President Obama has a tough sell, and he knows it

The soaring rhetoric that gets the troops to charge into battle doesn’t have the same ring after you’ve been fighting for awhile, says Dave Ross of President Obama’s DNC speech. (AP Photo/file)

Four years ago people were using words like “electricity and magic.” But the soaring rhetoric that gets the troops to charge into battle doesn’t have the same ring after you’ve been fighting for awhile.

This time, it’s Mitt Romney who has the freedom make the big promises.

“What is needed in our country today is not complicated or profound, doesn’t take a special government commission to tell us what America needs. What America needs is jobs. Lots of jobs,” Romney said.

And if you want jobs, cut your taxes and get government out of your way. Last night, the President mocked that idea as just so much aspirin.

“Have a surplus? Try a tax cut. Deficit too high? Try another. Feel a cold coming on? Take two tax cuts, roll back some regulations and call us in the morning,” Obama said.

But as he also said, he’s no longer a candidate, he’s the president. Which means he has to explain why his promises haven’t panned out, and what he thinks will move the needle.

“We honor the strivers, the dreamers, the risk takers, the entrepreneurs who have always been the driving force behind our free enterprise system. But we also believe in something called citizenship,” Obama said.

Citizenship! The idea that as American citizens we have duties and responsibilities toward each other, not just ourselves. It’s the same spirit that finally conquered the Great Depression-once the war started. But today a politician preaching citizenship is like a doctor preaching exercise. A lot of Americans would rather have the aspirin.