers or a step toward expanded higher education. The idea is to train people for jobs, such as those expected in the clean energy industry, when the economy turns around and begins to create jobs again instead of shedding them.

Under the plan, competitive grants would be offered to schools to try new programs or expand training and counseling.

High dropout rates would be addressed by designing programs to track students and help them earn an associate’s degree or finish their education at a four-year institution. Money would also be spent to renovate and rebuild facilities, and online courses would be developed to help colleges offer more classes.

The White House says the cost would be $12 billion over 10 years; Obama says it would be paid for by ending wasteful subsidies to banks and private lenders of student loans.

“Time and again, when we have placed our bet for the future on education, we have prospered as a result,” Obama said.

Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, a former education secretary, said Obama’s plan is a “typical proposal” that sounds better than it is. “When our biggest problem as a country is too much debt, he’s taking the entitlement spending he claims to be saving from the student loan program and adding it to the debt,” Alexander said.

Obama’s speech came a day after the White House issued an upbeat report predicting that health care and environment-focused jobs would help drive a jobs recovery but that education and training would have to keep up with a demand for higher-skilled workers.

Earlier on Tuesday at the White House, Obama said he expected the nation’s unemployment rate would continue to “tick up for several months.”

It is now at 9.5 percent, the highest in 26 years. Obama said renewed hiring tends to lag behind other signs of economic recovery.

In Michigan, Obama called the $12 billion in spending over the next decade “the most significant down payment” yet toward achieving his goal of having the highest college graduation rate of any nation.

Speaking in rolled-up sleeves, Obama said jobs requiring at least an associate’s degree are expected to grow twice as fast as those where college education is not required.

“We will not fill those jobs, or keep those jobs on our shores, without the training offered by community colleges,” Obama said.

Community colleges have been feeling pinched lately. Enrollments have been increasing for several reasons, including rising college costs at public and private institutions and the needs of people who have lost jobs and are eager to learn new skills.

About 6 million students attend community college, administration officials said. Obama is setting a goal of 5 million additional college graduates.

Meanwhile, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan told Republican senators on Tuesday at their private weekly luncheon at the Capitol that the government’s $1 trillion deficit was the single biggest hurdle to economic recovery. In his speech, Obama acknowledged the problem of debt but said again that the only way to start reducing deficits is to reform the health care system, his dominant legislative priority.

Obama’s trip wasn’t all about policy, however. Before returning to the White House, he changed into jeans and the jacket of his beloved Chicago White Sox to throw out the ceremonial first pitch at Major League Baseball’s annual All-Star game at Busch Stadium in St. Louis. It was his first pitch as president.

Analysis: Obama takes possession of economy

With four simple words — “Give it to me!” — President Barack Obama took possession of the economy.

For months, the White House and Obama’s economic team have laid the economic crisis at the feet of President George W. Bush. But there comes a point in a presidency when inheritance becomes ownership. Obama made that pivot Tuesday in Michigan, the state suffering the worst unemployment in the nation.

“I love these folks who helped get us in this mess and then suddenly say, ‘Well, this is Obama’s economy,’” the president said in a pointed deviation from his prepared text. “That’s fine. Give it to me!”

It was a defiant moment, reminiscent of Bush’s own “Bring ‘em on!” taunt in 2003 to militants in Iraq.

Like Bush’s brash challenge, Obama’s could haunt him, too. It’s a calculated risk that confronts his critics head-on and casts him as an activist, on-the-job president.

“My job is to solve problems, not to stand on the sidelines and harp and gripe,” he said Tuesday, his sleeves rolled up, barely disguising his targets as congressional Republicans.

Still, most economists and Obama’s own advisers foresee a slow economic recovery. The president himself conceded Tuesday that unemployment, already at a 26-year high, will likely “tick up for several months.” Republicans see the economy as Obama’s Achilles’ heel come next year’s elections, and they have found a political vulnerability in the continued rise in unemployment despite a $787 billion economic stimulus that Obama pushed through Congress in February.

In choosing Michigan to attach his name to the economy, Obama picked a state whose 14.1 percent unemployment rate could linger as evidence of policy failure. As home to the U.S. auto industry, it could also stand as a symbol of one of his first economic successes. Both General Motors and Chrysler have emerged in surprisingly swift fashion from bankruptcy protection proceedings that were imposed by the Obama administration.

“Remember, folks said there was no way they could do it?” Obama told his audience in hard-hit Warren, Mich. “They’ve gotten it done already, in record time, far faster than anybody thought possible.”

After a week spent overseas, the feisty, confrontational approach aims to regain the agenda from his critics. In one bold step this week, the Obama administration singled out Sen. Jon Kyl, a member of the Senate Republican leadership, for calling for an end to economic stimulus spending. Using Obama’s Cabinet members as muscle, the White House on Tuesday made public letters from four department secretaries listing transportation, housing, Indian education and other projects in Kyl’s home state that they said would be eliminated if the senator had his way. The letter was addressed to Arizona’s Republican governor, Jan Brewer.

At the same time, Obama is appealing for patience. In his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday and in a newspaper opinion piece, Obama argued that the stimulus program was designed as a two-year plan and that it had already halted the economic free fall. It hasn’t helped Obama, however, that the jobless rate now stands at 9.5 percent, even though his economic team initially predicted that the stimulus would prevent unemployment from going higher than 8 percent.

Obama and his advisers say the recession turned out to be worse than anticipated when they made that forecast in January. Still, 2 million jobs have been lost since Congress passed the stimulus package.

“I want the president’s economic stimulus to work, but guess what? It’s not happening right now,” Rep. Candice Miller, R-Mich., said Tuesday, voicing a common GOP refrain. “I don’t even think we have Wendy’s jobs anymore. Where’s the beef? Where’s the jobs?”

Obama’s unflinching embrace of his economic policies means he now is responsible for their consequences. If the free fall is now in check, as he claims, then the economy can no longer be Bush’s legacy alone.

What’s more, even amid indicators that show the economic plunge is slowing, unemployment in recent recessions has been slow to recover as quickly as the rest of the economy. And jobs are the clearest yardstick by which the public measures success. For Obama and his fellow Democrats, the danger lies in unemployment rates that remain high in time for next year’s congressional elections, or in a slow recovery that peters out and leads back into a recession.

Obama has already taken ownership of the nation’s foreign policy. In March, he announced a new approach in Afghanistan that included sending an additional 17,000 combat troops. Marines have just kicked off an offensive in Taliban strongholds in the south of the country. And two weeks ago, American troops in Iraq handed over security urban areas to Iraqi security forces, the first step toward meeting Obama’s pledge to end an unpopular war.

Now, just days shy of the symbolic six-month anniversary of his presidency, Obama has laid claim to the full measure of the job. When it comes to the economy, no one — certainly not his Republican critics — is going to keep him from taking it.

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