Laid-Off Worker Confronts Obama

CBS News reports

In one of the more personal exchanges from CBS News' town hall with President Obama, one audience member, a pregnant woman who recently found out she was being laid off from her government job, asked the president for some earnest advice: "What would you do, if you were me?"

Karin Gallo, who jokingly described her job at the National Zoo as "non-essential employee number seven," said she had taken a job in government "thinking it was a secure job" - but that now, she feared for her family's future.

"I am seven months pregnant in a high-risk pregnancy, my first pregnancy," Gallo told Mr. Obama. "My husband and I are in the middle of building a house. We're not sure if we're gonna be completely approved. I'm not exactly in a position to waltz right in and do great on interviews, based on my timing with the birth."

"And so, I'm stressed, I'm worried," she continued. "I'm scared about what my future holds. I definitely need a job. And, I just wonder what would you do, if you were me?"

Mr. Obama did not explicitly answer the (seemingly rhetorical) question - but he used Gallo's story as a means to defend government workers.

"Let me just first of all say that workers like you, for the federal, state, and local governments, are so important for our vital services," Mr. Obama said. "And it frustrates me sometimes when people talk about 'government jobs' as if somehow those are worth less than private sector jobs."

"I think the challenge has been that in some of these negotiations to try to reduce the deficit, I think the feeling - particularly on the part of some folks on the other side of the aisle - has been that we want to just cut and cut and cut. And that somehow is gonna create economic growth," he continued.

"Everybody has a tendency to think that somehow government is all waste and if we just sort of got rid of all the waste, well, that somehow we would solve our debt and our deficit," he added.

But Mr. Obama pointed to Gallo's situation as proof that slashing jobs - even government jobs - can't be looked at as an abstract sacrifice.

"These are not abstract questions," he said. "And I think Karin makes it really clear that there are real consequences when we make these decisions."

"Part of my argument is that we're having to make some decisions about cuts to federal programs now, but also states and local governments are making these decisions on programs that often times are doing a lot of good. I mean, these are good things."