Bush to goetta king: "What's goetta?"

Malia Rulon reports:

UPDATED:

WASHINGTON - The owner of Glier’s Meats, the largest commercial producer of goetta, met with President Bush on Monday.

The president’s first question: "What’s goetta?"

Daniel Glier said he told the president, “It’s a Cincinnati thing,” as he explained the origin of the German breakfast meat mixture popular mostly just in Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. (It’s a mix of pork, beef, whole grain, steel-cut oats, and spices.)

Read the new story here

Here's the White House press release....

Today, President Bush met with small and mid-sized business owners to discuss temporary tax incentives in the economic growth package. In February 2008, President Bush signed into law an economic growth package that will boost our economy by putting money back into the hands of American workers and businesses. This growth package meets the criteria the President laid out in January – it amounts to more than $152 billion, or about one percent of GDP, provides tax rebates to more than 130 million American households, and offers temporary tax incentives for businesses to invest in their companies and create jobs this year. These incentives are already in place and are starting to have an impact. The growth package was carefully calibrated and is large enough to promote short-run growth in our economy without jeopardizing our long-term budget objectives.

Today's Meeting Participants Were Prompted To Make New Investments This Year As A Result Of The Economic Growth Package

-- Dan Glier is the President of Glier's Meats, Inc., an 18-employee, USDA-inspected meat processing plant located in Covington, Kentucky. Established in 1946 by Glier’s father, Glier's Meats is a manufacturer of many types of gourmet meats but is most renowned for their specialty product, Goetta. Holding in excess of 90 percent of the Goetta market, Glier's annual production of Goetta now exceeds over 1,000,000 pounds. Earlier this year, Glier installed a new replacement refrigeration compressor for approximately $15,000. When the stimulus package passed, he additionally began planning to install a deer processing facility, an investment he would not have made without the incentives in the stimulus legislation.

And a goetta-less pool report:

4/7/2008
Pool report #1

Meeting with small and medium sized business owners in the Roosevelt Room.

No news, no questions, but POTUS reiterated his view that the economic stimulus package should be given a "chance to work" before another one is considered.

He said the stimulus package would encourage business owners to make decisions "that will help us recover from this economic slowdown".

Acknowledging concern about high fuel prices, he said: "I fully understand that not only are people worried about their homes, they are also worried about the cost of fuel."

High fuel prices were among the reasons why "we've got to keep taxes low,"
he added. (Check quotes against transcript).

The pool was ushered in at 1.47pm at the bottom of the meeting. POTUS was sat at the conference table with nine small and mid-sized business owners (see WH fact sheet for names and business details). Also at the table were advisers Joshua Bolten, Ed Lazear, Barry Jackson, Joel Kaplan and Kevin Sullivan.

POTUS grasped a black permanent marker pen with which he had scrawled a few notes -- unintelligible to your pooler -- on the notebook in front of him.

Andrew Ward
White House Correspondent
The Financial Times