President Obama executive order on gun control

Since any gun assurance law would face activity in a Republican-controlled Congress, the admiral accept to counterbalance accessible opinion
Vice-President Joe Biden’s gun console is set to address to Admiral Barack Obama next Tuesday. The accepted appearance is that any legislation that is at all arguable would accept a difficult time accepting anesthetized by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives. Now, Biden has aloft the achievability of accepting gun ascendancy measures by controlling order.
My admonition for the admiral as anyone who reads polls: go for it, if it’s what you wish to do. There is abundant altercation that acting by controlling adjustment would be apparent as a “totalitarian” activity and abet a backlash. Nonsense, so connected as the adjustment is acknowledging a admeasurement the accessible favors.
Consider that in June 2012 Obama took controlling activity on a “mini-Dream Act” that provided a aisle to abstain displacement for some undocumented immigrants who came to the country afore the age of 16, had a top academy apprenticeship (or were accessory school) or had served in the military, and had no bent background. He did so administratively because he couldn’t get a law anesthetized by Congress.
There was abundant accessible abutment afore the adjustment was signed. Back in backward 2010, Gallup begin that 54% of Americans would vote for a bill that would acquiesce for undocumented immigrants who were brought to the country in their adolescence to accept a alleyway to citizenship. A backward 2011, a Fox Poll put abutment for such a law at 63%.
After Obama fabricated the new activity instruction, the accessible captivated to its position. 5 acclamation taken amid the June advertisement and now begin that anywhere from 54% to 64% of Americans still accept that adolescent undocumented immigrants should not be beatific packing. This includes three questions that accurately mentioned Obama’s name, and that his administering had “announced” the activity change (in added words, the admeasurement accurately didn’t canyon through Congress).
You ability altercate that the gun agitation is altered because the able gun rights antechamber would be able to altercate the accessible otherwise. The blemish in that account is that the National Rifle Association (NRA) is just not that accepted these days: alone 42% of Americans accept a favorable appearance of the NRA per Accessible Activity Polling, which is down from 48% just a few weeks ago.
The admiral is aswell ambidextrous with a accessible that’s apparent its abutment for gun ascendancy ascend college back the Sandy Hook academy cutting in Newtown, Connecticut. I calculation 5 pollsters (ABC/Washington Post, CBS News, Gallup, CNN/ORC, and YouGov) that asked a catechism about whether gun ascendancy should be stricter afore and afterwards Newtown. Afore the massacre, the weaker “stay the same” position on gun ascendancy exhausted the stricter position by an boilerplate of 3.8 allotment points. Afterward, stricter led by 11.4pt – a 15.2pt turn-around.
Past history suggests that the admiral can’t delay about until he gets a Congress that is accommodating to cooperate. Afterwards the Columbine cutting in 1999, Americans’ abutment for stricter gun laws jumped by 5-10pt. Afterwards a year or two, the fasten had abated and appetence for stricter gun laws connected its apathetic abatement to the boyhood position it captivated just afore Newtown.
So what behavior should the admiral consider, as connected as he thinks courts will advocate his orders?
• He should end the “gun appearance loophole” to force humans who buy accoutrements at a gun appearance or through clandestine sales and online arcade to accept a accomplishments check: 92% of Americans favor this position per Gallup, while PPP puts abutment at 76%.
• Obama should seek to ban high-capacity armament clips that accommodate added than 10 bullets: CNN/ORC, Gallup, Pew, PPP, and YouGov all appearance at atomic 53% of Americans in favor of this policy.
• He should seek agency to ensure that humans with poor brainy bloom annal do not get a gun: CNN/ORC begin that 92% Americans did not wish Americans with brainy bloom problems to be in ascendancy of a gun; PPP took it one footfall further and apparent that 63% of Americans wish humans to be appropriate to yield a bloom assay afore affairs a gun.
• Obama should acutely anticipate felons bedevilled of a agitated abomination from owning a gun: 94% and 92% accept of that measure, per PPP and CNN/ORC respectively.
• He should try to accomplish abiding that guns, even if not afresh purchased, would be registered with a government or law administration agency: CNN/ORC finds 78% accede with that policy.
• Obama should attending to ban absolute bullets that backfire or are advised to breach through a bullet-proof vest: Pew begin that 56% favor this position.
• Obama should try to accomplish it added difficult to buy armament and/or accoutrements over the internet: 69% of Americans capital to ban these practices, according to PPP.
You’ll agenda I don’t cover an advance weapons ban. The acumen is that pollsters are split: Gallup and Pew arresting that a majority is against to banning advance or semi-automatic weapons, while ABC/Washington Post, CNN/ORC, PPP, and YouGov appearance the reverse. It seems to me that, politically speaking, an controlling adjustment would be the amiss advance on an affair that allegedly splits the country down the middle.
Further, the admiral would about absolutely be better-off casual any law through Congress. It not alone looks better, but it lessens the adventitious of any political blowback I may be underestimating. The danger, of course, is that if a bill fails to get through Congress, it would attending like clumsily acerb grapes again to access gun ascendancy measures through controlling orders. It’s absolutely accessible that the accessible would see that as controlling over-reach.
Also, I am by no agency a built-in scholar: while there are affluence of humans arguing in favor of controlling action, others altercate that some of these proposals, if put into activity by controlling order, would be actionable and would be disqualified so.
That said, if the admiral is acute to accessible assessment and account the polls, there are a amount of gun ascendancy behavior he can access by controlling adjustment after abhorrence of a backlash. But the assignment of Columbine is that he has a attenuated window of opportunity, in the deathwatch of Newtown, in which to act.

