US President Barack Obama criticizes his Republican predecessor George W. Bush for policies which dragged the country into recession. "We can't expect relief from the tired old theories that, in eight short years, doubled the national debt, threw our economy into a tailspin, and led US into this mess in the first place," Obama said in his weekly radio address on Saturday.
| So we're going to double the debt again as a solution? |
With a successful Senate vote on the stimulus bill in sight; however, the US president warned that quick action was needed to avoid catastrophe.
Earlier on Friday, Senate Democrats agreed to trim spending proposals and support tax cuts in a roughly $800 billion bill that was to go to a vote on Tuesday. They rolled back an earlier $937 billion proposal by culling what critics, mostly Republicans, called billions of dollars in unwarranted spending.
Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi predicted Obama would have a finished product to sign by mid-February.