by Brian Kelly

2009 Elections
Obama's Wake-Up Call (© David Horsey)

That didn't take long.

He is just completing his first year in office, and Barack Obama's presidency is verging on crisis mode.

Not a full-blown crisis, to be sure, but an array of bedeviling issues on so many fronts that he might soon set some kind of historical record for facing the most bad-choice / worse-choice decisions. He is officially a war president, having upped the troop level in Afghanistan and weighing even bigger questions about where we go from here. Then there is the Iranian pursuit of nuclear weapons, the stalled Mideast peace process, the fragile financial system, and the prospect of a jobless economic recovery. There's a global warming coalition in disarray, an incipient trade war with China -- and of course the slog over healthcare reform, which Obama intended to be his first triumph.

In each case, the questions being asked around the world are: How will the American president lead? What direction will he give? What tone will he set? Is he up to the job?

Microscope.

We start by looking at the president and what has to be the toughest leadership role in the world, even on a good day. It's clear President Obama has his own views, in some ways vastly different from those of many of his predecessors, about how to steer the nation through these issues.

It's also clear that his words and actions are under a microscope more acute than any we've seen. How some of these problems play out in the next few months may well determine the success or failure of his presidency.

 

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