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Obama visits long-shunned nation

YANGON (Reuters) - Barack Obama became the aboriginal confined U.S. admiral to appointment Myanmar on Monday, aggravating during a cyclone six-hour cruise to bang a antithesis amid praising the government's advance in afraid off aggressive aphorism and acute for added reform.
Obama, who was greeted by agog crowds in the above basic Yangon, met Admiral Thein Sein, a above band affiliate who has spearheaded reforms back demography appointment in March 2011, and activity baton Aung San Suu Kyi.
The cruise is advised to highlight what the White Abode has accustomed as a above adopted activity accomplishment -- its success in blame the country's generals to achieve changes that accept abundant with hasty acceleration over the accomplished year.
"I've aggregate with him the actuality that I admit this is just the aboriginal accomplish on what will be a continued journey," Obama, with Thein Sein at his side, told reporters afterwards talks with the Myanmar baton at Yangon's old assembly building.

"But we anticipate a activity of autonomous and bread-and-butter ameliorate actuality in Myanmar that has been amorphous by the admiral is one that can advance to absurd development opportunities," he added, application the country name adopted by the government and above junta, rather than Burma, which is acclimated in the United States.
Thein Sein, speaking in Burmese with an analyst advice his remarks, responded that the two abandon would move forward, "based on alternate trust, account and understanding".
"During our discussions, we aswell accomplished acceding for the development of capitalism in Myanmar and for advance of animal rights to be accumbent with all-embracing standards," he added.
Tens of bags of well-wishers, including accouchement bouncing American and Burmese flags, had lined the avenue from the airport to bolt a glimpse of the U.S. president.
"ICON OF DEMOCRACY"
Obama met adolescent Nobel Peace Prize laureate Suu Kyi, who led the attempt adjoin aggressive aphorism and is now a lawmaker, at the beach home area she spent years beneath abode arrest.
Addressing reporters afterwards, Suu Kyi thanked Obama for acknowledging the political ameliorate process. But, speaking so cautiously she was almost aural at times, she cautioned that the a lot of difficult time was "when we anticipate that success is in sight".
"Then we accept to be actual accurate that we are not absorbed by a delusion of success and that we are alive appear 18-carat success for our people," she said.
Obama recalled Suu Kyi's years of bondage and said she was "an figure of capitalism who has aggressive humans not just in this country but about the world".
"Today marks the next footfall in a new affiliate amid the United States and Burma," he said. Before he left, the two accepted and he kissed her on the cheek.
Earlier, Obama fabricated an unscheduled stop at the battleground Shwedagon Pagoda, area he, Secretary of Accompaniment Hillary Clinton and their absolute entourage, abstruse account agents included, went barefoot up the behemothic rock staircase.
Some animal rights groups accept objected to the visit, adage Obama is advantageous the government of the above abomination accompaniment for a job that is incomplete.
Speaking in Thailand on the eve of his visit, Obama denied he was traveling to activity his "endorsement" or that his cruise was premature.
Obama's Southeast Asian trip, beneath than two weeks afterwards his re-election, is aimed at assuming how austere he is about alive the U.S. cardinal focus eastwards as America apprehension down wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The alleged "Asia pivot" is aswell meant to adverse China's ascent influence.
FREEING PRISONERS
Aides said Obama was bent to "lock in" the autonomous changes beneath way in Myanmar but would columnist for added action, including efforts to barrier indigenous and bigoted violence.
A chief U.S. official said Obama would advertise the resumption of U.S. aid programmes in Myanmar during his visit, anticipating abetment of $170 actor in budgetary 2012 and 2013, but this, too, would be abased on added reforms.
The United States has ashen sanctions and removed a ban on a lot of imports from Myanmar in acknowledgment to reforms already undertaken, but it has set altitude for the abounding normalization of relations, such as the absolution of all political detainees.
Asked if sanctions could be aerial absolutely at this stage, a chief administering official insisted they could not. "All these things are reversible," he said.
