Obama also said he wants to enact measures designed to protect workers and families from future recessions.

By this Obama apparently is talking about measures to bail out companies so the workers (and their families) are 'protected'. The measures he is outlining involve subsidising inefficient and insolvent industries from the public purse. That is the communist method -- a command economy, not a free market economy (don't bring capitalism vs communism into this discussion at this stage, we are only talking about investment by government into private industry).

I suggest that the best way to protect workers (and their families, etc.) is to:-

a) Provide a stable financial and economic climate for business.
b) Ensure that workers make adequate provision from their regular income to protect themselves from the consequences of leaner times. i.e. Saving.
c) Provide a regulatory environment in which fraudsters will be detected early. Today's problem is that a sizeable part of the world's financial system was trading fraudulently. I knew that. Why didn't the experts?
d) Put into place satisfactory safety-nets to protect those who cannot afford the basics of food, water, shelter, clothing, education for their children and basic health care.
e) Declare that the USA will not borrow money other than to defend herself and provide the basic care outlined in a) through d) above.

Government borrowing to support wonky industries so they can continue to make products that nobody wants to buy, is crass.