Las Vegas Sun

May 22, 2013

Currently: 79° | Complete forecast | Log in

democratic national convention:

Asking for second term, Obama says nation will recover

Image

ASSOCIATED PRESS

President Barack Obama addresses the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C., on Thursday, Sept. 6, 2012.

Updated Thursday, Sept. 6, 2012 | 8:45 p.m.

Click to enlarge photo

ASSOCIATED PRESS

First lady Michelle Obama applauds with her daughter Sasha during President Barack Obama's speech at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, N.C., on Thursday, Sept. 6, 2012.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — His re-election in doubt, President Barack Obama conceded only halting progress Thursday night toward fixing the nation's stubborn economic woes, but vowed in a Democratic National Convention finale, "Our problems can be solved, our challenges can be met."

"Yes, our path is harder — but it leads to a better place," he declared in a prime-time speech to convention delegates and the nation, blending resolve about rescuing the nation from near economic catastrophe with stinging criticism of Republican rival Mitt Romney's own proposals.

Widely viewed as reserved, even aloof, Obama acknowledged "my own failings" as he asked for a second term, four years after taking office as the nation's first black president.

Citing progress toward recovery, he said, "After a decade that was defined by what we bought and borrowed, we're getting back to basics and doing what America has always done best: We're making things again."

"Four more years," delegates chanted over and over as the 51-year-old Obama stepped to the podium, noticeably grayer than he was as a history-making candidate for the White House in 2008.

First Lady Michelle Obama and the couple's daughters, Malia and Sasha, joined the president on stage in the moments after the speech, followed by other family members and Vice President Joe Biden and his wife. Strains of "Only in America" filled the hall as confetti filled the air.

Obama's speech was the final act of a pair of highly scripted national political conventions in as many weeks, and the opening salvo of a two-month drive toward Election Day that pits Obama against Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts. The contest is ever tighter for the White House in a dreary season of economic struggle for millions.

Biden preceded Obama at the convention podium and proclaimed, "America has turned the corner" after experiencing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

Obama didn't go that far in his own remarks, but he said firmly, "We are not going back, we are moving forward, America."

With unemployment at 8.3 percent, the president said the task of recovering from the economic disaster of 2008 is exceeded in American history only by the challenge Franklin Delano Roosevelt faced when he took office in 1933.

"It will require common effort, shared responsibility and the kind of bold persistent experimentation" that FDR employed, Obama said.

In an appeal to independent voters who might be considering a vote for Romney, he added that those who carry on Roosevelt's legacy "should remember that not every problem can be remedied with another government program or dictate from Washington.

He said, "The truth is, it will take more than a few years for us to solve challenges that have built up over the decades."

In the run-up to Obama's speech, delegates erupted in tumultuous cheers when former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, grievously wounded in a 2011 assassination attempt, walked onstage to lead the Pledge of Allegiance. The hall grew louder when she blew kisses to the crowd.

And louder still when huge video screens inside the hall showed the face of Osama bin Laden, the terrorist mastermind killed in a daring raid on his Pakistani hideout by U.S. special operations forces â€" on a mission approved by the current commander in chief.

The hall was filled to capacity long before Obama stepped to the podium, and officials shut off the entrances because of a fear of overcrowding for a speech that the campaign had originally slated for the 74,000-seat football stadium nearby. Aides said weather concerns prompted the move to the convention arena, capacity 15,000 or so.

Obama's campaign said the president would ask the country to rally around a "real achievable plan that will create jobs, expand opportunity and ensure an economy built to last."

He added, "The truth is it will take more than a few years for us to solve challenges that have built up over a decade."

In convention parlance, both Obama and Biden were delivering acceptance speeches before delegates who nominated them for new terms in office.

But the political significance went far beyond that — the moment when the general election campaign begins in earnest even though Obama and Romney have been pointing toward a Nov. 6 showdown for months.

To the cheers of delegates, Obama retraced his steps to halt the economic slide, including the auto bailout that Romney opposed.

"After a decade of decline, this country created over a half million manufacturing jobs in the last two and a half years," he said.

Turning to national security, he said he had promised to end the war in Iraq, and had done so.

"We've blunted the Taliban's momentum in Afghanistan, and in 2014 our longest war will be over," he said.

"A new tower rises above the New York skyline, al-Qaida is on the path to defeat and Osama bin Laden is dead," he declared, one of the night's repeated references to the special operations forces raid that resulted in the terrorist mastermind's demise more than a year ago.

He lampooned Romney's own economic proposals.

"Have a surplus? Try a tax cut. Deficit too high? Try another. Feel a cold coming on? Take two tax cuts, roll back some regulations and call us in the morning," he said.