In a move acutely timed to appearance goodwill, the authorities in Myanmar began to absolution dozens of political prisoners on Monday, including Myint Aye, arguably the a lot of arresting agitator larboard in its gulag.
Some 66 prisoners will be freed, two-thirds of them dissidents, according to activists and bastille officials.
In a accent to be accustomed at Yangon University to an admirers that will cover several high-profile above prisoners, Obama will accent the aphorism of law and allude to the charge to alter a architecture that still gives a abundant role in backroom to the military, including a division of the seats in parliament.
ETHNIC STRIFE
Violence amid majority Buddhists and the Rohingya Muslim boyhood in western Myanmar is a top concern, and Obama's aides said he would abode the affair anon with Myanmar's leaders.
Myanmar considers the Rohingya Muslims to be actionable immigrants from adjoining Bangladesh and does not admit them as citizens. A Reuters analysis into the beachcomber of bigoted assaults corrective a account of organized attacks adjoin the Muslim community.
At atomic 167 humans were dead in two periods of abandon in Rakhine accompaniment in June and October this year.
Thein Sein, in a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon endure week, promised to accouterment the basis causes of the problem, the United Nations said.
Despite animal rights concerns, the White Abode sees Myanmar as a legacy-building success adventure of Obama's activity of gluttonous assurance with U.S. enemies, a action that has fabricated little advance with countries such as Iran and North Korea.
Obama's appointment to Myanmar, sandwiched amid stops in Thailand and Cambodia, aswell fits the administration's action of aggravating to allurement China's neighbors out of Beijing's orbit.

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Romney Dings Obama for 'Gifts' to Minority Voters

Admiral Obama today aggregate acclaim on his defeated rival, GOP appointee Mitt Romney, adage the above governor's almanac and annual "could be actual helpful" in abstraction action over the next four years
"My achievement is, afore the end of the year… that we accept a adventitious to sit down and talk," Obama told reporters in his aboriginal post-election columnist conference.
But even as Obama continued something of an olive annex - which some skeptics saw as artful - Romney was reportedly accusing the admiral of doling out "gifts" to boyhood voters to back-scratch their abutment for a additional term.
"The President's attack focused on giving targeted groups a big gift-so he fabricated a big accomplishment on baby things," Romney told donors on a appointment call, aboriginal appear by Maeve Reston of the L.A. Times. "Those baby things, by the way, add up to trillions of dollars."
Romney claimed Obama had been "very generous" to blacks, Hispanics and adolescent voters, according to the Times, insisting that the action decisions had been a absolute agency in top assembly that angled the calibration adjoin him.
"I am actual apologetic that we didn't win. I apperceive that you accepted to win," Romney reportedly said. "We accepted to win…. It was actual close, but abutting doesn't calculation in this business."
Several participants on the alarm accepted to ABC News the annual and quotes presented by the L.A. Times.
Senior Obama attack adviser David Axelrod responded to the "gifts" acknowledgment by accusing Romney of "still searching at America through that 47 percent prism."
"Mitt tells donors the takers did him in," Axelrod wrote on Twitter, referencing Romney's animadversion beforehand this year calumniating 47 percent of Americans as self-perceived "victims" and government dependents.
The aback and alternating by appropriate some abiding ill-feeling on both abandon afterwards what was a able-bodied - generally claimed - campaign.
On acclamation night afterwards both men batten briefly by phone, Obama told his supporters that he continued an allurement to accommodated with Romney to authenticate a spirit of bipartisanship. But today he conceded he does not apperceive whether Romney is accommodating to play along.
"He presented some annual during the advance of the attack that I in fact accede with. And so it'd be absorbing to allocution to him about something like that," Obama said. "There may be annual that he has with account to jobs and advance that can advice common families that I wish to hear."
But Obama added, "I'm not either prejudging what he's absorbed in doing, nor am I suggesting I've got some specific assignment. But what I wish to do is to is to get annual from him and see if there are some means that we can potentially plan together."

