>> ifill: judy woodruff talks to stephen mufson of the washington post about a b.p. internal report, which blames the largest offshore oil spill in history on a series of human and mechanical failures. >> lehrer: and, global post reporter solana pyne looks at dhaka, bangladesh-- the fastest growing of the world's mega- cities and one of the poorest. >> i think if you simply project the present into the future, then we are headed no good place. >> lehrer: that's all ahead on tonight's "newshour." major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: this is the engine that connects zero emission technologies to breathing a little easier, while taking 4.6 million truckloads off the road every year. bnsf, the engine that connects us. and the william and flora hewlett foundation, working to solve social and environmental problems at home and around the world. and with the ongoing support of these institutions and foundations. and... this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> lehrer: the president accused the republicans of being fiscally irresponsible, but admitted that his own policies have not worked as quickly as hoped. congressional correspondent kwame holman reports. >> we got some business to do today. >> reporter: just eight weeks from election day, the president made his pitch in cleveland today to help the sputtering u.s. economy >> that means making long-term investments in education and clean energy; in basic research, technology, and infrastructure. >> reporter: and he also took a stand against extending the bush era tax cuts for the top 2% of earners, setting up a pre- election fight with republicans in congress. he accused the g.o.p. of being mr. obama repeatedly singled out republican house leader john boehner, who spoke in cleveland two weeks ago about his party's economic agenda. >> there were no new policies from mr. boehner. there were no new ideas. they would have us borrow $700 billion over the next ten years to give a tax cut of about $100,000 each to folks who are already millionaires. >> reporter: sustained unemployment near 10% and flagging growth are the main reasons the president's party is staring down potential major losses in the congressional mid- term election. trying to limit the economic and electoral damage, the president conceded that his recovery plans haven't worked fast enough, but he also sought to define the stakes he sees on election day. >> it's still fear versus hope; the past versus the future. it's still a choice between sliding backward and moving forward. >> reporter: mr. obama has called for more targeted stimulus spending and small- business tax breaks including $50 billion in infrastructure spending to upgrade or rehab roads, railways and runways. mr. obama also is proposing a permanent extension of a tax break on research and innovation and a more than $100 billion business tax cut, that would allow companies to write off all new investments over the next 14 months. on the bush era tax cuts, the president made clear he wants those affecting middle and lower income americans to continue. >> we are ready, this week, to give tax cuts to every american making $250,000 or less. >> reporter: on a.b.c. this morning, republican leader boehner said he was open to some of the president's ideas but again pushed to keep all of the bush tax cuts in place. >> you can't have a strong economy if you're raising taxes on the very people you expect to invest in economy to begin hiring people again. >> reporter: boehner also called on the president to work with congress on a budget that would hold to 2008 spending levels. >> ifill: we'll explore the president's tax cut proposals in back-to-back interviews with treasury secretary geithner and republican representative roskam, that will be followed by a report from chile on the physical and mental stress of the miners; the many failures in the b.p. oil spill, and the burgeoning slums of bangladesh. but first, with the other news of the day, here's hari sreenivasan in our newsroom. >> sreenivasan: the pastor of a small church in florida refused to back down from plans to burn copies of the koran on the 9th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. the controversial protest has drawn widespread criticism from the obama administration, military commanders, and religious leaders. but pastor terry jones said he has also received a lot of support ahead of saturday's demonstration. >> our burning of the koran is to call the attention that something is wrong. something is wrong. it is possibly time for us in a new way to actually stand up, confront terrorism. as of right now, we are not convinced that backing down is the right thing. so on september 11, we shall continue with our planned event. >> sreenivasan: in washington, the top two national security advisers in president obama's cabinet denounced the plans. defense secretary gates said it was ill-advised. and secretary of state hillary clinton urged jones and his church to back down. >> it's regrettable that a pastor in gainesville, florida with a church of no more than 50 people can make this outrageous and distressful, disgraceful plan and gets you know the world's attention, but that's the world we live in right now. it doesn't in any way represent america or americans or american government or american religious or political leadership. >> sreenivasan: jones has already received more than 100 death threats and said he has started carrying a pistol to protect himself. in afghanistan today, security forces in kabul beat back hundreds of angry customers trying to withdraw their savings from a branch of the country's largest private bank. the kabul bank is embroiled in a crisis that escalated last week, after its top two directors were forced to resign amid allegations of corruption. since then, afghans have removed more than half of the bank's $500 million in liquid cash. today, a spokesman for afghan president hamid karzai assured customers their savings are safe. police in pakistan announced plans to charge three men for helping a failed attack on new york's times square. the men face terrorism related charges for helping the bomber from afar, including sending him money. in may, faisal shahzad-- an american citizen-- drove an explosive packed s.u.v. into times square, but the bomb failed to detonate. shahzad has already pleaded guilty to terrorism and weapons charges in the u.s. related to the bombing. the government of iran today halted the stoning execution of a woman convicted of adultery, and said her case is under review. the sentencing of sakineh