CNN

The current loan balances need to be lowered to reflect the current value of the property. If you are under water it takes out the incentive to keep your business open. Small business needs help now.

Please quickly enact a "windfall profits tax" on the executives who receive vulgar amounts of bailout money..

they were responsible for their own meltdown.. they should be PROUD to give back to AMERICA!

How about 90 percent!

go research the historic tax rates for individuals and explain WHO enacted the 90 percent tax rate post WWII?

which stayed as high as 70 percent until Ronald Regan.

Be Aware...If YOu Can Pay Off Your Debt, DO IT NOW. Obama and his administtration can not and WILL NOT help. They are selling us into DEPRESSION.

PAY OFF YOUR DEBTS BEFORE THERE IS A RUN ON THE BANKS

The money that the government is giving to banks and small businesses is not free. Those banks and businesses will give it back when they get back to their feet. I believe in Obama administration.

Um, earth/Main St. to Obama:

SMALL BUSINESSES DON'T NEED LOANS – HELLO!! We actually have to pay our bills with *money we have* or we don't stay in business. I know you don't understand this because you live in Washingtonland.

WE NEED TAX RELIEF!!! I guess you're suggesting that we will need to take out a loan to pay our taxes. Well, guess what – we'll just go out of business and start getting our welfare checks so that we can start reaping the benefits of all the money you steal from us each month for a change. Way to stimulate the economy – geez, does no one in Washington have a brain or are they trying to devastate the economy?

"Turbo Tax Timmie" Why so confused???

Gee, maybe he's smartening up!

Great! Now I can get a low interest loan to help pay all my new taxes.

Of course, Prez–spend even more money than we have. My great-grandchildren will love paying for this waste!

Cheney's already threatening to have his al-Qaeda pals attack us again. The GOP must really be worried that the economy will rebound. Obama's leadership is making a difference!

For all of you wondering where the praise is for Obama's leadership because you claim the DOW is up....here it is....

"Thank You President Obama for recovering 40% of the amount the DOW has gone down since your dreadful policies have been put in place"

"Thank you for giving me only a 15% reduction in my 401 k rather than the full 25% you gave me earlier"

Obama has more "plans" than a dog has fleas. So far, giving money to large, corrupt...CORRUPT financial firms has not worked, but the employees love the bonuses!

This should have been part of the first stimulus not wasting tax money on more worthless federal projects!

How do you raise your poll numbers? Have a new crisis! We'd be in the same stage of recovery or real close if nothing had been done, economic nature had been left to its own correction and we had saved all of our grandchildren's future debt.

CNN – why did you bury the story about Maxine Waters on Saturday afternoon under a misleading headline?

RIP Journalistic Integrity...

Small businesses are where the jobs are right now; but the Republicans are trying to scare them into thinking that Obama is going to tax the hell out of them,when he had said he'd give them a tax break.

Who would want to go into business at this time? Too risky.

Again, more hot air from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

Here's an idea, Obama.... why don't you just cut their taxes so they can use their own money instead of having to borrow?

So much for all those people saying the government wasn't doing anything for small businesses. As a small business owner, I can't tell you how hard it is to get funding, especially through the SBA. And my initial loan was pretty small. This is a fantastic idea. I think this will be much more effective than tax cuts for the rich, as this will directly jumpstart small business loaning as opposed to giving 2% of small business owners a little bit more money at the end of the year.

What a crock.

great...they will loan money to companies but tax and regulate them to death.

This is really starting to get old. The Obama Administration is taking government to a whole new level. They really need to go back to the basics. The role of government is and only should be to provide "Public Goods". For those who don't know public goods are goods that are for everyone but individual people will not pay for on their own. A prime example is road repair. No one would pay to repair the pot hole in their street, and why should they, they pay for it out of pocket, use it a few times a day, but all the other motorists get to use it for free and never pay for the repair, and worse still why would you pay to repair a road that you don't even use? I'm sorry, but Health Care is not a public good and should not be provided for by the Government. When I choose to pay for health care it affects me and my family, and that is it. No one else gets to use my health care for free, and if I choose to not purchase health care then I just have to pay more for the service then others. We need to get back to the basics in this country and let people fend for them selves. I have greath faith in the American people and believe that without all the help from the government they can not only make it but prosper.