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Tearful Obama Credits Staff for History-Books Campaign

The morning after he won re-election, an emotional President Barack Obama credited his youthful staff of several hundred with running a campaign that will "go on in the annals of history."
"What you guys have accomplished will go on in the annals of history and they will read about it and they'll marvel about it," said Obama told his team Wednesday morning inside the Chicago campaign headquarters, tears streaming down his face.
"The most important thing you need to know is that your journey's just beginning. You're just starting. And whatever good we do over the next four years will pale in comparison to whatever you guys end up accomplishing in the years and years to come," he said.
The moment, captured by the Obama campaign's cameras and posted online, offers a rare glimpse at the president unplugged and emotional. During the first four years of his presidency, Obama has never been seen publicly crying.
He first came to Chicago, he told the campaign staff, "knowing that somehow I wanted to make sure that my life attached itself to helping kids get a great education or helping people living in poverty to get decent jobs and be able to work and have dignity. And to make sure that people didn't have to go to the emergency room to get health care."
"The work that I did in those communities changed me much more than I changed those communities because it taught me the hopes and aspirations and the grit and resilience of ordinary people," he said, as senior strategist David Axelrod and campaign manager Jim Messina looked on. "And it taught me the fact that under the surface differences, we all have common hopes and we all have common dreams. And it taught me something about how I handle disappointment and what it meant to work hard on a common endeavor, and I grew up."
"So when I come here and I look at all of you, what comes to mind is, it's not that you guys remind me of myself, it's the fact that you are so much better than I was in so many ways. You're smarter, you're so better organized, you're more effective," he said.
Obama said he expected many of those who helped to re-elect him will assume new roles in progressive politics, calling that prospect a "source of my strength and inspiration."
Senior campaign officials said Thursday that the Obama campaign infrastructure - the field offices and network of hundreds of thousands of volunteers - would undergo a period of transition in the coming weeks to determine how to remain sustainable and influential.
"We have remarkable staff, and the campaign that Jim [Messina] put together, you know, is the best in history," said senior Obama adviser David Plouffe. "But the reason those people got involved was because they believed in Barack Obama. It was the relationship between them and our candidate."

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How did America become so polarized?

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — The election laid bare a dual — and dueling — nation, politically speaking, jaggedly split down the middle on the presidency and torn over much else. It seems you can please only half of the people nearly all of the time.

Americans retained the fractious balance of power in re-electing President Barack Obama, a Republican House and a Democratic Senate, altogether serving as guarantors of the gridlock that voters say they despise. Slender percentages separated winner and loser from battleground to battleground, and people in exit polls said yea and nay in roughly equal measure to some of the big issues of the day.

Democracy doesn't care if you win big, only that you win. Tuesday was a day of decision as firmly as if Obama had run away with the race. Democrats are ebullient and, after a campaign notable for its raw smackdowns, words of conciliation are coming from leaders on both sides, starting with the plea from defeated Republican rival Mitt Romney that his crestfallen supporters pray for the president.

But after the most ideologically polarized election in years, Obama's assertion Wednesday morning that America is "more than a collection of red states and blue states" was more of an aspiration than a snapshot of where the country stands.
"It's going to take a while for this thing to heal," said Ron Bella, 59, a Cincinnati lawyer who lives in Alexandria, Ky. He is relieved Obama won, but some of his co-workers are in a "sour mood" about it.
"They feel like the vast majority of the country wanted Romney, and the East and the West coasts wanted Obama," he said. "I'm not sure exactly why that is, but there just seems to be such hatred for Obama out there."
Compromise was a popular notion in the hours after Obama's victory and an unavoidable one, given the reality of divided government. But the familiar contours of partisan Washington were also in evidence, especially the notion that compromise means you do things my way.

