It’s going to help small business owners upgrade their plants and equipment, it will encourage large corporations to get off the sidelines and start putting their profits back into the economy, and it will accelerate $55 billion in tax cuts for businesses that make job-creating investments over the next year.

Third, it creates a new initiative to strengthen state programs that spur private sector lending to small businesses -– a step that will support $15 billion in new small business loans across the country.  Maryland, for example, will be able to support $250 million in new lending for businesses that are expanding and creating jobs in communities like this one.

Thousands of small business owners across America had been waiting for months for this bill to pass -– for the loans and tax cuts they have badly needed to grow their businesses and hire new employees.  Unfortunately, it was held up all summer by a partisan（党派的） minority until a few courageous（勇敢的） Republican senators put politics aside.  Just imagine the difference it could have made for small businesses and our economy had it happened months before.

Putting the American people back to work, expanding opportunity, rebuilding the economic security of the middle class is the moral and national challenge of our time.  It is too important to fall prey to pure partisanship or blind ideology（思想意识，观念学） .  This bill’s rapid results prove that when we work together, we can get a lot done.  And that’s what the great debate we’re having today is all about.

I believe that instead of extending tax loopholes（漏税） that encourage investments in overseas jobs, we should permanently extend the tax credit that goes to companies for all the research and innovation they do right here in America.

I believe that instead of borrowing another $700 billion we don’t have to give tax cuts to the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans who don’t need them, we should permanently extend the tax cuts for middle-class families.  They’re the folks who saw their wages and incomes flat-line over the past decade, and they’re the ones who deserve a break.

And I believe that instead of sitting still, we should invest in rebuilding America’s roads and railways and runways. Too many American workers have been out of work for months, even years –- and that doesn’t do anybody any good when there is so much of America to rebuild.  Our infrastructure（基础设施） is falling far behind what the rest of the world is doing, and upgrading it is vital to our economy and our future competitiveness.  This is a project worthy of America’s efforts.  It’s something that engineers, economists, governors and mayors of every political stripe support, and many of them issued a sobering（清醒的，冷静的） report about this challenge last week.  And on Monday, I will be meeting with some of them at the White House to discuss how we can put Americans to work doing what they do best –- building America.

As I’ve said many times before, it took us a long time to get out of where we are right now.  And the damage left by this recession is so deep that it’s going to take a long time to get out.  It will take determination, persistence（持续，固执） , and, most importantly, the will to act -– all elements that the American people have in abundance.  And if we summon that spirit now, if we keep moving forward, I’m absolutely convinced that we will rebuild our economy, we will put our people back to work, and we’ll come through these tough days to better and brighter days ahead.

And I want to thank Brendan not only for his hospitality（好客，殷勤） here today but somebody who’s got the courage and the foresight and the skills to create a terrific business that’s supporting so many families.  Thank you very much.