Mocking Romney for his overseas trip earlier this summer, Obama said, "You might not be ready for diplomacy with Beijing if you can't visit the Olympics without insulting our closest ally." That was a reference to a verbal gaffe the former Massachusetts governor committed while visiting London.

The hall was filled to capacity long before Obama stepped to the podium, and officials shut off the entrances because of a fear of overcrowding for a speech that the campaign had originally slated for the 74,000-seat football stadium nearby. Aides said weather concerns prompted the move to the convention arena, capacity 15,000 or so.

Obama's campaign said the president would ask the country to rally around a "real achievable plan that will create jobs, expand opportunity and ensure an economy built to last."

Biden told the convention in his own speech that he had watched as Obama "made one gutsy decision after another" to stop an economic free-fall after they took office in 2009.

Now, he said, "we're on a mission to move this nation forward â€" from doubt and downturn to promise and prosperity. ... America has turned the corner."

Delegates who packed into their convention hall were serenaded by singer James Taylor and rocked by R&B blues artist Mary J. Blige as they awaited Obama's speech.

There was no end to the jabs aimed at Romney and the Republicans.

"Ask Osama bin Laden if he's better off than four years ago," said Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, who lost the 2004 election in a close contest with President George W. Bush. It was a mocking answer to the Republicans' repeated question of whether Americans are better off than when Obama took office.

The campaign focus was shifting quickly â€" to politically sensitive monthly unemployment figures due out Friday morning and the first presidential debate on Oct. 3 in Denver. Wall Street hit a four-year high a few hours before Obama's speech after the European Central Bank laid out a concrete plan to support the region's struggling countries.

The economy is by far the dominant issue in the campaign, and the differences between Obama and his challenger could hardly be more pronounced.

Romney wants to extend all tax cuts that are due to expire on Dec. 31 with an additional 20 percent reduction in rates across the board, arguing that job growth would result. He also favors deep cuts in domestic programs ranging from education to parks, repeal of the health care legislation that Obama pushed through Congress and landmark changes in Medicare, the program that provides health care to seniors.

Obama wants to renew the tax cuts except on incomes higher than $250,000, saying that millionaires should contribute to an overall attack on federal deficits. He also criticizes the spending cuts Romney advocates, saying they would fall unfairly on the poor, lower-income college students and others. He argues that Republicans would "end Medicare as we know it" and saddle seniors with ever-rising costs.

After two weeks of back-to-back conventions, the impact on the race remained to be determined.

You're not going to see big bounces in this election," said David Plouffe, a senior White House adviser. "For the next 61 days, it's going to remain tight as a tick."

Romney wrapped up several days of debate rehearsals with close aides in Vermont and is expected to resume full-time campaigning in the next day or two.

In a brief stop to talk with veterans on Thursday, he defended his decision to omit mention of the war in Afghanistan when he delivered his acceptance speech last week at the Republican National Convention. He noted he had spoken to the American Legion only one day before.

Romney's campaign released its first new television ad since the convention season began.

It shows Clinton sharply questioning Obama's credibility on the Iraq War in 2008, saying "Give me a break, this whole thing is the biggest fairy tale I've ever seen." Obama was running against Hillary Rodham Clinton at the time for the Democratic nomination.

It will likely be a week or more before the two campaigns can fully digest post-convention polls and adjust their strategies for the fall.

Based on the volume of campaign appearances to date and the hundreds of millions of dollars spent already on television advertising, the election appears likely to be decided in a small number of battleground states. The list includes New Hampshire, Virginia, Ohio, Colorado, Nevada and Iowa, as well as Florida and North Carolina, the states where first Republicans and then Democrats held their conventions. Those states hold 100 electoral votes among them, out of 270 needed to win the White House.

Money has become an ever-present concern for the Democrats, an irony given the overwhelming advantage Obama held over John McCain in the 2008 campaign.

This time, Romney is outpacing him, and independent groups seeking the Republican's election are pouring tens of millions of dollars into television advertising, far exceeding what Obama's supporters can afford.

Discussion: 5 comments so far…

Comments are moderated by Las Vegas Sun editors. Our goal is not to limit the discussion, but rather to elevate it. Comments should be relevant and contain no abusive language. Comments that are off-topic, vulgar, profane or include personal attacks will be removed. Full comments policy. Additionally, we now display comments from trusted commenters by default. Those wishing to become a trusted commenter need to verify their identity or sign in with Facebook Connect to tie their Facebook account to their Las Vegas Sun account. For more on this change, read our story about how it works and why we did it.

Only trusted comments are displayed on this page. Untrusted comments have expired from this story.

