20.Obama Tells Ohio, Our Economy Is Growing AgainYOUNGSTOWN, Ohio President Obama came Tuesday to this area long synonymous with economic distress to take a few strides on a victory lap for the policies he credits with helping create jobs and to knock Republicans for standing in the way. “Despite all the naysayers in Washington, who are always looking for the cloud in every silver lining, the fact is our economy is growing again,” Mr. Obama told an audience of several hundred workers in a cavernous and expanding pipe-making plant, citing four months of job growth. The president mocked Republicans in Congress who voted in near unanimity against his economic stimulus plan but at home participate in ribbon-cuttings for the job-creating projects it has helped finance. “If the just say no crowd had won out,” he said, “if we had done things the way they wanted to go, wed be in a deeper world of hurt than we are right now.” Mr. Obamas expressions of confidence in the economy and his political swipes at the opposition have both become more pronounced lately. Last year, even amid early signs of recovery, the president tempered his boasts because jobs continued to be lost, though in decreasing numbers. He has stepped up his attacks on Republicans as they have continued to dig in against his agenda, and as the midterm elections grow closer. Mr. Obama has been trying to get out of Washington at least once a week to call attention to the effects of his economic policies. His visit on Tuesday was to V&M Star, which boasts of being North Americas leading producer of seamless pipe for the oil and gas industry. The trip had the unintended effect of calling to mind the moratorium he recently approved, since the gulf oil spill, on his proposal earlier this year to open more coastal waters to drilling. Donning a hard hat and a flame-retardant jacket, Mr. Obama toured the plant, chatting with company and state officials amid the roar, sparks and heat of an 85-ton blast furnace and massive machines firing orange-hot, 18-foot steel cylinders made from melted scrap. Mr. Obama said a politician can get “jaded” after touring numerous factories, but this one, he marveled, is “like off of a movie set.” Owners of the factory, which has been adapted from a former steel works dating to the early 1900s, in an industrial corridor dotted with rusted and long-abandoned plants, recently announced plans to invest $650 million to expand by a million square feet. Mr. Obama called that the biggest manufacturing investment in Ohio since the 1960s. According to the company and the White House, V&Ms decision came about in part because the state is using $20 million from last years $787 billion stimulus act to prepare the site for the plants expansion and to rebuild a nearby rail yard so the company can move freight to the main rail line. That construction work has created 35 jobs to date. Far more jobs will stem from the companys investment 400 for constructing a new mill and then 350 positions for workers there, doubling the workforce by the end of next year. Mr. Obama was accompanied by Ohios governor, Ted Strickland, a Democrat, and three Democratic congressmen from the area Representatives Charlie Wilson, John Boccieri and Tim Ryan. He saluted them for supporting the stimulus law in the face of Republicans attacks, telling the workers, “Theyve got bumps all over the backs of their heads.” The mostly male audience applauded often, but reflecting the regions decades of losing jobs overseas, the workers were most enthusiastic when Mr. Obama called for “free and fair trade.” A number of employees applauded only rarely. One worker, Robin Jackson, a 61-year-old crane maintenance worker, said he did not clap because he was “praying for the economy.” “His message was excellent,” added Mr. Jackson, who said he did not vote for either Mr. Obama or his Republican rival, Senator John McCain, in 2008. Ron Williams, 51, said “theres a lot of enthusiasm from this area” for the stimulus spending and tax cuts, “because the economys been so down and out here and the steel mills have been shut down for so long.” 21.The Bar Code Is Taking a Leap Forward LOOK closely at recent supermarket coupons, and you may see some new markings on them near the traditional bar code: sets of neat black bars stacked in two rows.The new symbols, called GS1 DataBars, can store more data than traditional bar codes, promising new ways for stores to monitor inventory and for customers to save money. One use of the symbols will be in sophisticated coupon offers that combine deals on multiple products, said Jackie Broberg, who leads coupon control management at General Mills in Minneapolis. A single coupon, for example, could offer discounts on three separate items like eggs, bacon and biscuits, all in one transaction.Another use of the new symbols is already helping to streamline operations for a common spee