A somber President Barack Obama, marking the end of his first three months in office, warned a recession-weary nation Wednesday that its patience and resilience will be tested even more in the second 100 days — grappling as it is with an array of simultaneous crises with few if any precedents (this sentence as published has been corrected in this text).
Piled atop the continuing economic woes and Washington’s deepening entanglement in some of the country’s biggest private companies, Obama said the government also faces a potentially dangerous flu epidemic, divisive questions about the use of torture to combat terrorism and the Taliban’s growing threat to a weak but nuclear-armed government in Pakistan.
“The typical president, I think, has two or three big problems,” Obama said in a prime-time appearance in the East Room of the White House. “We’ve got seven or eight big problems. And so we’ve had to move very quickly.
“If you could tell me right now when I walked into this office … that all you had to worry about was Iraq, Afghanistan, North Korea, getting health care passed, figuring out how to deal with energy independence, deal with Iran and a pandemic flu, I would take that deal,” he said. “I would love a nice, lean portfolio to deal with, but that’s not the hand that’s been dealt us.”
Given so many serious problems demanding such urgent action, he said, improvement would not be immediate.
“The ship of state is an ocean liner, it’s not a speed boat,” the president said. “If we can move this big battleship a few degrees in a different direction, we may not see all the consequences of that change a week from now or three months from now, but 10 years from now, or 20 years from now.”
Discussing the flu crisis, Obama rejected the idea of closing the border with Mexico, the epicenter of the most virulent outbreaks, because he said public health officials say border closures have not proved effective in the past.
“It would be akin to closing the barn door after the horses are out,” the president said, sounding like school nurse-in-chief. He urged people to wash their hands and cover their mouths when coughing.
While much of the news conference focused on domestic issues and politics, some of the president’s most sobering comments involved Pakistan, the rising internal threat posed by the Taliban and the challenge of keeping Islamabad’s nuclear arsenal secure.
Describing the Pakistani regime as “extremely fragile,” Obama said military leaders and government officials were only belatedly recognizing that its half-century-long obsession with India had blinded it to the more immediate threat posed by the Taliban. “You’re starting to see some recognition just in the last few days that the obsession with India as the mortal threat to Pakistan has been misguided, and that their biggest threat right now comes internally,” he said.
Although other U.S. officials have been critical of the Pakistani government in the past, Obama went further. Most critiques have focused on Islamabad’s failure to provide services in their border areas or to combat insurgents. Obama’s criticism was sharper, and he pointed to failures that extended throughout the country.
Nonetheless, the president expressed confidence that Islamabad’s nuclear weapons would not fall into Taliban or terrorist hands.
Obama’s news conference came on the 100th day of his presidency, a stock-taking benchmark the administration wound up embracing after some initial hesitation.
Earlier in the day, the president marked the occasion with a campaign-style event near St. Louis where he delivered much the same message: that he has put the nation on a better path, though the kind of economic recovery he promised may be years away.
Still, Obama has clearly won the public’s confidence. National polls show his approval rating tops 60 percent, while growing numbers of people believe the country is on the “right track” since he took office.
In his opening remarks in the East Room of the White House, Obama said: “So we have plenty of work left to do. It is work that will take time. It will take effort. But the United States of America will see a better day.”
Americans, he said, “can expect an unrelenting, unyielding effort from this administration to strengthen our prosperity and our security — in the second hundred days, and the third hundred days, and all the days after.”
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A presidency in 4 nutshells
During his news conference, President Barack Obama was asked by reporter Jeff Zeleny of The New York Times a four-part question:
What has surprised him about the office, enchanted him, humbled him and troubled him the most?
Excerpts from Obama’s answer, according to a transcript:
OK. Surprised. I am surprised compared to where I started, when we first announced for this race, by the number of critical issues that appear to be coming to a head all at the same time …
Troubled? I’d say less troubled, but, you know, sobered by the fact that change in Washington comes slow. That there is still a certain quotient of political posturing and bickering that takes place even when we’re in the middle of really big crises …
Enchanted? Enchanted. I will tell you that when I — when I meet our servicemen and women, enchanted is probably not the word I would use. But I am so profoundly impressed and grateful to them for what they do …
Humbled by the — humbled by the fact that the presidency is extraordinarily powerful, but we are just part of a much broader tapestry of American life, and there are a lot of different power centers. And so I can’t just press a button and suddenly have the bankers do exactly what I want or, you know, turn on a switch and suddenly, you know, Congress falls in line …
And I’m humbled, last, by the American people who have shown extraordinary patience and I think a recognition that we’re not going to solve all of these problems overnight.
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The president, in pictures: Read about the president’s first 100 days and see the related pictures at chicagotribune.com/100days