03/12/2009 - Obama: Midwest must retool (Fort Wayne Journal Gazette)

Obama: Midwest must retool
Sylvia A. Smith
Washington editor

Indiana and other states that are hemorrhaging manufacturing jobs must put more emphasis on research, biomedicine, energy technology and other innovation sectors, President Obama recommended Wednesday.

"We're going to do everything we can to preserve our manufacturing base," he said. "We have to recognize that some of those workers who used to manufacture steel are now are going to be manufacturing solar panels. We have to make sure they're equipped to do that."

States that invest in technology, education and research will be in a better position, Obama said.

On a day the government announced that Indiana lost 59,400 manufacturing jobs last year, Obama held up Indianapolis and Chicago as examples of regions that have used economic diversity to their advantage.

"What started off as hard-core, traditional manufacturing towns made the transitions to other areas, building on the universities, setting up research parks, thinking about innovative sectors in biomedicine or energy technologies," he said.

Obama said all states should take steps to invest in their citizens "so we're attracting world-class businesses that are looking for world-class employees."

He said emphasis on education, strategic infrastructure investments and research facilities that spur spinoff commercial applications of new technology are among the smart steps states can and should take.

"Some states do that better than others," Obama said. "There's no reason why, working with some world-class universities that exist in the heartland of the Midwest, that we don't adopt some of those same practices."

He singled out high-speed rail and investment in biofuels that go beyond corn-based ethanol as two examples.

Linking major hubs such as Indianapolis and Chicago with high-speed rail - both for passengers and freight - would "provide us a competitive advantage in the world economy," Obama said.

"It's important for us to transition to the next generation of biofuels," he said. "Corn-based ethanol, over time, is not going to provide us with the energy-efficient solutions that are needed.

"I want to make sure, though, as somebody who comes from a corn-growing state, that the progress we made building up a biofuels infrastructure and the important income-generation that has come from ethanol plants, that that is maintained," Ohama said.

He said ethanol technology is a bridge to future biofuels, and he said he will ask the Agriculture Department to focus on that.

Obama met with 15 journalists for an hour Wednesday afternoon. The invited reporters represented midsize newspapers throughout the country; each had a chance to ask one question.

He sat in the center of a massive oval table in the Roosevelt Room, the original site of the president's office and now used as a conference room. The walls are a pale mint green, and orange brocade settees and chairs are beneath portraits of two presidents - Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin Roosevelt.

Obama shook each reporter's hand before and after the session, which was the second time in his seven-week-old presidency that he met with Washington-based reporters from newspapers throughout the country. Representatives of national media were not included.

"This is my monthly occasion to break out of the Washington bubble and enjoy the keen insights of people outside of Washington," he said with a chuckle.

He was asked an array of questions on topics of special interest to various regions of the country. Reporters from the Southwest asked about violence along the Mexican border; a Southern reporter asked about Justice Department oversight of election procedures in Southern states; Gulf Coast reporters asked about FEMA and the space program.