President Obama said Wednesday that people in "VFW halls all across America" and other places with access to cable news and talk radio have a warped view of the economy.

The president's comments came as part of a riff in Elkhart, Ind. on what he saw as distorted perceptions of the nation's jobs and fiscal situations during his tenure in the Oval Office.

The relevant portion of the transcript is below:

I hope you don't mind me being blunt about this, but I've been listening to this stuff for a while now. And I'm concerned when I watch the direction of our politics. I mean, we have been hearing this story for decades: tales about welfare queens, talking about takers, talking about the '47 percent'. It's the story that's broadcast every day on some cable news stations, on right wing radio. It's pumped into cars and bars and VFW halls all across America, and right here in Elkhart. And if you're hearing that story all the time, you start believing it. It's no wonder people think big government is the problem. No wonder public support for unions is so low. No wonder that people think the deficit has gone up under my presidency when it's actually gone down.

According to the RealClearPolitics average, the president has received roughly an equal amount of support and disapproval for his handling of the U.S. economy in recent months.

Gallup's measure of the confidence Americans have in the economy has held steady in the last year after dipping substantially in the months following January 2014. The current level is -14, with +100 meaning all respondents saying the economy is good or excellent and getting better, and -100 representing the opposite. Nearly six out of 10 Americans said the economy was getting worse in Gallup's tracking poll concluding May 15.