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As Unemployment Rate Dips, Obama Readies Jobs Proposal

With unemployment edging down to 10 percent, the White House said Friday that President Barack Obama will ask Congress to pass a series of job-creating proposals to be unveiled in a speech on Tuesday.The Labor Department reported earlier Friday that the nation lost 11,000 jobs in November and that the overall unemployment rate was down to 10 percent from 10.2 percent the previous month.Obama “has talked with some Members of Congress,— White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said, “but something larger will happen— in terms of Congressional outreach after Tuesday’s speech at the Brookings Institution.Gibbs, who spoke to reporters Friday morning, told Roll Call afterward that Obama’s ideas will likely be considered as part of a mix of jobs proposals Congress is expected to review, and the White House is not insisting on a take-it-or-leave it package.Gibbs celebrated the news that the unemployment rate had taken an unexpected dip, calling the new figures “the best numbers that have been released in 22 months— and saying the economy is “clearly moving in the right direction.—In a statement, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) noted that despite the decline in unemployment, hiring has yet to begin.“Of course, while any decrease in the unemployment rate is encouraging, a ‘jobless recovery’ and double-digit unemployment is not what the American people were promised,— he said. “More than three million Americans have lost their jobs since the President signed the trillion-dollar ‘stimulus’ that was supposed to keep unemployment below 8 percent and put people back to work ‘immediately.’—

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