  1. By JudgeRoyBean (Klaus Steinke)
    Sept. 6, 2012
    9:36 p.m.
    Flag

    "I won't pretend the path I'm offering is quick or easy. I never have. You didn't elect me to tell you what you wanted to hear. You elected me to tell you the truth. It will require common effort, shared responsibility, and the kind of bold, persistent experimentation that Franklin Roosevelt pursued during the only crisis worse than this one."

    FDR type experimentation? You mean the unconstitutional National Recovery Administration? The one that invaded every facet of business to the point where kosher butchers were told how to take chickens out of cages for customers?

    Or how about that farming community in Arizona that was in everything but name a communist collective farm?

    Or the FDR decrees that employers need to keep the wages of workers high - no cuts in pay? That beauty made sure that some had jobs and many others couldn't find them, since the cost of wages were so high.

    Or does Obama see himself as FDR, deciding what the price of gold, or in today's vernacular, the value of the currency is while still lying in bed in the morning?

    FDR's policies extended the Great Depression. Obama's policies have extended the Great Recession. Now, Mr. Teller of Hard Truths - exactly what do you have in mind for the next four years? I'm not impressed with what you've done with the past four.

  2. By jlfcopter (Jerry Farland)
    Sept. 7, 2012
    4:25 a.m.
    Flag

    The economy will recover slowly as it has the past 4 years whether he is the President or not! That is the problem. Obama is good at two things, making speeches and blaming others for his own weaknesses. Liberals elected a man with absolutely zero, zip, nada leadership experience to run the greatest free country in the world in 2008. His policies that were rammed through during his first two years with full and absolute control of house and senate have failed miserably. We are still treading water after 4 years of hope and change. He has been in full campaign mode now for 16 months, absent from any leadership in this dire time of economic crisis. The only reason he wants to be re-elected is that he is so scared that he will go down as the worst one term President in US history as he well deserves.

  3. By JeffFromVegas
    Sept. 7, 2012
    9:28 a.m.
    Flag

    In attitude and altitude you can see these truths in the comments here:

    Age Range Percent
    18-27 6%
    28-37 14%
    38-47 15%
    48-57 24%
    58+ 37%

    That is the current make up of the republican party. The people who are in the 2 age ranges of 28-47 are primarily rabid TeaBaggers and it is just a matter of time before these people (republicans) either become friendly to the electorate or become as relevant as a member of the current Whig party.

    You know, like a kid you pat on the head and say "That was cute, move along now".

    The biggest problem is who wants to hang with your weird TeaBagger cousin or your Grandpa on an every day basis? It is nice to see both once or twice in a while, but pretty boring in the end.

  4. By JeffFromVegas
    Sept. 7, 2012
    2:03 p.m.
    Flag

    stevenrblv:

    Wot you say has credence. What is your solution?

    I say incremental change is historically what happens until anarchy explodes.

    Got any workable ideas in the middle?

  5. By thelmamhomer (Thema Homer)
    Sept. 8, 2012
    4:33 p.m.
    Flag

    Obama's glaring dishonesty is shameless; He has manipulated his own identity to achieve his ends and in doing so, has manipulated the truth. He keeps saying, "We inherited a $l.3Trillion deficit..that wasn't me!" Actually it was: the Democrats held control of Congress 2007&08 and so controlled the purse strings that led to the deficit Obama says he inherited. Obama supported the bailout pkg in Bush's final months, a pkg the Democrats wanted to make even bigger. His pledge of cutting the deficit in half by the end of his first term was totally ignored and in reality he increased our debt by $5 Trillion. The "Pay As You Go" policy he touted was never instituted and so the deficit soared and keeps soaring. His fall regulatory Agenda is due but why bother...he failed to publish the one due last spring even though required by law. His exec. orders number 900 so far allowing his govt to seize control of all our hwys, airports, railroads, education, welfare etc. etc. etc. well mostly everything that moves inside our country plus those forcing us to submit to international regulations instead of our Constitution. Obama only knows the blame-game--Bush and the Tea Party. He is borrowing every dollar we owe or he spends. In order to secure the Latino vote, he issued an Exec.Order and 'policy' changes to provide amnesty...increased visas & stopped enforcing our existing laws; this sunnami of illegal immigration and legal immigration is supplanting the unemployed blacks in the workforce. Wake up--the enemy is in the White House.
    tmh/Elko

Post a comment

Commenting requires registration.

Comments are moderated by Las Vegas Sun editors. Our goal is not to limit the discussion, but rather to elevate it. Comments should be relevant and contain no abusive language. Comments that are off-topic, vulgar, profane or include personal attacks will be removed. Full comments policy.

If you would like to submit your comment as a letter to the editor, you may submit it here.

Most Popular