Obama: ‘The party now is over’

UPDATED:

A somber President Obama used his first prime-time press conference Monday night to pressure Congress to pass his massive economic stimulus spending bill, acknowledging it is imperfect but declaring he won’t negotiate with Republicans who think government should not intervene substantially in the economy.

“The federal government is the only entity left with the resources to jolt our economy back to life,” the new president said.

Mr. Obama pronounced “in fact, the party now is over” for free-spending Americans, defended his cataclysmic language on the health of the economy and said bipartisanship will have to take a back seat to getting an economic recovery spending bill completed.

The hour-long session in the White House East Room, before an audience of more than 160 journalists, was dominated by the economy, with Mr. Obama promising a “difficult year ahead.”

In the prime-time affair coordinated with a week of appearances around the country to sell his proposal, the president repeatedly bashed Republicans for doubling the nation’s debt over the last decade while they controlled the White House and Congress. Mr. Obama also ridiculed conservatives who have said the stimulus bill is going to make things worse.

Mr. Obama said he hoped to build trust with Republicans over the long term, but in this debate he drew a line between Republicans he said he could negotiate with and those who he said should be left out of the conversation because they oppose any government action at all, saying President Roosevelt’s New Deal answered those questions.

“They’re fighting battles that I thought were resolved a pretty long time ago,” Mr. Obama said.

As for the second infusion of $350 billion to the Troubled Assets Relief Program for financial institutions, Mr. Obama said the money is needed to restore confidence in the markets and that he will ensure the money is spent more wisely than the first installment, with better oversight.

“We are going to have to work with the banks in an effective way to clean up their balance sheets so that some trust is restored within the marketplace, because right now part of the problem is that nobody really knows what’s on the banks’ books,” said Mr. Obama. Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner will lay out principles for using the money Tuesday.

He promised to review the policy that prevents press coverage of U.S. troops killed in action overseas, though in response to a question he said he wants to hear the results of the review before overturning the Bush administration policy.

He said New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez’s admission that he took steroids was “depressing news,” but praised Major League Baseball for taking steps to clean up the sport.

“It tarnishes an entire era to some degree,” he said.

On the international scene, Mr. Obama said he has shown Iran that he wants U.S. engagement, by delivering his first television interview to Al Arabiya and naming a special envoy to the Middle East. He said now Iran must show it’s ready.

“In the coming months, we will be looking for openings that can be created where we can start sitting across the table, face to face - of diplomatic overtures that will allow us to move our policy in a new direction,” Mr. Obama said.

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