David Plouffe – Democrats best hope

by YankeeJim | September 5, 2010 at 01:35 pm

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David Gregory interviewed David Plouffe on Meet the Press today. In my opinion, David Plouffe is the smartest individual on the Democratic Party team. I think he is smarter and more able than the President. I quoted him in my book, Smart Data, after having had lunch with him.

So, I am going to summarize what he told Gregory and you can check the link for the whole story.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39011239/ns/meet_the_press-transcripts/ns/meet_the_press-transcripts

Democrats—running on a 19 month economic record

Did any American think that President Obama and the Democrats were going to walk in the middle of a Republican initiated economic depression and turn it around overnight? Maybe in four years you could see the light. It took eight years to dig the hole. It takes two years to stop wars and pull troops out. How long after you put the brakes on and put in the stimulus do you expect a return? For me, four years would be remarkable.

David Gregory said: “This president and his party are running on an economic record. And here is that record in a nutshell, and it's not a good one: 9.6 percent unemployment rate, 14.9 million unemployed, 6.2 million of which are long-term unemployed beyond 27 weeks, an estimated three million property foreclosures this year. We cannot forget the depth of the housing crisis. After 19 months in office, President Obama is accountable for this record, is he not?”

David Plouffe answered:

· The President is accountable for his nearly two years in office.

· Republican policies contributed to the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

· They opposed the Recovery Act and if they had their way we would be in a Depression.

· We are making progress.

Plouffe asks: “Do you want to return to the policies that got us into this mess or not? We are digging out of a deep hole. We’re on the right path.”

· Economic policies aimed squarely at the middle class and small businesses;

· Creating a new energy sector;

· The healthcare law which, over time, I think is going to play a big impact on economic growth.

Gregory reminded that 82 percent of Americans polled believe that the country's still in recession.

Plouffe responded: “Republican ideas were soundly rejected at the ballot box the last two years, more importantly were soundly rejected by the American people. They're offering nothing new. Republicans are very enthusiastic about voting. We have to get more Democrats enthused about voting.

· Laying out the stakes of this election,

· The real choice, that they're not just going to bring bad ideas, they're going to roll back all that the president and his party's accomplished.

· For those undecided voters out there, make them understand this is not the new Republican Party. It's the same old ideas, the same old adherence to the special interests.

“Joining us now with a view from the other side we turn to the man who is in charge of getting Barack Obama elected president, his 2008 campaign manager and author of the newly-updated paperback version of his book, "The Audacity to Win: How Obama Won and How We Can Beat the Party of Limbaugh, Beck, and Palin."

David Plouffe, welcome back to MEET THE PRESS.

MR. DAVID PLOUFFE: Good to be with you, David.

MR. GREGORY: A lot to get to. I want to start on the economy and domestic affairs, and we'll touch on the wars, as I did with Senator Graham, just a minute. I want to start with the reality, and that is that this president and his party are running on an economic record. And here is that record in a nutshell, and it's not a good one: 9.6 percent unemployment rate, 14.9 million unemployed, 6.2 million of which are long-term unemployed beyond 27 weeks, an estimated three million property foreclosures this year. We cannot forget the depth of the housing crisis. After 19 months in office, President Obama is accountable for this record, is he not?

MR. PLOUFFE: Sure he is. We're less than 60 days out from election and elections are about choices. So let's remember where we were. The Republican Party that wants to gain back control, their policies contributed to the worst economic crisis this country's seen since the Great Depression. If they had their way, we might have headed to a depression, opposing the Recovery Act. So no one's satisfied with where we are. The question is, are we making progress? We had 22 straight months in this country of private sector job loss. We've had eight straight months of private sector job gain. Not as high as anyone would like, but we're on the right path here. And so the question for the American people is, the Republican experiment's a very recent one--fiscal irresponsibility, really, an unprecedented assault on the middle-class and small businesses. The same exact policies--and by the way, the guy who's in charge of the Republican campaign committee was on your show about six weeks ago and said if they won back the majority what they were going to pursue were the same policies they had done previously, which led to this economic calamity.”