Stick with the man they elected 14 months ago to change
stimulus plan is lifting the country out of its worst economic mess in
80 years. Push forward to enact the rest of his blueprint, including at
least some overhaul of the country’s health care system, to build a
strong recovery.
Sure, Obama tried to tap into the voter anger and
anxiety about the economy in his first State of the Union address,
hoping to channel it rather than being overrun by it, as the
to small banks to encourage lending and tax breaks for small
businesses, calling them just more steps in his plan to grow the
economy and create jobs. He also vowed to start reining in soaring
budget deficits.
Yet despite the stinging defeat his party suffered in
the erosion of his own political support and calls from Republicans and
moderate Democrats to change his agenda, Obama signaled that he’ll make
no abrupt turn from the path he set more than a year ago.
Nothing like the change that the first President
“read my lips” campaign promise not to raise taxes. Nothing like
Rather, Obama in 2010 channeled a bit of
Entering his second year in office, Reagan also
faced high unemployment, rising anxiety and sinking poll numbers. His
response? Tell the country and
“Our task is to persevere,” Reagan said in his
“To stay the course, to shun retreat, to weather the temporary
dislocations and pressures that must inevitably accompany the
restoration of national economic, fiscal and military health.”
Like Reagan, Obama reminded Americans what a mess he
inherited when he took office. While they differ in style and policy —
Reagan said government was the problem, not the solution; Obama argued
the opposite Wednesday — Obama took a similar,
damn-the-political-torpedoes, full-steam-ahead approach.
“To Democrats,” Obama said, “I would remind you that
we still have the largest majority in decades, and the people expect us
to solve some problems, not run for the hills.”
First, he tried to convince the country that his economic program is working, even if people aren’t feeling the benefits yet.
“Because of the steps we took, there are about 2
million Americans working right now who would otherwise be unemployed,”
he said. “And we are on track to add another one and a half million
jobs to this total by the end of the year. “
That’s been a tough sell, as the country has lost
3.5 million jobs since Obama took office, but he tried again.
“Economists on the left and the right say that this bill has helped
saved jobs and avert disaster,” he said.
Second, the president tried to assure Americans that
he has more ideas to create jobs, including tax credits for small
businesses that hire more people, more spending to build or repair the
nation’s infrastructure and money for energy conservation.
All were in line with his agenda for the last year.
He also pushed anew for health care legislation and financial regulation, both of which he has been seeking for months.
“By the time I’m finished speaking tonight, more
Americans will have lost their health insurance,” he said, maintaining
as much or more emphasis on helping the uninsured as on controlling
costs for those who have coverage.
“As temperatures cool, I want everyone to take another look at the plan we’ve proposed.”
Perhaps in irony, perhaps by design, Obama’s message may be welcome news to the left and the right.
The left because liberals are angry or dispirited
that he hasn’t pushed through more of his agenda on issues such as
financial regulation and health care.
The right because it can use the president’s
proposals to keep the conservative base at fever pitch heading into
November’s elections, when the entire
Republicans already have used the loss of millions
of jobs on Obama’s watch to portray his policies as a failure and his
agenda as a threat. By linking economic anxiety to sky-high federal
spending and warning of perils in a still-impenetrable health care
proposal, they’ve turned out voters against Democratic candidates not
only in
Many Democrats argue that the only way to hold their
base and re-energize the voters who turned out for Obama in 2008 —
idealistic young people, independents and the working class — is to
tune out complaints from conservatives and push through the agenda that
Obama promised in 2008.
Ultimately, it probably will take more than a speech for Obama to rally the country — and thus the
History shows that presidents rarely, if ever, get
bounces out of the annual ritual. Since the 1970s, Clinton was the only
president to get any kind of bump in his approval ratings, according to
Gallup, with an average increase of 3 percentage points after his State
of the Union addresses.
—
(c) 2010, McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
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