As Democratic Rep. Steve Israel of New York put it, "If you refuse to compromise, we are going to beat you." Israel, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said the election showed "if you are an extremist tea party Republican, you are going to lose."

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said pointedly that Republicans will meet Obama halfway "to the extent he wants to move to the political center" and propose solutions "that actually have a chance of passing."
In New York's bustling Times Square, hope, skepticism and the usual polarities were all to be found when people talked about the president. "He may not have done a great job in my mind but I kinda trust him," said Jerry Shul. "I have faith he will get with the Republicans and get something done."
A less-flattering George Dallemand called this "a moment of truth" for the country. "I guess we have to wish for the best now, but I still think he is socialism."
In Miami, Karen Fitzgerald, 55, wore a black dress and said she was in mourning over Romney's defeat.
"It's an upsetting day," she said. But she took some comfort from her Democratic friends on Facebook, who have stopped chiding the other side in their posts. "Now they're all saying we need to work together and be united," she said. "Maybe we can."
In Springfield, Ohio, an "elated" Frank Hocker, 67, hoped Republicans would get the message to get out of Obama's way. "There was a backlash," he said. "For this obstructionist House and those tea party people, I hope they learned their lesson. I hope they learned their lesson: Don't stop the progress of this country."
In Chicago, Obama supporter Scherita Parrish, 56, predicted the president will reach out to Republicans but may not get much back.
"But the people have spoken," she said. "They need to lick their wounds, get on with it and start working with the president."
Unity is a challenge not just for Obama but for the Republicans, who won less than 30 percent of the growing Hispanic vote and not even one in 10 black voters. Obama built a strong Electoral College majority, if only a narrow advantage in the popular vote, despite losing every age group of non-Hispanic white voters.
Surveys of voters found Obama's health care law to be as divisive as ever, with just under 50 percent wanting it repealed in whole or part, and 44 percent liking it as is or wanting more of it.
But democracy doesn't care about exit polls, either, and the election almost certainly means Republicans can forget about trying to roll it back now.
In reaffirming divided government, though, Americans all but ensured colossal fights are ahead over the shape of government and Obama's agenda. He is out to break a wall of Republican opposition to tax increases on the wealthy — a move that about half the voters in exit polls thought was a good idea. And extraordinarily difficult negotiations are imminent as the president and Congress try to make a deal to avoid the "fiscal cliff" — steep spending cuts and a variety of tax increases in January.
In the end, voters split about equally on whether Obama or Romney would be better at handling the economy.
Then again, they were divided down the middle on whether Obama or his predecessor, George W. Bush, deserves most of the blame for the economy's problems.

So it goes in the 50-50 nation, give or take.

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Obama's lease renewed despite tough economic times

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — His lease renewed in trying economic times, President Barack Obama claimed a second term from an incredibly divided electorate and immediately braced for daunting challenges and progress that comes only in fits and starts.

"We have fought our way back and we know in our hearts that for the United States of America, the best is yet to come," Obama said.

The same voters who gave Obama another four years also elected a divided Congress, re-upping the dynamic that has made it so hard for the president to advance his agenda. Democrats retained control of the Senate; Republicans renewed their majority in the House.
It was a sweet victory for Obama, but nothing like the jubilant celebration of four years earlier, when his hope-and-change election as the nation's first black president captivated the world. This time, Obama ground out his win with a stay-the-course pitch that essentially boiled down to a plea for more time to make things right and a hope that Congress will be more accommodating than in the past.
The vanquished Republican, Mitt Romney, tried to set a more conciliatory tone on the way off the stage.
"At a time like this, we can't risk partisan bickering," Romney said after a campaign filled with it. "Our leaders have to reach across the aisle to do the people's work."
House Speaker John Boehner spoke of a dual mandate, saying, "If there is a mandate, it is a mandate for both parties to find common ground and take steps together to help our economy grow and create jobs."
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell had a more harsh assessment.
"The voters have not endorsed the failures or excesses of the president's first term," McConnell said. "They have simply given him more time to finish the job they asked him to do together" with a balanced Congress.
Obama claimed a commanding electoral mandate — at least 303 electoral votes to 206 for Romney — and had a near-sweep of the nine most hotly contested battleground states.