Good start but equity requirements must be reduced on SBA as well as excessive fees.. Just as homeowners have lost equity, so have samll businesses. The key is to focus on future true cash flow forecasts and not on collateral. Forecasts must be month-to-month cash budgets with careful analysis based on historical and future events and prices.

Does this mean that Obama and rest of the Democratics realize their pork barrel "stimulus bill" does absolutely nothing to help the economy? Probably not.

This plan will be a great idea as long as all of a great majority of the small businesses benefit. With the AIG bailout, which was a disgrace, especially after we were hit with the bill for these greedy individuals to get bonuses on top of their cushy salaries while we are all struggling.
For this, the right thing to do is for the Government to take back the bailout money from AIG. Also, I hope that before this new small business plan is put into action that it is reviewed carefully so that it doesn't get everyone's hopes up and then leads to a lot of dissapointment like the Hope for Homeowners. In my state, only 8% are eligible, and meanwhile, my state has the highest foreclosure rate in the nation, and a lot of people were left to feel very put out, especially after finding this out and then hearing about the AIG Bailout. We want to see some real results now, not a big show with big promises and a bunch of public relations.

Only because the stimulus was a total flop!!!

It is hard to believe anything that comes from Geithner!!!

Now he wants to take over small businesses also! He already has the banks and the auto industry. Way to go you Obama nuts! Keep drinking your kool aid while we become a socialist country.

Sorry, can't trust the president and his clueless golden boy 'uhhh whats a plan?' Geithner

It seems to me the best way to help small business is not to socialize the national baking system, but to CUT TAXES. B.O. is just using the so-called "economic crisis" as an excuse to execute his socialist agenda. His chief of staff has all but said that this is the plan.....don't let a good crisis go to waste.

Hey ...... You want to make things fair and increase the Fed Tax Money? Google "Fair Tax" ... Basically a flat tax 23% that EVERYBODY pays, Tourists, illegals..... don't matter....... You completly do away with the IRS .... Everybody that works gets an immediate pay raise because payroll tax deductions stop - what's your highest bill every month? House Mortgage? WRONG..... TAX! and you can't "foreclose" on that! or I guess you can refuse to pay it unless you get picked to serve on Obama's cabinet like the Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner..... The head of Household gets a "refund" check from the Feds ea month based on number in Household.....But guess what ...The 545 on the Hill won't support "Fair Tax" Why? They lose the power to buy votes with their "entitlements....." "Fair Tax" will Greatly increase the Fed coffers to cover all social actions incl SSI ....Look it up

Tell me this dude don't look like a Crook!!

Tell you what ...... I'll keep Jesus, My Guns and My Freedom........ And you can keep your #@)& Change!

So will policies like this finally shine some light on the souls of broke Republicans? Even the moderately rich ones should see the hope and change that is represented here.

The next step should be to impose a tariff tax on all the low quality products that Walmart imports from China. We can funnel all that revenue right back to China to repay our debt to their country. So that when the Walton family's ridiculuous "richest in the world" wealth finally dries up.....small business America will be stronger than ever.

But those are just my dreams, lets hear all the responses that I'm ant-christian. I can't wait.

This comment is for John King. I have watch your state of the union several times, There is a question I want to ask you why is it that whenever you have democrat or republican on your show you let the republican give the last comment? I want you to know that the person who gives the last comment is what people remember the most. You are becoming like a fox news or Lou who call himself Mr independent. May be if both of you can go back to your previous tapes you will know what I'm talking. Also CNN your coverage is coming less news. Does any one of you care about the school in South Carolina. Where is the news about that? By the way John that is news worthy then your interview with Cheney which angered a lot of people that watch your show including me.

This is too funny. But not really. McCain made it clear that small business needed to be taken care of if the economy was to rebound, but all Obama and Co. wanted to do was make fun of the "Joe the Plumbers" of America during the election.

Now, after the new administrations failure to stimulate the economy (after spending almost 4 trillion of our dollars to do so), they want to act like this was their idea all along–help small business. Geez...give me a break!

Why didn't they realize this sooner? They only issues a small portion of the stimulus (60 million) to small businesses?

