US President Barack Obama pushed job creation to the top of his agenda and vowed not to abandon his struggling healthcare overhaul after a political setback that raised doubts about his leadership.
With the economy still weak and unemployment at a painful 10 percent, “jobs must be our No. 1 focus in 2010,” Obama told Congress in his annual State of the Union address on Wednesday.
Obama, who inherited a financial crisis and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from the administration of former US president George W. Bush, said he had made mistakes and that his first year in office had been a difficult one.
He promised, however, not to give up in his efforts to change the way Washington works and push through his ambitious agenda for financial reforms, healthcare, energy and climate change, even though many Democrats fear losing their seats in November congressional elections.
“We don’t quit. I don’t quit,” he told Congress, split largely along Republican and Democratic lines over Obama’s policies. “Let’s seize this moment — to start anew, to carry the dream forward and to strengthen our union once more.”
He pledged tough new rules for Wall Street, but said he was “not interested in punishing banks,” comments that helped boost US stock futures by appearing to retreat slightly from some of his fiery rhetoric.
Global equities rallied on Obama’s focus on job creation instead of any concrete details of banking reforms that have rattled financial markets.
Obama said he would work to dig the US out of a “massive fiscal hole” and was willing to use his veto power to enforce budgetary discipline. The US deficit — a record US$1.4 trillion last year, or almost 10 percent of GDP — is forecast by the Congressional Budget Office to fall slightly this year to US$1.35 trillion.
Obama vowed to double exports in five years to help create jobs, which weighed on the dollar and prompted some in the market to think the government may seek a weaker US currency. Others said there was little substance to his promise to boost jobs and exports.
“The devil is in the detail,” said Andrew Neale, portfolio manager at Fogel Neale Wealth Management in New York. “Making a speech and getting things done are two very different things.”
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