President Obama got an earful this past week from Americans worried about the state of the economy, during his three-state heartland bus tour. CBS News correspondent Anthony Mason was invited to come along, and now reports our Sunday Morning Cover Story:
The road across the farm fields of Middle America is a long way from Washington and the White House.
This past week, the presidential motorcade cut through the heartland, stopping in Minnesota, Iowa and Illinois - three states Barack Obama carried in the last election. But the faltering economy has made voters everywhere uneasy.
Please don't challenge us with more rules and regulations from Washington, D.C.," one town hall participant said.
"This is one of the most painful places I think our country has been in decades or centuries," said another.
"I don't think we should solve this debt crisis on the backs of the middle class," said another.
For three days, the president traveled in the new black, armored bus, commissioned for him by the Secret Service and nicknamed "Ground Force One."
How does he like his new bus? Mr. Obama was asked when we caught up with him in Illinois:
"You know, the bus is terrific, mainly because it allows me to get into places that otherwise we couldn't go," he said.
"It has a slightly Darth Vader quality to it," Mason opined.
"I will say that unless I'm in the front of the bus, people can't see a thing," Mr. Obama laughed.
After the bruising battle to raise the debt ceiling, the president was eager to be seen out here. Mr. Obama was about to escape on a 10-day vacation. But the economy's troubles have proved inescapable:
"This has been a scary summer for a lot of people," Mason said.
"Absolutely," said the president.
"'Cause the stock market, economy's struggling. Should Congress be back in Washington? Should you be going on vacation?"
"Well, no, because I think that, you know, if all we're doing is the same posturing that we saw before the debt limit vote, that's not gonna encourage anybody; that's gonna discourage people," President Obama said. "And the reason I'm out here is to remind people what the expectations of ordinary Americans are. In small towns like this, and in big cities all across America, they are saying to their representatives, 'Stop playing the games and get something done.'"
Complete transcript of Anthony Mason's interview with President Obama
The road into Atkinson, Illinois - population 1100 - was lined with nearly as many American flags.
Larry Eckhardt, who collects Old Glory, had planted them for people awaiting the president's arrival:
"Having an avenue of flags this long - this is about 2-3 miles - it brings a lot of emotion back to them and it kind of jars them awake and makes them realize that hey, it is a great country," Eckhardt said.
The president, who stopped in Atkinson on Wednesday, tried to reassure voters of that, too.
"There's nothing wrong with our country right now; there is something wrong with our politics," he said to applause.
At a town hall meeting in the warehouse of Wyffels Hybrids, a seed corn company, he got an earful about the economy:
"Since the debt ceiling fiasco in Washington," said Luanne Levine, "we have no consumer confidence after what has just happened."
Wyffels employees Fritz Behr, Carlie Elliot Bowman and Jeff Hartz were in the crowd.
When asked by Mason how he felt about his country today, Behr replied, "Concerned. I mean, our political process is scary and the economy is kind of on edge."
Behr voted for Obama in the last election. Hartz and Bowman voted for John McCain
"What would you like to hear from the President, right now?" Mason asked.
"Well, I'd love for him to say that, you know, our economy's going to blossom again," Bowman said.
"And I think, you know, there's a lot of people that are just tired of listening about what we need to do," said Hartz. "They want to see something happen. They want to see the results of all this talk."
When the town hall ended, we met with the president, in a back corner of the Wyffels warehouse:
"This past week your popularity hit a record low," Mason said. "What does that say to you?"
"Well, what it says to me is I'm the President of the United States and when people aren't happy with what's happening in Washington, that I'm gonna be impacted just like Congress is," Mr Obama said. "And you know, I completely understand that, we expected that.
"It frustrates people, understandably, when you've got an unemployment rate that is still too high, an economy that's not growing fast enough. And for me to argue, 'Look, we've actually made the right decisions, things would have been much worse has we not made those decisions,' that's not that satisfying if you don't have a job right now," the president said. "And I understand that, and I expect to be judged a year from now on whether or not things have continued to get better."
Source: http://feeds.cbsnews.com/~r/CBSNewsMain/~3/a0HUKUbZx90/main20095106.shtml
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