Do they suddenly have a clue?

we really need to help small businesses inorder to move this economy moving again.
March 14th, 2009 9:20 pm ET

D. Major wrote, "If Mr. Obama would like for Republicans' such as myself to start liking him he needs to show some respect to people who do not agree with his policies & are offended by his stupid comments re: the GOP. I never voted for him & never will! I'm counting the days until he is out of office."

D. Major, let me ask you this question again, How many days are left untill Obama is out of office? I guess it is 665 days left for Obama. and then guess what? what? There will be another Democrat in the presidency for the next 4 terms.Tthat is 16 years untill the rightwing will reclaim it because in the state the GOP is in right now, they will not win over the minority and a great deal of the white vote as been predicted and proven right. They will even loose big time this time around come 2010 elections and 2012 and then all the way to 2016.

HERE IS THE FACT. the GOP have to win over 68% of the white vote and that is not going to happen because the Democrats have to lose 26% of the white vote to Republicrats. The last time I have checked, Obama lost to Mccain 14% of the white vote. If Republicans want to win the presidency thus far this time they have to gain an 11% of the white vote. But wait that is not going to happen because Obama has to screw up big time in his term. The way it seems right now the economy is gonna comeback and there will be prosperity even better than back in the Clinton/Gore days, so, there will be even a backlash of voter response to what the republicrats did in opposing to revive the economy when Obama saught bipartisanship and they obstructed him every step out of the way.
For a fact I say this: Obama and Biden will win the next election even bigger than before and will choose a successor after his two terms in office end by just endorsing a candiate and actively campaigning for that candidate. But wait, in the primaries of 2016 there will be allot of candiates that will seek Obama's endorsement, I can predict that right now, but Obama is gonna choose who thinks will not screw up the economy and the things that makes this great country so great. I say this that there will be a woman that Obama is going to endorse in 2016. I am not saying this will be former first lady and current first lady, but it is my instinct that says it is gonna be a woman. That woman has to put herself in the spotlight right after the 2016 elections. Period end of story.

What?
Obama's trying to help small business?
What will the Repubs say now?

Even Joe the "plumber" should be able to see that it is the Democrats that have his best interest. That spin and those lies from the right wing-nuts have fallen apart. They would rather do nothing, or refuse to take the stimulus funding. It is only the fool and the dead who cannot tell the source of true help and support.

Well it looks like President Obama took another Republican argument off the table,since the president is about to take care of small business.

Obama-Biden 2012'

Spend baby Spend!!!! Geez Obama.....you and all your spending are going to run this country into the ground. Did you think to consider that problems MIGHT be solved by doing something other than throwing billions of dollars at them?

This country is in trouble.

Spur lending to small business how about ENFORCE IT

Why are small businesses "suffering from dried-up coffers and unpaid bills," when they have been getting a steady dose of GOP tax cuts (that were supposed to make them invincibly competitive) you wonder?

This worries me. While you need lending to get going again, these types of loans are just as dangerous as the subprime ones that started this whole problem. Not sure about this.

I can't wait to see the Cheney/Palin 2012 economic plan.

Even as a democrat I'm really getting tired of seeing "more bailout money for so and so."

We need to stop with all this bailout talk. To much money is changing hands and I guarentee a bunch of it is going to be lost and given to people and companies undeserving.

I'm almost wishing I voted McCain if this keeps up.

Everyone else is getting bailout, it's about time for small business sectors to get reinforment. Personally I applaud this move by the Barack Obama administration. Who says Obama is not for the common man? He is the common man who happened to make his way to the Elite DC circle. He knows what he is doing. Keep it up Mr. President!

"Under the administration's new initiative, the government will step in to buy these loans to help unlock the frozen credit market, using money from the $700 billion financial bailout package in the range of between $10 billion to $20 billion, one official briefed on the plan said.

In other words the president and geithner will be using money already set aside, not new money.

I know the repugs are yelling already because CNN failed to put how it will be paid for, so I looked it up for you.,

The DOW is down 20 percent since inauguration day and down 30 percent since election day. Really, Barry, don't you think you've done enough "helping?"

Barry can blame some things on Bush, but the 20/30 percent market slides can't be blamed on Bush.

If you have unpaid bills shouldn't you pay those off before going further into debt?

