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In a Labor Day address before union workers in Milwaukee, President Barack Obama acknowledged what Republicans in Congress have been too afraid to admit — that the shattered economy he inherited when he took office could not be mended quickly. Obama stepped into the Oval Office facing catastrophic marketplace failures in housing and finance.

Thanks to his predecessors in the Bush administration, greedy Wall Street companies ran amok in an unregulated environment. Meanwhile, nothing was being done to protect America’s working class.