Because Barack Obama is a marathon runner

He missed more than a health crisis. Barack Obama plays golf, in bermuda, in full outbreak of swine flu. This is not the casually, but the symptoms of his "zen attitude". It does not consider Obama the stoic, "the serene Center of the cyclone", as it was named American scholar Robert Reich, in terms of traditional politicians. Its strength is to escape the cursors listed. No one would have the idea of reducing the balance of its first 100 days to the evolution of the Dow Jones index. Somehow, Obama embodies a new form of stoicism triumphant not yet published in the American landscape. This does not mean that the sans-faute of its Gallop to test does not leave a bitter taste to the magnitude of the challenges.

"Full of energy, but not miracles", summarizes the American press, although still widely as charm. This is true. Nothing is settled: the banking crisis, nor the dramatic situation of the automotive industry, compounded by the freezing of credit, or the rise of unemployment, which could just 10 at the end of the year. It prevents: Democratic President retains intact 68 confidence rating, a record since JFK. Practically not a scratch! Yet, were all criticized Barack Obama. To do too much in building at the outset on a massive Keynesian stimulus in the short term or to not quite go according to the Nobel Prize in economics Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz. The latter even ideas his "ersatz capitalism" applied to banks (the "New York Times", March 31). Even its most ardent critics did recognize not less its Ombudsman outstanding talent and its powerful anxiolytic power on deep America. Despite the constant flow of bad news, the 44th President of the United States has been able to maintain one sense of underlying national optimism, which contrasts with the ability to the groaning other nations yet less experienced by the crisis. As Franklin Roosevelt in his time, he knew constantly maintaining dialogue with opinion traumatised by a sui generis recession by deploying treasures of pedagogy.

"We cannot rebuild this economy on the same pile of sand." "We must build our House on a rock", has launched Barack Obama, April 14, citing the parable of the Sermon on the mount. Without simply respond to the need of renovation of infrastructure American, he multiplied the ambitious promises, the latest being double the level of funding for research to 3 of GDP, the never-seen since Kennedy. Whether its plan for renewable energy, health and education, its horizon is closer to 2020 than in November 2010 mid-term elections.

The question remains whether if Barack Obama will keep the means of his policy, despite an abyssal forecast deficit of 1.800 billion (about 13 of GDP) in 2009. Already the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), responsible for the evaluation of public policy, provides that the US deficit is likely to turn into a gigantic bubble superior to the White House forecast. Questions about economic policy are not limited to the size of the deficit. For the time being, the Secretary of the Treasury, Timothy Geithner, is often regarded as the weakest link of the Obama administration because of its ties with Wall Street and its responsibilities in the management of the crisis. Growing doubts about the effectiveness of the treatment of toxic assets plan Bank, and the "stress tests" baroque management did not help things. But it is the economic team in his whole that is often suspected of "clintonism" repressed.

The great paradox of Obama is that personal authority and charisma seem disconnected the solutions to the crisis and the degree of confidence in his teams. A "New York Times" - CBS News poll published April 28, 72 of Americans are great hopes for their President and reported that they are optimistic about the next four years, 53 are not confident (compared to 37 of confident only) that he will succeed in "the country out of recession." As if a part of the American waiting something other Obama as solutions to a crisis which is neither responsible nor liable. This is why the presidential "sans-faute" first 100 days has a slight bitterness, largely related to the devastating context, but also a form of frustration. This gap growing between the stature of the President and the credibility of the teams could prove to be a real factor of fragility in the term.

Ultimately, rarely the "benchmark" of the hundred days, invented for Franklin Roosevelt in 1933, was also not significant for a President that defies both the "short-termism". Because Barack Obama is a marathon runner. Its true endurance test will be to see if, once the fire is circumscribed end of 2009, he will successfully preserve the means to rebuild an economy "on the rock", with the loyal support of the Congress.