Tax them to death and then try and work out how to get them dependent on you – the Obama way. The beginning of another Fannie Mae/ Freddie Mac? Loans for those who can't afford it – go Democrats let's see if you can lay the foundation for another disaster

I feel that this a right thing to do as president. Small company need the chance to grow into a large company as well. I feel that we as a nation should help each other out we are all suffering from this hard time in this period.

This will be interesting ,so far everything has been BS,I need some additional credit for my company because of the government has screwed up the market place so bad,it hard to get paid.

That's funny, I remember Obama dismissing McCain's plan to help small businesses during the election. I think he said McCain was out of touch.

Is this a "NO" too ,GOP?

Thank you Mr. President. I would suggest that we use other alternative than the SBA. SBA is time consuming.

Doesn't matter what you do. It's all cycles. Whomever happens to be president when the markets turn up will get the credit. Whomever happens to be president when the markets turn down will get the blame. Although I do wonder where we would be if it weren't for Barney Fiffe, I mean, Frank, saying that Sallie and Freddie were sound back in 2003 when Bush wanted to regulate them.

The problem with this is the SBA is horribly broken. The fed loves to talk about small business, but they forget that the majority of "small businesses" are micro businesses. There are no viable programs for Micro Business. The fed needs to take a hard look at the SBA and what it does. They could learn lessons by modeling a national program after the one in New Hampshire (MicroCredit NH) where I used to live. We are so sorry for relocating to Montana where there is little real support for small business.

I challenge CNN to do an in depth meaningful piece on the realities of REAL small businesses in America, including the millions of Micro Businesses that help keep the economy flowing.

C'mon Obambi enough of this bailouts, you're putting future of our children and grandchildren in the PAWNSHOP.

The best you can do is to cut taxes across the board to stimulate the economy, putting people back to work. Government is NOT the solution for our problems, in fact BIG GOVERNMENT is the PROB LEM!

When government start injecting themselves into businesses, the more a nation goes down due to the fact people in the government don't know how the real business world work. These bureaucrats based everything in THEORY. If these people are business savvy, tfhey wouldn't be receiving salaries from TAXPAYERS!

Theres no business like the lending business.Once upon a time you could make money saving it,but they made sure that didnt last long.Now the consumer has become the consumed,eaten by the giant tapeworm that only eats enough to keep its prey alive.Lookup "Solari" on google to find more on this subject.Please post this CNN.Thank you.

Dang I was hoping for another good day in the market. Every time he talks or annonuces a program the market dives.

Ben Bernanke was brilliant on 60 minutes explaining why we needed to do this spending. He concentrated on the Great Depression and why it began. Before we get the right wing "stop the spending!!" you should watch it...

Borack Obama's Flea-Market. Look at them Skoot!

#44 +Geithner = failures

Lending to Borack Obama's Democrats? Very-Small-Business..

what about money in the american people's pocket.. WHAT ABOUT US NOW!

Are people are broke, and this dude is helping to make the perobelm worse, hwo in the heck can this mousey dude say that he is in control, when he can not even talk to the press, he gets hissy fitz!

And the day after this announcement, Dana Perieno will say that was Bush's idea.

glad to hear it.

I was happy to hear Republican Bill Frist say that he thought health care reform was needed and Obama was doing a good job in his approach to the problem.

Finally a positive step out of this White House. Make loans to private businesses (small, medium and large) easier! Make taxes for workers, investors and business owners, partnerships and corporations lower! Take away any unnecessary regulation to make businesses more efficient. The private market can get itself out of this recession if the government can get out of the way.

good.

Increase Micro-grants awards: If a business owner submits a plausible, reasonably good SBIR proposal, he or she deserves some compensation, since writing SBIRS often take time, networking, as well as travel in certain situations. $2000-$5000 would not only ease financial burdens, but would also encourage innovation.

Obama should have helped the small business owner before bailing out AIG, the Auto Industry and Wall-Street. Now AIG is going to give millions in bonuses instead of using that money to reduce their debt. Obama doesn't have the experience to run this country and the knowledge of choosing the right people. 5 or 6 had to step down because of their problems. I expect this country to go into a deep depression close to the one in 1929 if he keeps on lending millions of dollars. There are still thousands of foreclosures, companies closing and millions collecting unemployment checks. If I am correct Obama was talking about the economy and how he was going to fix it while campaigning. No new taxes. I remember McCain saying he will raise your taxes and he was right. How did the American public get sucked into voting for Obama. And will they make the same mistake over again.

it would seem to be maximumly ludicrous, that we pay hard earned taxes to provide idiotic ill skilled ceos, goofy bonuses while they skilllessly run their companies into the ground. is someone offering an explanation for this maximum stupidity?

