Despite an unexpected drop in unemployment last month, payrolls still shrank. In Washington,  Congress and the White House redoubled efforts to create jobs. President Obama proposed loans for small businesses as a way to spur the economy. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of good-paying green jobs would be created under legislation proposed on Thursday by Senator Bernie Sanders to put 10 million solar panels on private homes and businesses.  The bill's other plusses include cheaper electricity, breaking our dependence on foreign oil and a reducing greenhouse gas emissions. 

Jobs The nationwide unemployment rate dipped to 9.7 percent in January, according to figures released on Friday by the Labor Department. Nevertheless, the economy continued to shed jobs. Payrolls fell by 20,000 in the first month of the year. Earlier in the week, President Obama unveiled a plan to free up $30 billion in lending for small businesses as a way to spur job creation.   Sanders discussed the loan program and other issues during an interview on MSNBC.  "We`ve got to rebuild this economy. We have got to provide jobs for the American people. One way you do it is get credit out to small business. . . I know in Vermont and around this country you have small business people ready to expand, ready to create new jobs. They can`t get the loans from the banks they need. We should, in fact, provide those loans." To watch the full interview, click here.  Meanwhile, Senate Democratic leaders unveiled a new "jobs agenda" on Thursday and hoped to hold a first vote on the proposal in the coming week. To read more about the jobs proposal in The New York Times, click here.

Budget President Obama announced a $3.8 trillion spending plan on Monday. Sanders, a member of the Senate budget committee, said he will focus deficit reduction by scrutinizing waste at the Pentagon and other agencies. He also pressed for eliminating Bush-era tax breaks for the wealthy. At Senate Budget Committee hearings later in the week, Sanders reacted forcefully to Republicans critics. "I do get a little bit tired of being lectured about how serious the deficit crisis is today by, in many instances, the exact same people who caused the deficit crisis," Sanders said. Republicans in recent years, he noted, backed two wars without paying for them, slashed taxes on the wealthiest Americans without making up the lost revenue, pushed repeal of the estate tax on the super-wealthy, and passed a prescription drug plan rigged to keep prices high for pharmaceutical companies by barring Medicare from negotiating lower prices. To watch a discussion of budget issues on C-SPAN's Washington Journal, click here.

Taxes Sanders also asked the White House budget boss Peter Orszag and Treasury Secretary Geithner why they would wait another year before rolling back the Bush-era tax breaks on top incomes.  "They're scheduled to expire at the end of this year, and we think that's the right time for them to expire," Geithner dodged. Orszag told Sanders that "this was just the best way forward." Pressed further, he added, "2010 was not the year to reduce the deficit, given the economic downturn."  Said Sanders,  "I certainly don't agree with that." To watch the exchanges with Geithner and Orszag, click here and here.

Solar Energy Sanders, chairman of the Senate's green jobs subcommittee, introduced legislation Thursday to encourage the installation of 10 million solar systems on the rooftops of homes and businesses over the next decade. "I'm a member of both the environment committee and the energy committee, and it just astounds me how little discussion there has been about the potential of sustainable energy in general and solar in particular," Sanders told Grist.  For more information on the legislation, click here. To read the complete Grist interview, click here.

Nuclear Energy Sen. Sanders told Energy Secretary Steven Chu at a hearing on Thursday that the Department of Energy is risking taxpayer money by proposing $36 billion in new loan guarantees for nuclear power. "New nuclear power plants are the most expensive to build" and "we don't have a place to put the nuclear waste," Sanders said. Meanwhile, in Vermont there were more alarming reports that high levels of radioactive tritium was leading from underground pipes at the Vermont Yankee reactor along the Connecticut River near Vernon.  Sanders pressed The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to investigate.