Duty Calls- President Obama uses his congressional speech to warn Americans that the "day of reckoning" has arrived.

By: Dayo Olopade

It was a poor man’s State of the Union—but we are all poor now. And, like a responsible parent, President Barack Obama wouldn’t let us forget it last night. Despite the sobering tumbles of financial markets and the steady uptick in job-loss numbers, the president asked the American people and their elected leaders in Congress to stay and fight. "What is required now is for this country to pull together, confront boldly the challenges we face, and take responsibility for our future once more," he said. Echoing the words of a young girl from South Carolina who wrote to Congress asking for help with her crumbling school building, he said: “We are not quitters. We are not quitters.”

The speech, which was not an official State of the Union address, was previewed by advisers as “Reaganesque," and it lived up to the hype. With Reagan’s sunny style, Obama delivered a hybrid speech, mixing the gloomy global prognosis of his inaugural address and the call to responsibility that rang through some of his most memorable moments as a candidate. The starkly progressive address was a firm, impassioned call to “claim opportunity from ordeal.”

That’s a fancy way of asking America to make lemonade from lemons—though Obama has proven himself a master at pricking the national conscience while still winning our admiration (as with the 67 separate ovations the Democratic Congress offered its new leader). In the first, most populist, third of his speech, the president went heavy on the admonitions. “If we’re honest with ourselves, we’ll admit that for too long, we have not always met these responsibilities—as a government or as a people.” He called out bankers in search of “quick profit at the expense of a healthy market” and CEOs who “use taxpayer money to pad their paychecks or buy fancy drapes or disappear on a private jet.” All this was in line with the tone struck at this week's White House fiscal responsibility summit, held in advance of the unveiling of Obama's first budget tomorrow.

Duty Calls....

Highlights from President Obama's 2009 Address to a Joint Session of Congress