Where's Obama's Fight?
Jules Witcover

Like it or not, President Obama's reelection campaign is upon him full bore now, in the wake of latest economic slowdown. It's just as well, because if he hopes to win a second term, he needs to do something more dramatic to demonstrate that job creation is really at the top of his agenda now.

The clamor is rising, and not only from liberal Democrats, to use the federal government's power to pump-prime the economy once again to get unemployed middle-class and lower-class Americans back to work. Yes, Obama needs to ignore the Republican demonizing of "stimulus" and fire up an FDR-style public works program to rebuild the nation's crumbling infrastructure. It's a twofer of simple common sense.

The Republican leaders in Congress, and certainly the tea party members there, will scream bloody murder at the very notion. But the president must recast the national debate from dry deficit reduction to one focused on real human needs, to smoke out where they stand.

The latest public opinion surveys bear out that the American people are more concerned now about joblessness and all the Main Street ills it causes than about the national debt, now that the threat of federal default posed by the GOP blackmail has been lifted.

The infrastructure bank Obama has already proposed is modest compared to the need, and has been easily ignored by the Republicans. The dire circumstances now give Obama -- if he has the nerve and the backbone -- the opening to challenge the obstructionists to vote down truly major and concrete job-creation proposals laid before them in legislation, not just talked about.

Like Eliza Doolittle in "My Fair Lady," Americans are sick of words at this point. They want their president to use more than his heralded smooth and controlled rhetoric to grapple with the growing crisis. By the time Congress comes back from its summer recess, Obama should send to Capitol Hill a bigger jobs-making proposal that will engage local and state governments, and the private construction industry, on a grand scale.

Doing so will confront the congressional Republicans, who ever since they won control of the House of Representatives have wrested the policy initiative from the president. They have managed by sheer will to take it from the party that still controls not only the executive branch but also one-half of the legislative branch.

The reality is that Barack Obama is now facing a personal leadership crisis that demands a stronger show of who's in charge. If he doesn't take charge, he is going to limp toward the 2012 election on the defensive, against opponents who have boldly declared their prime objective to be making him a one-term president.

The odds of actually enacting this kind of massive job-creation proposal look anywhere from slim to impossible right now. But only by finally drawing the line against his opponents, and getting them on the record in terms of their disregard of the plight of idle and underemployed America, is he likely to regain public confidence.

Whenever the Democrats rant about such things as the injustice of continued tax cuts for the rich, the wail of "class warfare" is heard across the land. Pitting the poor against the rich is decried by some as contrary to the American dream of every man and woman becoming a millionaire.

The counter-wail of "redistribution of the wealth" is also heard, as if providing some measure of security for the poor, including the working poor, the elderly and the ill is some wicked Robin Hood scheme, rather than the moral obligation of a democratic state.

The time has come for Barack Obama to quit harping on the unwillingness of his congressional foes to compromise. He needs to make the best case he can to use all his resources as head of the executive branch to put America back to work. He will sink or swim politically whether he tries now or in the thick of the next election, so there's no point in waiting. Better to fight all-out and lose for jobs that can boost the economy and rebuild the country than to continue more of the same stalemate.

Twitter: @ihavenet

Read the latest political news.