Obama continues using nation’s infrastructure to push for jobs bill

{mosads}Obama used other examples to make the case for his $447 billion jobs plan, which includes spending $50 billion on transportation projects and creating a national infrastructure bank to lure private-sector financing for other projects.

“In Maine, there is a bridge that is in such bad shape that pieces of it were literally falling off the other day,” he said. “And, meanwhile, we’ve got millions of laid-off construction workers who could right now be busy rebuilding roads, rebuilding bridges, rebuilding schools. This jobs bill gives them a chance to get back to work rebuilding America. Why wouldn’t we want that to happen? Why would you vote against that?”

In answering a question about whether he still has the power to persuade lawmakers to approve the jobs bill, the president acknowledged that his argument might have limits. 

“I can go out there and make speeches, but until they actually see action, some of that cynicism is going to be there,” he said.

A Senate vote on the jobs act, in the form of an amendment to another bill, could come Thursday afternoon.