mohammadi ashtiani provoked an international outcry. adultery is the only crime that carries the penalty of death by stoning under sharia law. the iranian government said it was moving ahead with. mexican marines have arrested seven gunmen suspected of taking part in last month's massacre of 72 migrants near the u.s. border. four were arrested after a shootout last week with marines. the others were taken into custody several days later. investigators suspect the migrants were killed for refusing to work for the zetas drug cartel. on wall street today, stocks were up slightly in another day of light trading. the dow jones industrial average gained 46 points to close at 10,387. the nasdaq rose 20 points to close above 2,228. those are some of the day's major stories. now, back to jim. >> lehrer: and now to treasury secretary timothy geithner. i spoke to him earlier this evening about president obama's speech today. mr. secretary, welcome. >> good to be here, jim, thank you. >> lehrer: the republicans caused current economic mess and now are refusing to participate in helping fix it. is that legitimately-- is that a legitimate description of what the president's message was today? >> jim, i'm the wrong person to ask about politics or messages, as you know, but what i can tell you is this, which is this crisis was much more damaging than almost anybody thought. it's going to take us a longer time to dig out of this hole. it's going to be harder because the damage was so severe and so savage, plus it's going to take time. we have now been growing for more than a year . the private sector-- the private sector, not the government it's private sector has now created more than three-quarters of a million jobs. we saw job growth come back sooner than the last two recoveries. part of the economy are actually doing reasonably well. i don't know, the american companies thatic mat things the world needs were very innovative very productive but parts of the economy are very hard, very tough. what the president is trying to do and our responsibility in washington is to figure out ways to help reinforce this recovery, get people back to work more quickly. what the president laid out today was the smartest most sensible set of ideas we could fiend to help reinforce this process of recovery. >> lehrer: he said over and over again, he said it not for the first time, but he said it over and over again today, he inherited this, that this didn't happen on his watch. this happened on the other watch. >> but that's, of course, unassailably true. when the president took office, the american economy, the envy of the world, was falling off the cliff. growth was declining at an annual rate of 6%. we were losing three-quarters of a million jobs every month. the american financial system was in freefall. people were wondering whether they should keep their money in banks, whether they should buy treasuries, the first time since the great depression that happened. that was the reality when this president came into office. and there was no way out of that except for the president working with the fed and the congress to dp take aggressive, strong, bold actions to arrest the freefall and start the economy growing again. and that's what he did, and that's what's happened. but these things -- these recessions doesn't capture it. crises caused by financial crises, they take time to heal. we have a lot more work to do, and rks again, our responsible is to do everything we can to make sure we find ways to get washington to act, to strengthen private investment, get people back to work. >> lehrer: is it correct to say, had there been a different president and a different set of officials in the government of the united states before, this would never have happened? the crisis itself? >> lehrer: yes. >> oh, absolutely. the financial crisis was caused by a set of policy choices that we made as a country over a significant period of time , certainly the decade before that. so we saw financial institutions across the country take on a huge amount of risk without restraint. you saw the government of the united states living way beyond its means. borrowing from future generations to finance a set of programs and tax cuts without paying for them. now, lots of other things contributed to this crisis, but the crisis was much more damaging because of those basic judgments and it's going to be much harder to solve, take more time to solve because of those basic judgments. those were consequences of policy choices. now , they weren't solely responsibility of the previous president or republicans during that period of time. but the crisis was made worse by and made much harder to solve because of the cumulative policy choices that happened the decade before this president took office. >> lehrer: is the politics of today making it much more difficult to solve now? >> it is making it harder to solve 12k34re78 explain the difference-- from your point of view, as secretary of the treasury, where are the politics get 234g your way to do what you think should be done? >> i'll describe it in two very practical ways. the president the president of the united states outlipd earlier this year a set of targeted, very sensible measures to help get people back to work more qukly, help make sure we're helping cushion and repair the damage caused by this, expending unemployment insurance, getting more money to states, so they can keep teachers in the classroom, provide support for small businesses, tax inceptives for small businesses,. now, it is -- those were good sensible policies. congress has been working very hard to enact those policies . it's taken much longer than they expected because they've had no support and lots of option from republicans in congress. that's not a political statement. that's a reality. so the -- if there had been more on those measures sooner , the economy would be stronger today. there's another effect which is also very damaging and hard to quantify which is i think the american people 2079 see people in washington , whose responsibility to govern, coming it and do things that will make the country stronger, and better not their time in disreal estate fighting over these things, and i think the spectacle of the american people see how hard it is in washington to get things done does not help confidence. there has been a lot of talk about confidence. in the face of that-- it's good to point this out-- in the face of that you are seeing businesses across the country start to invest again, private investment-- not public investment, not the