PRESS BRIEFING BY PRESS SECRETARY ROBERT GIBBS

James S. Brady Press Briefing Room

2:10 P.M. EST


MR. GIBBS: Good afternoon, guys, how are you? I have absolutely nothing to announce, which means we'll go straight to questions.

Yes, ma'am.

Q Thanks, Robert. Is it true that the President was considering announcing a Social Security task force, but decided not to? And can you talk a little bit about how he wants to, today, put meat on the bones of actually addressing some of these problems that carried through on his deficit reduction promise?

MR. GIBBS: Well, Jennifer, I think everyone has seen the President convene today a summit on fiscal responsibility here at the White House. And reports over the weekend about a budget -- that will be outlined in greater detail on Thursday -- that shows a deficit that was inherited before the stimulus of nearly $1.3 trillion that the President believes and the economic team believe that we can cut in at least half at the end of four years, the end of his first term. I think the American people are rightly concerned about the path of this economy, but also concerned that for many years we've had a borrow-to-spend attitude. And what the President hopes to get our country back on is a program that helps us save and invest.

The President outlined in his radio address a budget that is sober in its assessments, honest in its accounting -- which is a change -- that will, as I said, invest in what we need, cut in what we don't, and restore fiscal responsibility.

The President also talked during the campaign about this notion of the fact that it is hard to get to some degree of fiscal responsibility without addressing all of our challenges. I think you'll hear the President begin to talk on Tuesday, and continue what he did in the campaign, to talk about strengthening retirement security, as well as cutting health care costs. I think the articles in the paper demonstrated, for instance, that you cannot -- if you're going to talk about Medicare and Medicaid, you're talking about the rising costs of health care in this country that we've seen outstrip inflation sometimes more than double over the past 10 years.

So without getting ahead of where the President's going to be on Tuesday, I think you'll hear him begin the discussion on restoring a sense of fiscal responsibility to this town and understanding that we have to begin to live within our means.

Q I understand that he's displaying a commitment to that by staging the summit and, as you said, talking about it tomorrow night and further, I assume, on Thursday. But if he doesn't start to put actual action behind that, those numbers aren't going to come down. So --

MR. GIBBS: Well, I think you'll see -- I think you'll see this week the action behind that.

Q What about the Social Security task force?

MR. GIBBS: Well, let me, again, not get ahead of where the President is going to be over the course of this week. I do believe, getting back to that first phrase, I think you will be able to see, both in what the President says on Tuesday and ultimately what is forwarded to Congress on Thursday, will demonstrate clearly the President's intention and desire to see our country return to a path of fiscal responsibility, and in doing so, through honest budgeting, making very tough decisions that the American people understand we have to make, and cutting this deficit in half by the end of his first term.

Yes, ma'am.

Q On the question of bank nationalizations, both Greenspan and Senator Graham have called it a possible option. I think Greenspan said it was the least bad alternative. Are they wrong, or is this something that you're planning to do as part of the program announced today to allow banks to convert their government preferred shares into common --

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