Lew said as important as it was to lower the deficit it cannot be a guiding star. Just reducing the deficit alone cannot be a form of economic policy, said Lew during a speech in Ohio.

Lew said the same kind of urgency had to be applied to expanding the economy and to getting people back working. Lew also pointed out that the country was still living with deep scars that were caused by the financial crisis of 2008.

Lew insisted that the only way to battle the 7.5% unemployment rate was to have an ambitious program of infrastructure building. That program he said would contain an element that would attract private capital so the nation’s debt was not increased.

According to a report from the International Monetary Fund, the national debt is expected to reach 108.1% of the output in the economy this year.

Lew also spoke harshly of the sequester budget cuts that went into effect March 1 because of a failure by the partisan Congress to reach a compromise over deficit reduction.

The government sequester will cut over $85 billion from spending through the end of this fiscal year and has already created furloughs and even cancelled the Cleveland Air Show, which was scheduled near where Lew was giving his speech. The show would have brought millions of dollars into the local economy.

Inter-regional trade continues to increase as it has for a decade, though the Middle East maintains one of the lowest levels of trade within its own region. In the last ten years trade between the Arab states and Turkey has increased to ten times what it had been, amounting to almost $50 billion last year.

Food and water security loom large for the future of the Middle East. More than half the food in the region is imported from outside, leading to poor food security. Even Saudi Arabia, which as an oil-rich Gulf state is well-equipped to import food, has invested heavily in recent years in foreign food sources, for example African farmland.

Increasing water in the Middle East requires either tapping ever more groundwater or the highly energy-intensive process of desalination. Just in February, researchers at the University of California, Irvine, revealed that groundwater along Tigris and Euphrates rivers had dropped precipitously in the last decade, setting a chilling note for future water supplies in the region.

With greater demand for domestic energy production the Middle East is becoming a hotbed of investment in solar energy. The need for energy, the fact that the region has clear skies 80% of the year, and the advantages of building energy infrastructure that does not compete directly with the fossil fuel exports that are the lifeblood of the region combine to make this highly advantageous. 6.8 billion dollars worth of projects are currently underway in the region.

The spending plan of $3.77 trillion, which is two months late being delivered to Congress, attempts to curb the deficits by increasing taxes further on the country’s top earners and through reining in Social Security growth.

However, the Republicans argue there has been enough sacrifice by them through agreeing to increased taxes to fight off the fiscal crisis and showed little interest in another hike.

Liberal Democrats, in particular the powerful advocacy groups, launched a number of campaigns aimed at opposing any changes to the country’s social security.

The proposal by the President, which gets unveiled in its entirety today, includes another $1.8 trillion in reduction to the deficit over the following decade, which brings the total savings to the deficit to $4.3 trillion. Obama’s administration projects that the country’s deficit for the budget year 2014 will be $744 billion.

The budget proposal of Obama now joins two other separate proposals that have been approved by the Senate, which is run by the Democrats and the House, which is run by the Republicans.

The biggest and most sweeping proposal in the budget for Obama is the change to the way the adjustments in the annual cost of living for social security recipients are calculated.

Currently the method of how to measure the increases in the CPI – consumer price index would receive a modification to track a process that is known as chained CPI.

The bill was passed in a bipartisan vote of 318-109. It originated in the House but was amended by the Senate. It will now go to President Obama’s desk for his signature. It didn’t require 11th hour negotiations to avoid a government shutdown and prevent a fiscal crisis.

Both parties will now move forward over talks about their full year budget proposals and negotiations of increasing the debt limit that is needed to be acted on this spring. Before passing the short term budget bill, House Republicans passed their 2014 budget proposal. It contained the overhaul of the Medicare program and balances the budget over the next 10 years.

Democrats are against this plan and expected to pass their own budget proposal in the Senate by the end of the week. Their plan will repeal the sequester and get $1.85 trillion worth of savings over 10 years via spending cuts and tax revenue increases.

Both parties maintained they are serious about passing a full year budget. Democrats and Republicans are expected to get serious with the negotiations after the two week recess. Observers expect both parties to keep on lambasting each other.

Analysts are still skeptical whether the willingness of the Republicans to act with the Democrats is the product of President Obama’s recent charm offensive. Recent polls showed that Congress’ inability to work with each other has made them unpopular with the voters.

More than 70 percent of voters want Democrats and Republicans to reach a compromise on the budget battles, such as the sequester and spending cuts. This is according to a poll made by CBS News.

Obama, says White House officials, will point out the negative effects the sequester – $1.2 trillion in cuts over 10 years -  will have by standing with the people who are first responders  and will be directly affected if the cuts go into force.

White House officials said President Obama would be joined by emergency responders at the White House, the type of Americans whose jobs will be on the line if Republicans in Congress fail to come up with a compromise.

An official from the White House said that Obama would challenge Congressional Republicans to a very simple choice: protect investments made in healthcare, national defense and education or continue prioritizing and protecting the tax loopholes that are benefitting very few Americans at the expense of working and middle class Americans.

The cuts of $1.2 trillion, which originally were scheduled to start on January 1, emerged from budget negotiations in Congress during 2011. Only ten days remain before the cuts will go into force and at this time there is not a single alternative plan that exists and Congress is on a weeklong recess until Monday February 25.

Economists say the cuts would slow down the U.S. economy and the White House has shown how they would hurt the country’s middle class from cuts in education to cuts in loan guarantees for small business. A nonpartisan group estimated that cutting $1.2 trillion from the budget would put nearly one million jobs at risk.

President Obama has a wide range of goals for his second term. These include executive action to control Medicare costs, slow down climate change, and curb gun violence. At the factory, the president focused on his economic plan to bolster the middle class after years of falling wages.

