Barack Obama sets out to recapture the center

| The president of the United States last night gave the traditional speech on the state of the Union. A key moment to try to find favor in the eyes of his countrymen
Employment, budget deficit and finding compromises. Barack Obama emphasizes these three areas since the beginning of the year to win back the Americans, who inflicted a stinging slap in the midterm elections. The traditional discourse on the state of the Union, he delivered last night before lawmakers and relatives of victims of the shooting of Tucson, is part of this strategy and marks the kickoff of its campaign for the presidential election of 2012.
Barack Obama has decided, late last year, placing himself at the center of the political spectrum and a Congress now divided into a House of Representatives and a Republican-majority Senate dominated by Democrats. Early results are encouraging for him. According to a poll released by AP last week, his popularity rating is 53%, 6 percentage points from November.
The challenge for Obama is yet to successfully convince Republicans to support his initiatives without being let go by the left wing of the Democratic Party. A difficult task at a time when the Conservatives announced their intention to block the new government spending to reduce the budget hole.
Even before the speech last night, where he was to advocate investments in education and the five-year freeze on discretionary spending, Republicans have criticized his approach "We'll look at his recommendations," said Mitch McConnell, Senate Republican leader, adding that this is not the time to increase government spending in many areas.
Conservatives advocate significant cuts while the president's party prefers a policy mix to freeze spending and higher taxes. The Progressive Democrats, who have not forgotten the compromise of the White House with Republicans on tax cuts for all income classes, demanding action on employment.
It is also the message of the president who wanted to show yesterday that the job is his priority. Last month, unemployment has retreated shyly to go from 9.8% to 9.4%, but it remains the main concern of Americans. And Obama knows that his hopes for reelection in 2012 will be directly linked to its ability to deliver his people to work.