Obama makes brief appearance at Ohio warehouse

YOUNGSTOWN, OHIO -- Call it the new message discipline.

Eager to send the message that the economy is improving thanks to the president's policies, the White House has honed the quick, in-and-out factory stop to an art form.

Tuesday's was a warehouse operated by V&M Star, a maker of steel tubular goods -- basically big pipes and rods -- that is expanding its operations thanks to $20 million in Recovery Act funding. That will translate, eventually, into a new facility and 350 additional jobs.

President Obama popped in, took a brief tour, gave a quick speech, and is already headed back to Washington to be home by dinner.

"A year ago, we took significant action to jump-start economic growth and job creation," Obama told a small crowd of employees. "I invite anyone who thinks we shouldn't have taken those actions or made those investments to come to places like this and tell us why. Come here and tell us why companies like this in towns like Youngstown shouldn't be given every chance to expand and add jobs."

On a tour of the factory before his remarks, Obama surveyed massive machines that whirred and rumbled as 18-foot-long cylinders of steel moved along the production line, glowing orange with molten heat. Wearing a black protective flame retardant jacket with red trim, Obama pointed at machines and nodded under his white protective hat.

As he did last week at a similar stop in Buffalo, the president took aim at Republicans who opposed the Recovery Act and other Democratic efforts to confront the economic recession.

"We could sit back, do nothing, make a bunch of excuses, play politics and watch America's decline -- or we could stand up and fight for our future," he said Tuesday afternoon. "I think any fair-minded person would say that if we hadn't acted, more people in the Mahoning Valley, more people in Ohio, and more people across America would be out of work today."

The speech was similar to the one he gave in Buffalo at a metal fabricating and welding plant.

Before the Buffalo trip, aides to the president offered the following: "During the economic crisis, the President and his allies in Congress were forced to make some politically difficult decisions to get our economy back on track. But as a result of those actions, we are beginning to see jobs created and the economy is growing. He will talk of the actions that were taken and also point out that many of his most vocal opponents stood on the sidelines predicting failure."

As they head toward the midterm elections this November, White House officials are eager to have Obama repeatedly connect the dots between his policies and the economic recovery, which has been producing an increasing number of jobs recently. April's job report showed an increase of nearly 300,000 jobs, the best in years.

Aides have said that Obama will continue doing these events, probably weekly, into the year. They hope that the message will eventually break through a public that has appeared resistant to believing that the stimulus has worked.