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Weekly Address: President Obama – A Better Bargain for Responsible Homeowners

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BONUS VIDEO ADDED: Video of President Obama and the First Lady addressing injured veterans at the Disabled American Veterans National Convention below the fold (with transcript)

From the White House – Weekly Address

In this week’s address, President Obama says that the housing market is starting to heal, and now it’s time to build on that progress by creating a better bargain for responsible, middle class homeowners. The President announced steps he will take to strengthen the housing market, and now Congress must act to help make homeownership a source of pride and middle class security for generations to come.

Transcript: A Better Bargain for Responsible, Middle Class Homeowners

Hi, everybody.  For the past few weeks, I’ve been visiting folks across America to talk about what we need to do as a country to secure a better bargain for the middle class.

I’ve been laying out my ideas for how we can build on the cornerstones of what it means to be middle class in America.  A good job.  A good education.  Affordable health care when you get sick.  A secure retirement even if you’re not rich.  And the chance to own your own home.

This week, I went to Arizona and California, two of the states hit hardest when the housing bubble burst, triggering the recession. All across the country, millions of responsible Americans were hurt badly by the reckless actions of others.  Home values plummeted. Construction workers were laid off.  And many families lost their homes.

Over the past four years, we’ve worked to help millions of responsible homeowners get back on their feet.  And while we’re not where we need to be yet, our housing market is beginning to heal.  Home prices and sales are rising. Construction is up.  Foreclosures are down.  Millions of families have come up for air because they’re no longer underwater on their mortgages.

Now we have to build on this progress.  Congress should give every American the chance to refinance at today’s low rates.  We should help more qualified families get a mortgage and buy their first home.  We should get construction workers back on the job rebuilding communities hit hardest by the crisis.  And we should make sure that folks who don’t want to buy a home have  decent, affordable places to rent.

As home prices rise, we have to turn the page on the bubble-and-bust mentality that created this mess, and build a housing system that’s rock-solid and rewards responsibility for generations to come.  We need to wind down the companies known as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, make sure private capital plays a bigger role in the mortgage market, and end the era of expecting a bailout after your pursuit of profit puts the whole country at risk. We need to preserve access to safe and simple mortgages like the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage.  We need to keep laying down rules of the road that protect homeowners when they’re making the biggest purchase of their lives.  And finally, Congress needs to confirm Mel Watt to be our nation’s top housing regulator, so that he can protect consumers and help responsible lenders provide credit.

No program or policy will solve all the problems in a multi-trillion dollar housing market, and it will take time to fully recover.  But if we work together, we can make a home a source of pride and middle-class security again.  And if Washington is willing to set aside politics and focus on what really matters, we can rebuild an economy where if you work hard, you can get ahead.

Thanks, and have a great weekend.

Bolding added.

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The President and First Lady speak at the DAV convention in Orlando on August 10th.

Transcript: Remarks by The First Lady and The President at Disabled American Veterans Convention

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Editor’s Note: The President’s Weekly Address diary is also the weekend open news thread. Feel free to leave links to other news items in the comment threads.


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2 comments

  1. JanF

    MakingHomeAffordable.gov


    An official program of the Departments of the Treasury & Housing and Urban Development

    The Making Home Affordable Program  (MHA) ® is a critical part of the Obama Administration’s broad strategy to help homeowners avoid foreclosure, stabilize the country’s housing market, and improve the nation’s economy.

    Maybe your expenses have increased due to medical bills or you’re picking up the pieces after a separation or divorce. Maybe you’re trying to get by with less because your hours were cut or your business stumbled. In any case, it’s important to be proactive. MHA ® can help you get real help and real answers right now.

    888-995-HOPE (4673)

    ~

    Nomination of Mel Watt to head Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), May 1

    Mel’s mom raised Mel and his brothers in Charlotte, North Carolina, just outside — grew up in a house where you could see the stars through the roof and the ground through the floor.  But Evelyn Watt sacrificed and worked hard to give her boys a fighting chance.  As Mel says, “[She] never, ever let us know we were poor or couldn’t do anything that anybody else could do.”

    And that love and support eventually led Mel to Congress, where he’s represented the people of North Carolina for 20 years — every one of them as a member of the committee that oversees housing policy.  And in that capacity, Mel has led efforts to rein in unscrupulous mortgage lenders.  He’s helped protect consumers from the kind of reckless risk-taking that led to the financial crisis in the first place.  And he’s fought to give more Americans in low-income neighborhoods access to affordable housing.

    So Mel understands as well as anybody what caused the housing crisis.  He knows what it’s going to take to help responsible homeowners fully recover.  And he’s committed to helping folks just like his mom — Americans who work really hard, play by the rules day in and day out to provide for their families.  So, Mel, thank you so much for agreeing to accept this nomination.

  2. JanF

    Obama Torches GOP For ‘Ideological Fixation’ With Repealing Obamacare (VIDEO)

    In a Friday press conference, President Obama went after Republicans with a rarely shown aggressiveness over their ongoing efforts to destroy Obamacare, calling it an “ideological fixation” and saying the party’s “number one priority” is to make sure millions of Americans don’t have access to health care.

    “Now, I think the really interesting question is why it is that my friends in the other party have made the idea of preventing these people from getting health care their holy grail,” he said. “Their number one priority, the one unifying principle in the Republican Party at the moment is making sure that 30 million people don’t have health care. And presumably repealing all those benefits I just mentioned. Kids staying on their parents’ plan, seniors getting discounts on their prescription drugs, a return to limits on lifetime limits, continuing to get blocked from health care insurance.”

    Greg Sargent talks about the “Obamacare Trap” that the Republicans are in:

    … it may prove hard for Republicans to explain their unremitting repeal drive when constituents ask why they would take away specific provisions like the protections for people with preexisting conditions. The fact that the next GOP replace bill will include such protections (details are not yet available) only confirms this to be the case. […]

    They know proposing repeal while not offering a serious alternative is untenable. But when they do propose alternatives that would accomplish the popular parts of Obamacare, conservatives revolt, because they don’t want to sap the repeal-Obamacare drive of its energy and don’t want to legitimize an interventionist role for government.

    The already rolled out provisions of the Affordable Care Act are popular because health care coverage is a BHD for most Americans. The rest of the provisions, when the go into affect in 2014 and 2015 will also prove popular. Republicans who insist on pushing for repeal without replace … or who can’t figure out how to replace without embracing the popular provisions of a law that is already passed, signed, SCOTUSed and in effect … will not be treated well by their constituents.

    Patrick McHenry in Virginia found that out recently:

    But during a town hall in Swannanoa on Wednesday, voters confronted the five-term Congressman with an entirely different sentiment: they demanded to know why Republicans would take away the law’s protections for people with pre-existing conditions without offering any credible other alternative for reforming the health care system. One grieving mother, who spoke to reporters before the event, said that her son was denied insurance because of a pre-existing health condition and eventually died of colon cancer.

    These comments forced McHenry – who had repeatedly advocated for “full repeal” of Obamacare – to admit that he does support some of its most popular provisions.

    Nancy Pelosi piles on:

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