MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

“Day of reckoning” for the US has arrived warns Obama

Obama assures Nation: "We Will Rebuild"

US President Barack Obama has addressed a joint session of Congress for the first time, warning that a “day of reckoning” has arrived for the US. Stressing the severity of the economic crisis, Mr Obama told lawmakers the US will emerge stronger when it ended.

"We will rebuild, we will recover," Mr Obama said, adding: "Now is the time to act boldly and wisely." Republicans said Mr Obama's plans were "wasteful", saying they spent "money we do not have on things we do not need". Mr Obama has seen Congress pass a 787 billion US dollars economic stimulus plan and is preparing to announce a budget. Delivering a televised rebuttal shortly after Mr Obama spoke, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal said Republicans opposed the view that the way to strengthen the country was to strengthen government. In his speech to the joint session of the House of Representatives and the Senate, Mr Obama emphasised that his hard-fought stimulus bill - which includes efforts to save or create 3.5m jobs - will help restore growth. An era of extravagant spending must end, the president told Congress. Outlining what he saw as the roots of the economic crisis, Mr Obama told congressmen that short-term gains had been prized over long-term prosperity. "And all the while, critical debates and difficult decisions were put off for some other time on some other day," he said. "Well, that day of reckoning has arrived, and the time to take charge of our future is here." He praised Congress for passing the economic stimulus plan, which he said would create millions of jobs and revitalise the US, and deliver a tax cut to 95% of Americans by 1 April. The package, signed after compromises debated in both houses, was designed to channel federal money toward infrastructure projects, health care, renewable energy development and conservation programmes. The first month of Mr Obama's presidency has also included a banking bail-out worth at least 1.5 trillion US dollars and a plan to support "responsible homeowners" struggling with mortgages. He won a standing ovation when he told his audience that banks and bankers taking public money would be fully accountable, vowing that tax dollars would not be frittered away. "Those days are over," Mr Obama said. "It's not about helping banks, it's about helping people." The speech came days before the unveiling of the administration's first budget, with sights set on reducing the giant US budget deficit, currently standing at about 1 trillion. Mr Obama said the vast deficit and the "crushing cost" of healthcare made the need for wide-ranging reform more urgent than ever and pledged to reform and improve the nation's schooling and boost the numbers of students in higher education. He restated a pledge made on Monday to cut the deficit in half by the end of his first term, and said officials had begun to go "line by line" through the federal budget "to eliminate wasteful and ineffective" schemes. The BBC's Kevin Connolly in Washington says the address looks and feels like the State of the Union addresses which normally come at about this point in the political calendar. But because Mr Obama is new to office, and therefore not in a position to take responsibility for the triumphs and disasters of 2008, it has been billed simply as an address to the joint houses, our correspondent adds. While much of his speech focused on domestic issues, Mr Obama also touched on the key foreign policy issues facing his administration. Reviews of US involvement in both Iraq and Afghanistan were currently ongoing, the president said, and would soon deliver their results. He promised a "new and comprehensive strategy" for Afghanistan and Pakistan aimed at defeating al-Qaeda and defeating extremism. He paid tribute to US troops serving overseas, but made no detailed reference to plans for Iraq, or any reference to Iran, whose nuclear programme is viewed by many analysts as a key foreign policy challenge for the new president. The speech came as some of the first polls analysing Mr Obama's level of public support indicate that voters still strongly back the man they chose for office fewer than four months ago. A New York Times/CBS News poll published ahead of his speech put the president's approval rating at 63%, with a Washington Post/ABC News survey showing 68% support. The presidential address - which began late and lasted a little over 45 minutes - was followed by a response from Republican Bobby Jindal. The 37-year-old governor of Louisiana - the first Indian-American to occupy such a post - is one of the Republican Party's rising stars, and is tipped as a likely contender for the White House four years from now.