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Interview

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The jobless rates for blacks is 16.7 percent and Democratic Congresswoman Maxine Waters is pushing the president to do more for her community.

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REP. MAXINE WATERS (D), CALIFORNIA: When you tell us it's all right, and you unleash us and you tell us you're ready for us to have this conversation, we're ready to have the conversation.

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PHILLIPS: So, just moments ago, I asked Congresswoman Waters, has she been able to unleash herself and go after the president on jobs?

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WATERS: Yes, the conversation has begun. We not only put a face on it. We continue to remind this Congress and the president of the United States, this is not something that can be swept under the rug.

PHILLIPS: So, you --

WATERS: This is something that has to be identified and has to be talked about, has to be dealt with and I expect him to say something about it tonight in his speech.

PHILLIPS: Well, and you have said that the president isn't creating the type of jobs that blacks need. You've said that green jobs are what he keeps talking about, and that's not what African- Americans want. What do you want to hear from him tonight?

WATERS: Well, what I'd like to hear is that he is going to target some efforts toward the most needy in this country, where the unemployment numbers are high, that's where you need to send some resources. Of course, you should deal with all of the unemployment but you should pay some special attention whether it's rural or it's urban, or it's suburban, wherever it is. We know that in the rural communities and the urban communities, people are hurting, and we want to see special efforts directed towards them.

We want green jobs, but they have not developed as we have talked in the Congress or the president has talked about. I'd love to have solar panel development going on down in my district but it is not happening. So, what we want to do is we want to make sure that there's a big investment in the infrastructure so that we can repair the roads and the bridges and the streets and the water system, put people back to work like the CCC program, the WPA of the Roosevelt Years. We want to make sure that we get those resources.

PHILLIPS: Yes, you're talking about America now. Right.

WATERS: Yes, I'm talking about all of that, yes, absolutely.

PHILLIPS: So, let me ask you this. Have you considered looking away from Obama and looking to another Democratic contender?

WATERS: No, I have not. This president, I think, wants to do the right thing. I don't know what it takes to get him to stop being nice and stop trying to compromise too much. I was sick when Boehner walked away from the negotiations on raising the debt ceiling saying you got 90 percent of everything he wanted and we got hurt.

Not only are we having to suffer these terrible cuts and all kind of government programs, services and operations, we didn't get any revenue. The richest people in this country still are getting their tax break.

So, those kinds of negotiations do not work. You've got to get tough and everybody wants hem to be tough.

PHILLIPS: You know, speaking of tough, let me ask you a question. As you know, Dick Cheney has been out on his book tour and he said last week, hey, Hillary Clinton may not be a bad idea. She's worked well with Republicans like me. What are your thoughts about Hillary Clinton?

WATERS: Well, first of all, we don't need Dick Cheney telling us what we should be doing in the Democratic Party. I know that he has his book out there and he is promoting his book and every time he says something that's controversial, he does that.

We have this president. He has not been challenged. He is the party's nominee basically and we want him to take that mantle and run with it.

We want him to be tough. We want him to create the kind of change that he talked about when he first ran for office. We believe that he is capable of doing that and now we hope that he has seen that everything that he has tried does not work, they want to kill him off as quickly as they can, legislatively, and this cannot happen.

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