I personally think the market has been manipulated. Look what happened from Tuesday when market started to recover. I think there is alot of crap in America we can not even trust our media. What a joke we have become?

Instead of lending more taxpayer moneyto small business, wake up and realize that the key is to REDUCE
taxes. I guess that goes directly against Barry's liberal tax and spend philosopy though. Wake up America!

A bill to help small businesses in the US?

I think I can anticipate the Republican reply: Why reward the mediocrity and limited capability displayed by small business owners? Better to squander billions on sweetheart no-bid contracts for large mutinationals in the middle east.

SHE,,,,,,,,,,,,,SAYS,,,,,,,,,,,,,ECONOMY,,,,,,,,,,IN,,,,,,,,,,,GREAT,,,,,,,,,,SHAPE,,,,,,,,,

OBAMA,,,,,,,,,,,,SAYS,,,,,,,,,,,,NO,,,,,,,,,,,,,GEITHNER,,,,,,,,,,,,,SAYS,,,,,,,,,,,OK,,,,,,

WHO'S,,,,,,,,,,RIGHT ? ? ?

Well, before you give any more money to the banks, you've got a new, major headache to contend with, folks, namely a major loss in the credit union industry. Where many people thought, well at least the credit unions are safe from the toxic derivatives and mortgage mess, along comes the information that no, they are not.

They're going to boost small businesses than any earning over 250K , will get taxed to hell and back, good plan!

Tax cheater geithner doesn't have enough smarts to balance his check book. Although he was pretty good at cheating on his taxes.

This should have been done in the first package. Small business is the backbone of this country. I wonder how much more they are going to spend and where it will come from. I guess we'll see when our taxes go out of sight next year. Your right people CHANGE is coming and in a big way.

As the co-owner of a small business and Obama supporter, I applaud this move. It's a step inthe right direction. Small businesses employ 65% of America's labor force. If we succeed, the country succeeds.

Is this all that this administration knows how to do is SPENDING?

We were in hole very deep hole left behind by Bush, and all that this administration wants to do is spend and put us deeper into debt.

How about taking back all of the money that was given to AIG, it seems that it is only going to pay for more BONUSES to the top executives, the ones that have run AIG into debt! WHAT A JOKE!

Small business is the backbone of our economy. This move, if successful, will power us back to the the top. Plus any President with the backing of small businesses will be a political success as well.

And this tax cheat will turn around and tax the hell out of the same small businesses. These are the same idiots that are making plans to force wounded veterans to pay for their own medical bills for injuries and wounds sustained on active duty. You also whine about capital punishment as cruel and unusual, while you have no problem murdering innocent life in the womb. This is the demented logic of the American Liberal. You liberals are despicable, disgusting human beings.

Oh No! There goes the take-over by the federal govt of the small businesses of the former USA.

Given the very large amount of my money that they have already been given, would it be too much to ask that Goldman Sachs pay for this particular program that might actually help someone that's not on Wall Street?

Or, should I just send the deed to my house and my car keys to Llyod Blankfien?

Anybody got Lloyd's address...?????

Obama is putting 730 million dollars towards small businesses. In obamas own words, small businesses account for 70% of the new jobs of the past 10 years. So he is spending 0.1% of the 787 billion dollar stimulus package. You heard it right, for every $1000 of stimulus money spent, $1 goes to help small businesses. It just shows how unqualified obama is in running the country. You wanted change, you got it.

How about this:
no more bailouts.
Create a flat tax.
Take all taxes and add them up. Take 85% of this amount and divide it by the number of citizens. Divide this number by 12. Take this amount and send a check for this amount to EVERY citizen once a month.

Take the 15% for running the government – cut and borrow the rest.
Keep doing this until the recession is over. Why have so few decide how to get us ut of this when we could all help?

After that, either embrace change or go back to the same old same old

I guess joe the plumber will accept this spreading the wealth around.

After all is done and economy is back on track, I still want to see Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld escorted to prison.

"Obama to squander more money"...

