Obama pushes back against the Congressional Black Caucus

President Obama on Saturday pushed back against criticism from the Congressional Black Caucus, telling black lawmakers and those gathered for the Caucus' annual foundation dinner that members need to quit complaining and get back to work.

"I don't have time to feel sorry for myself. I don't have time to complain. I am going to press on," Obama said, according to the official White House transcript. "Shake it off. Stop complaining, stop grumbling, stop crying. We are going to press on. We've got work to do, CBC."

The president's remarks received applause Saturday night, but some members of the audience say they were none too keen on the president's criticisms. Several outside commentators have echoed that disenchantment.

"By some accounts, black people have lost more wealth since the recession began than at any time since slavery. And Obama gets to lecture us?" Washington Post columnist Courtland Milloy wrote in a Sunday piece taking Obama to task for addressing race and black voters' concerns only during an election cycle.

"Funny, isn't it, how Obama always gets the nerve to say shut up when he's addressing a friendly audience?" Milloy wrote.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), a CBC member who has openly criticized the president for what she characterizes as a failure to address unemployment in the black community, said Monday she believes that the gist of the president's message was unfair.

"I found that language a bit curious because the president spoke to the Hispanic Caucus, and certainly they're pushing him on immigration... he certainly didn't tell them to stop complaining," Waters said Monday on CBS' "The Early Show." "And he would never say that to the gay and lesbian community, who really pushed him on 'don't ask, don't tell' or even in a speech to [the American Israel Public Affairs Committee], he would never say to the Jewish community 'stop complaining about Israel.' So I don't know who he was talking to."

Waters added that she believes some of the president's language Saturday was "not appropriate" but was encouraged by the president's decision to address some of the chief concerns of the black community.

You can watch Waters' interview below via CBS:

Waters, former head of the CBC who is now heading up the caucus' jobs effort, has also called out the president in the past for avoiding visiting communities hit hard by disproportionate black unemployment.

Waters also publicly challenged Don Graves, head of the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, last month at a town hall meeting in Miami, Fl. to utter the word "black."

CBC member John Conyers (D-Mich.) in early August called on "thousands" to protest in front of the White House over the debt ceiling deal reached by the administration and Republican members of Congress.

The CBC organized job fairs and town hall meetings in several black communities around the country this summer in an attempt to directly address growing unemployment rates. The unemployment rate for blacks in August was 16.7 percent, higher than the overall unemployment rate of 9.1 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

A Washington Post-ABC poll released last week showed the number of African-Americans expressing "strongly positive views" of the president dropped 25 points since their mid-April survey. Back then, 83 of African-Americans expressed strongly favorable impressions of Obama, but that number dropped to 58 percent in this month's poll.

African-American voters helped propel Obama to the White House in 2008. But CBC members now warn that a lack of voter enthusiasm in the black community could threaten turnout and support for Obama in 2012.

[You can read more about a controversy over the transcription of President Obama's remarks Saturday here via The Cutline.]