Obama to reintroduce himself during State of the Union

abcnews ^

[traumer]

Populist or professor? Contrite or uncompromising?

President Obama will have a chance Wednesday to reintroduce himself to the nation when he delivers his first official State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress.

The prime-time speech, which will be aired on all major TV networks and cable stations, could hardly come at a more critical time for a president grappling with double-digit unemployment, sinking poll numbers and the possible collapse of his top domestic policy priority, an overhaul of the nation's health-care system.

"As often as the president has spoken over the past year, critics on the right and left have largely defined him," says University of Notre Dame American studies professor Robert Schmuhl. "For the State of the Union, he needs to redefine himself, who he is politically and what his core principles and policies are."

In Ohio on Friday, just three days after Democrats lost the 60th Senate vote that gave them an edge in pushing their agenda through Congress, Obama struck a decidedly populist tone.

Shunning a necktie for a midday town hall-style meeting in Elyria, Obama told the crowd again and again that he'll "never stop fighting" for them on issues from health care and jobs to education and accountability.

On Wednesday, however, the setting will be decidedly different: formal and steeped in history and tradition.

When he speaks to the nation from the House of Representatives' chamber, he will take "the biggest stage the president has" to speak to the people, says Michael Gerson, White House speechwriter for George W. Bush.

How he responds to last week's message from Massachusetts voters, who gave Republican Scott Brown the seat held by Sen. Edward Kennedy for nearly five decades, could set the political course for the next year and beyond.

[OldDeckHand]

This will be an all-out frontal assault based ENTIRELY on class envy and warfare. I predict he'll talk about the death-tax. He'll talk about the capital gains rates. He'll talk about luxury taxes. He'll talk about "fat cats on Wall St." (where have we heard that before?), and a new windfall profits tax on banks and bank bonuses. And, he'll talk about the corrupting influence of "corporate money" in politics and the horrible far-right wing Supreme Court. It will be non-stop populism and class-warfare moving forward.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

I will write a $100 reelection campaign check to the first congresscritter who stands up and shouts “LIAR”
during Barky’s speech.

[OrioleFan]

Obama: "Hi! I'm Barry Sotero, your Presidente!" DemocRATs: "Yeahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! "

[Wee-Weed Up]

Reintroduce himself? For what, the 10,000th time in the past year?

[FatherofFive]

Populist or professor? Contrite or uncompromising?

Wrong questions! Should be:

Stupid or a liar?
Fascist or Communist?
Muslim or Atheist?

[Stosh]

Everybody here is just so cynical.

Lookit, it’s been almost 2 years since he’s had a chance to write (or have written for him) another autobiography - given that the pressures of White House receptions and working on his short game have certainly made it tough to write that third autobiography, of course it’s reasonable that he have an opportunity to reintroduce himself with a speech.

[griswold3]

We know who Barak Obama is.
The question is , ‘Does he know who WE are?’

[tcrlaf]

“The freaking Kenyan has been on TV 7x24 for an entire year.”

And yet, he hasn’t held a Press Conference in over SIX MONTHS...

Remember how the media whores howled when Bush went 3 months without one????

[DManA]

I recall that Clinton went through this periodically during his 8 years. “Struggling” to define himself.

[italianquaker]

He will say hi some of you know me as ELLIE LIGHT

[kosciusko51]

Why is it that the left always thinks that they haven't gotten their message across when people reject it? It seems that they believe that they need to work harder at re-introducing themselves to the public, as if this will change our minds about them.

Examples:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0002/06/sm.06.html

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NTFhYWExNWQ1ZjcwMjcxMDdhZjk4ZDVhMjRmMTRhYzM=

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/22/AR2008062201964.html

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/uselection/article/485466--michelle-obama-reintroduces-herself

http://blogs.mcclatchydc.com/nationalsecurity/2009/08/hillarys-long-hot-summer.html

[Lancey Howard]

That scumbag better not interrupt my TV shows.

[boocoowell]

VERY funny headline. A real gem. Trouble is the headline writer is serious. That’s the problem.

[OafOfOffice]

The other one was a tax credit for daycare.

[manonCANAL]

Obama you suck, or maybe Larry Sinclair sucked. Can’t remember which.

[kcvl]

President Obama will have a chance Wednesday to reintroduce himself to the nation

What the hell does that mean?! He has been in our faces everyday that he has been in office for over a year! How does he think he is going to 'reintroduce' himself?!

Someone is living a a fantasy world and it AIN'T US!

[spectre]

Middle class Tax credits for Child Care and Elder care.

Income based repayments for student loans...uh oh. Make sure Federal student loan payments for over burdened borrowers are no more than 10% of their income..

Retirement savings over haul. Establishing an automatic individual retirement act, ie, an IRA. 50% match on the first 1,000 of retirement from the gov't.

Biden is at this moment proposing these things.

sw

[COBOL2Java]

Obama to reintroduce himself during State of the Union

Which one?

[Arrowhead1952]

For someone who has been in front of camera after camera 24/7, I don't need a reintroduction. "You LIE!"

How he responds to last week's message from Massachusetts voters, who gave Republican Scott Brown the seat held by Sen. Edward Kennedy for nearly five decades

"Bush's fault"

[Eric in the Ozarks]

158 interviews with various MSM.
411 speechs.

This is the CBS News count for Barky’s FIRST YEAR in office.