This clown is a complete IDIOT! GET OUT OF THE WORKINGS OF OUR ECONOMY YOU MARXIST SOCIALIST PIG!

Here we go again...........more dumb ideas from the Obama administration. What small businesses are you going to allow to use this money (loans)? I'm sure only the ones selectively picked by Obama. I'm sure any small business like a Christian bookstore or anything like that would be turned down........the same way as it was with the stimulus package.

Our youth group at church used to use showers during the summer from a public high school down the street from the church when we had events that were multiple days at the church. If that school would let us use their showers this summer, they would be banned from any stimulus money. How wrong is that? And that is in no way a violation of separation of church and state. It's simply a school being nice to the community.

Keep your head high Mr. Tim. We need you!

As a small biz owner and tax payer, I'd like to request for Obama's economic teams. PLEASE DO NOT ANNOUNCE IMPERFECT PLANS WITHOUT DETAILED, IF OBAMA'S TEAMS DON'T KNOW WORKABLE NUMBERS OR PROCESSING. It's irresponsibilities that "Romer said the government would pump "a significant amount" of money into boosting small business lending, but she did not reveal a total figure."
I've been in a small business owner in New York. It's equally hard to get the SBA Loan as much as like to get star in the sky.

my mom used to ask, do you think money grows on trees, hey President Obama, pehaps someone needs to ask you.

A good man doing every thing he can for America.

Obama's ears should have been a give away, a Mickey Mouse administration.

They're just flailing away, hoping something will stick.

Still nothing for the suffering individuals. All big and small business. Not ONE of them is offering jobs.

When is Washington going to muster the courage to tell the ceo's to forget about bonus's. If they want to leave who cares, don't tell me more bs that they are the only ones capable of doing the job. I know i am sick of hearing excuses. Time to grow a set, and be less worried about the sky will fall if these goons don't get their big bonus, and more worried about working stiffs. These sleazebags voted republican, and always will.

Thank Heavens! We are small business owners that are very pleased to hear that the administration is doing something to help us!

They'll need the loans mostly to pay for the Obama tax increase...

One of President Obama's economic advisers said Sunday that the economy is fundamentally sound, a striking reversal from the Democrat's campaign rhetoric as his administration now guides the nation's financial health amid dire conditions.

Obama's Democratic allies pleaded for patience for an administration hitting the two-month mark this week, while Republicans said the White House's plans ignore small business and the immediate need to fix what ails the economy.

During the fall campaign, Obama mercilessly mocked his Republican opponent, Sen. John McCain, for declaring, "The fundamentals of our economy are strong." Obama's team painted the veteran senator as out of touch and failing to grasp the challenges facing the country.

On Sunday, economic adviser Christina Romer was asked during an appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press" if the fundamentals of the economy were sound. "Of course they are sound," she replied.

"The fundamentals are sound in the sense that the American workers are sound, we have a good capital stock, we have good technology," she said. "We know that - that temporarily we're in a mess, right? We've seen huge job loss, we've seen very large falls in GDP. So certainly in the short run we're in a - in a bad situation."

Just a week ago, White House Office of Management and Budget director Peter Orszag declared that "fundamentally, the economy is weak."

The seesaw message from the new administration drew sharp criticism from Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, who said Obama's team was exploiting the economic situation for political gain.

"They're taking advantage of a crisis in order to do things that had nothing to do with getting us into the crisis in the first place," McConnell said.

Interesting that CNN left out another quote from Christina Romer that she made today. She said she believes the US economy is "fundamentally sound". Now where have I heard that before. Oh yeah, John McCain said it during the election (when things weren't as bad as now) and Obama criticized him. The hypocrisy of this Administration continues to amaze.

iLLEGALS ARE ON THE TOP OF HIS LIST .

Ok Republican, now we have a plan for small business. I am sure you will find some objections to this plan as well. It would be nice to see the Republican's come up with some kind of alternative plan.

The fed should have set up shop as a loans company long ago and allowed the banks to fail, they only have themselves to blame.

All this money going to banks whose job it is to make sound financial decisions, you have got to be thinking we are throwing good money after bad with these bailouts. It is not a natural way for companies to survive or to be productive in, it just allows them to say "don't worry, the tax payer will pick up the bill" after they charge us fees for being unemployed and having a bank account.

GOOD MOVE!