government-- private investment in the united states expanded at an annual rate of 20% the first half of this year, stronger in the second quarter since the first quarter. that's encouraging. it's slowed since then, which is one reason it's a good idea to take additional action to help stimulate private investment. >> lehrer: so the obama administration should not accept-- does not deserve any blame for what has happened over the last two years to try to dig this out and for things not to happen quicker? >> think of the way-- again, i'm not the right person to ask about politics, jim-- but think about what the dominant debate has been over this country for the first part of '09, was the administration was doing too much for the economy, too quickly. what the president did was absolutely essential. nothing would have been possible without it. without the president of the united states and fresh acting aggressively to stop an economy in freefall, help put oi a financial fire, nothing would have been possible. you can look back and people will look back over time and say could you fund a way politically to go more? it's hard to worry that qution now. you k see the president of the united states acted with speed and courage because he knew all the things necessary to start to arrest that crisis, repair the damage, were going to be politically unpopular, difficult to do, and he was willing to take that risk and he should have been because that was the responsible thing to do. >> lehrer: any reading of any political poll right now show that people don't believe that. >> i think this is the basic tragedy of how you think about financial crises. it's very hard for people to appreciate, particularly for americans at this time , what scale of risk is in terms of how bad things could have been, what was necessary--. >> lehrer: could have been. not are. >> exactly. and the action you that you have to take in a financial crisis are deeplyun popular. that's why most governments wait too long to act. that's why crises become much more expensive to solve. what the president did of the necessary census beginning of a foundation that grew out of this and of course we're not done. he said from the beginning 1k3rk this is absolutely critical for people to understand,ee are going to keep at this until we are pair damage, have americans back to work, and we knew it was going to 20 take a stand effort over a long period of time. and we saw the president say here's what's next sdplim it must be a terrible disappoint to you as well as the president that things have not gone faster than they have. >> again, it's very hard 207b what would have been possible. the lesson--. >> lehrer: you didn't expect things to go quicker? you didn't expect unemployment-- >> i think the expectations of most people, most economists, compared to what people thought at the beginning of january of 2009 , you had growth come back more quickly , stronger than almost anybody wof predicted. i'll give you an example. when the president came into office, people thought it was going to take maybe $700 billion maybe trillions of dollars to soft financial crisis. but because of the impact of what the president and fed did, you know, we've recovered or left unspent more than three-quarters of the authority congress gave us to solve the financial crisis. we've knot that money back from the banks much more quickly. again, we've had much more impact on stabilizing things than we thought possible. the fact that this is going to take time is something we knew. americans were 11th beyond their means for a long period of time-- not just the government 50 and borrowing against future income to spend things in retrospect they probably cooperate afford. it will take time to rebuild savings. people think that's weakness but it's strength because there's no path to a more sustainable recovery for united states, that doesn't have to go through-- not just the financials, but americans starting to save again and you're seeing that happen. >> lehrer: the president mentioned house minority leader john boehner self times in his speech today. but boehner, as you know, a few days ago, said one of the first things the president ought to do is fire you, the secretary of the treasury, and other members of his team if he really wants to get things going on the economy. i suspect you think that's a really louz idea? >> it's not a new idea. it's an old idea. my wife had it first, i think, and i'm going to do this as long as the president asks me to do. >> lehrer: mr. secretary, thank you. >> nice to see you, jim. >> ifill: for a republican view, we turn to illinois congressman peter roskam. he serves as a republican department whip and is helping to shape the public policy agenda for the fall elections. welcome, congressman. >> thank you. >> ifill: we just heard secretary geithner say but for the action of the obama administration, things would be much, much worse. we might perhaps be headed towards a depression? do you disagree to that? >> i think that is an overstatement. i think in fairness to the president, he inherited a difficult economic situation. there's no doubt about that. secretary geithner was sort of arguing in the alternative. he was referring in some cases to the actions that took place in the fall of 2008, with the intervention of the tarp and some to stimulus argument. ultimately, i think we will never know where the economy would have been but we do know where the economy is right now. the economy is in a place the administration told us we would never see. secretary geithner and other members of the administration said unemployment would peak at 8%, just declaratively, 23 only the stimulus bill would be passed. i don't know , the secretary said now president obama has put forth the smartest, most sensible policy. we've seen that rhetoric before, and it's clearly underperformed, and i think the american public, and a know a whole host of business in my district are interested in a different pathway. >> ifill: one of the policies the president was selling today in ohio, was the notion that the bush-era tax cuts should end right now, something even his advisors have disagreed 0. what is your view? >> peter orzag, the budget chief who is leaving and also dr. christina romer, as you pointed out, who heads up his-- is the chairman of his council of economic advisors, have bog, isly said raising taxes at this point isn't helpful. and where i disagree with the president is the notion of somehow not extending the '01, and '03 tax cuts for everybody along the line. the president is basically say