But one of the president’s notable elements has hit a roadblock. House Speaker John A. Boehner said that he was against the increase of the federal minimum wage from $7.25 per hour to $9. He said that raising the price of employment will result to fewer jobs.

Boehner’s opposition was a reminder of what President Obama didn’t mention in his State of the Union address. He didn’t state how he planned to get his ideas via the GOP-led House. Republicans have embraced some of the president’s agenda but they also show little inclinations to some of the areas.

This was the case in the debate over the automatic budget cuts that would take effect March 1. Both the Democrats and the Republicans want to replace the across-the-board cuts that are divided between domestic and military programs with a more thought-out deficit reduction plan that would bring less harm to the economy. President Obama didn’t refer to the standoff during his State of the Union address but instead laid out his approach in reducing the deficit.

Republicans accused the president of shirking his responsibility. They said that the nation need the president to lead and come with proposals to solve the problem. Republicans said that they are ready and want to be part of the solution.

Obama said the families in the middle class should not be made to suffer just because Congress could not come up with a plan to eliminate some special interest loopholes in taxes or programs in the government that are just not working.

At this time, when business leaders and economists from across the board are saying the economy is poised for new growth, we should not create anything that would impeded that progress, added the president.

A significant amount in his address was devoted to the real consequences that would take place as a result of the sequester being implemented. Top White House aides warned on Friday that the cuts would hurt law enforcement, withhold mental health care, hurt education programs and layoff thousands of people.

Obama said if the sequester goes forward thousands in the U.S. who work in education, national security and clean energy will likely lose their jobs. Food inspectors and even fire fighters could find themselves without work, leaving communities throughout the U.S. vulnerable.

Obama warned that the sequester cuts could cause a problem with the military readiness. The president added that military leaders in the U.S. have stated that changes like what the sequester would cause, would affect their ability in responding to threats in area of the world that are unstable.

Although the president has warned about the dire impact of the cuts, neither Congressional Republicans nor he seems that willing to give any ground.

The perception of the financial and banking industries improved from 2011, when only 25 percent of US respondents believed that they were trustworthy. It was also in 2011 when the said industries were above media, which got 22 percent of respondents who said they trusted. 50 percent of the respondents said they trusted business in general to do the right thing. 18 percent said they trusted business leaders to tell the truth.

Five years have gone since the financial crisis but major banks were still involved in scandals in 2012. The public learned about the rigging of benchmark interest rates that are connected to every type of financial product, including mortgages and swaps. The banking scandal involved the manipulation of the London Inter-Bank Offered Rate or Libor. This was reflected in the leaders’ truthfulness score, which was pretty pathetic.

Reputations of some major banks were tarnished by accusations made by government that they were used as money-laundering conduits for drug cartels and terrorists. Some banks were also accused of doing business with rogue states like Iran. A lot of institutions continue to face lawsuits filed by the government and settlements connected to the mortgage meltdown and the financial collapse.

The 2012 Edelman Trust Barometer had more than 30,000 online respondents from across the globe. The survey showed that there was a significant crisis of leadership where leaders were not seen as leading. Because of this sentiment, people look to other sources of information for the straight story, such as from academic experts or peers through the internet and social media.

Even while officials at the Federal Reserve were worrying about the financial markets and more and more evidence was mounting that a meltdown in home mortgages was imminent,  most of the Federal Reserve members were oblivious to what extent the crisis would damage the U.S. economy.

In August of 2007, during a committee meeting at the Federal Reserve, Bernanke said the odds were in favor of the market stabilizing. William Poole, the President of the Federal Reserve Bank in St. Louis echoed the sentiments of Bernanke by saying he bet the financial market would not fundamentally change what was already taking place in the economy.

Red warning flags however were raised by some members of the Federal Reserve. Dallas Federal Reserve President Richard Fisher said during June of 2007 that the problem at Bear Stearns created an enormous risk for the economy. However, other members of the Fed who were present at the members brushed those concerns by Fisher away.

Warning signs continued to become worse through the summer but at that time, it seemed as though Bernanke remained reluctant to act too soon. In September, at the Federal Reserve’s monthly meeting, the Chairman said it was not the business of the Fed to bail out individuals or businesses.

Even in December, as the crisis was starting to grip the country, Bernanke said that he still did not expect insolvency to be a problem amongst the larger financial institutions. Nevertheless, the economy was already in a nosedive toward recession.

Yet it has received a lot of attention and garnered new controversy as the White House and Republicans head toward another deadlock regarding the nation’s debt ceiling. It is a fight that could come as soon as February.

The trillion dollar coin idea made its way to the White House Wednesday. Press secretary Jay Carney said that there is neither Plan B nor a backup plan. It is Congress’ responsibility to pay the bills of the United States. With regards to the trillion dollar coin, he said that he has no coins in his pocket.

Carney didn’t rule out the idea but he deferred further question about it to the Treasury Department. There are some supporters who are hopeful that one of outgoing Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner’s act is to mint a platinum coin with a 1 and 12 zeroes on it.

The loophole is from a 1997 law that allows the Treasury to mint and issue platinum bullion coins and proof platinum coins in accordance with specification, designs, varieties, quantities, denominations, and inscriptions as the secretary, in the secretary’s discretion, may prescribe from time to time. They say that the secretary could authorize the creation of a commemorative eagle coin and put on sale for collectors.

The Treasury Secretary could mint a $1 trillion coin but instead of selling it, he can deposit it at the Federal Reserve. This could pay for a trillion dollars in debt liabilities. This would allow the Treasury to carry out its spending, including sending out Medicare payments and Social Security checks.