Obama’s Re-Election Campaign Begins

And so they’re off: Barack Obama’s speech to Congress last night was the beginning of his re-election campaign. This is a jobs bill, he said. You should pass it. In case anyone doubted this he repeated the message more than a dozen times. The forcefulness of his tone appears to have delighted the liberal blogosphere. Democrats appear to believe This is the Obama we’ve been waiting for. Which only reaffirms the fact that this was a political speech disguised as a policy address. As David Frum says, it was all quite cunning.

In fact, as Megan McArdle notes, a good deal of what Obama said is unobjectionable: extending payroll tax cuts is a good idea. Increasing investment on much-needed infrastructure upgrades is a good thing too even if few of these projects will be up-and-running before the election.

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Above all, however, the speech was designed to make the President seem