Full Text of the President's Speech

Kevin Lamarque  /  Reuters

I've just finished reading the full text of President Obama's jobs speech, and if you missed the address, I would urge you to do the same. Yes, it's long, but educating ourselves takes effort, and this speech contains important details about our economy, something we all say we care about a great deal.

I have to say, President Obama has laid it all out for Congress. He has provided a wealth of specific job creation ideas and he has enumerated specific ways of paying for everything he proposed.

He also very openly acknowledged that there are some ideas his fellow Democrats won't appreciate (like adjustments to Medicare and Medicaid programs) and some ideas Republicans will balk at (like raising tax rates on the very top tier of wealthy Americans). Who gives a damn? If Congress wants to avoid wholesale incumbent replacement in the 2012 election, then they better suck it up, move past the politics and ideology, and take meaningful action.

The White House has gathered all these proposals for boosting our economy WITHOUT increasing our debt into a program called the American Jobs Act. It's now up to Congress to pass this legislation, in whole or in part, and if they can't do that, then they better damn well enact some legislation of their own that will move us forward as a nation.