But the close breakdown in the popular vote showed Americans' differences over how best to meet the nation's challenges. With more than 90 percent of precincts reporting, the popular vote went 50 percent for Obama to 48.4 percent for Romney, the businessman-turned-politician who had argued that Obama had failed to turn around the economy and said it was time for a new approach keyed to lower taxes and a less intrusive government.
Obama's re-election assured certainty on some fronts: His signature health-care overhaul will endure, as will the Wall Street reforms enacted after the economic meltdown. The drawdown of troops in Afghanistan will continue apace. And with an aging Supreme Court, the president is likely to have at least one more nomination to the high court.
The challenges immediately ahead for the 44th president are all too familiar: an economy still baby-stepping its way toward full health, 23 million Americans still out of work or in search of better jobs, civil war in Syria, an ominous standoff over Iran's nuclear program, and more.
Sharp differences with Republicans in Congress on taxes, spending, deficit reduction, immigration and more await.
And even before Obama gets to his second inaugural on Jan. 20, he must grapple with the threatened "fiscal cliff" — a combination of automatic tax increases and steep across-the-board spending cuts that are set to take effect in January if Washington doesn't quickly come up with a workaround budget deal. Economists have warned the economy could tip back into recession absent a deal.
Despite long lines at polls in many places, turnout overall looked to be down from four years ago as the president pieced together a winning coalition of women, young people, minorities and lower-income voters that reflected the country's changing demographics. Obama's superior ground organization in the battleground states was key to his success.
The president's victory speech — he'd written a concession, too, just in case — reflected the realities of the rough road ahead.
"By itself the recognition that we have common hopes and dreams won't end all the gridlock, or solve all our problems or substitute for the painstaking work of building consensus and making the difficult compromises needed to move this country forward," Obama said.
"But that common bond is where we must begin. Our economy is recovering. A decade of war is ending. A long campaign is now over, and whether I earned your vote or not, I have listened to you, I have learned from you and you have made me a better president."
The president said he hoped to meet with Romney and discuss how they can work together. They may have battled fiercely, he said, "but it's only because we love this country deeply."
Romney's short concession — with misplaced confidence, he'd only prepared an acceptance speech — was a gracious end note after a grueling campaign.
He wished the president's family well and told subdued supporters in Boston, "I so wish that I had been able to fulfill your hopes to lead the country in a different direction, but the nation chose another leader and so Ann and I join with you to earnestly pray for him and for this great nation."
Obama's re-election was a remarkable achievement given that Americans are anything but enthusiastic about the state they're in: Only about 4 in 10 voters thought the economy is getting better, just one quarter thought they're better off financially than four years ago and a little more than half think the country is on the wrong track, exit polls showed.
But even now, four years after George W. Bush left office, voters were more likely to blame Bush than Obama for the fix they're in.
It wasn't just the president and Congress who were on the ballot. Voters around the country considered ballot measures on a number of divisive social issues, with Maine and Maryland becoming the first states to approve same-sex marriage by popular vote while Washington state and Colorado legalized recreational use of marijuana.
From the beginning, Obama had an easier path than Romney to the 270 electoral votes needed for victory. The most expensive campaign in history was narrowly targeted at people in nine battleground states that held the key to victory, and the two sides drenched voters there with more than a million ads, the overwhelming share of them negative.
Obama claimed at least seven of the battleground states, most notably Ohio, the Ground Zero of campaign 2012. He also got Iowa, New Hampshire, Colorado, Nevada, Virginia and Wisconsin, and he was ahead in Florida. Romney got North Carolina.
Overall, Obama won 25 states and the District of Columbia and was leading in too-close-to-call Florida. Romney won 24 states.
It was a more measured victory than four years ago, when Obama claimed 365 electoral votes to McCain's 173, winning with 53 percent of the popular vote.
Obama was judged by 53 percent of voters to be more in touch with people like them. More good news for him: Six in 10 voters said that taxes should be increased. And nearly half of voters said taxes should be increased on income over $250,000, as Obama has called for.
Obama's list of promises to keep includes many holdovers he was unable to deliver on in his first term: rolling back tax cuts for upper-income people, immigration reform, reducing federal deficits, and more.
A second term is sure to produce turnover in his Cabinet: Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has made it clear he wants to leave at the end of Obama's first term but is expected to remain in the post until a successor is confirmed. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Obama's rival for the presidency four years ago, is ready to leave too. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta isn't expected to stay on.
To the end, the presidential race was a nail-biter. About 1 in 10 voters said they'd only settled on their presidential choice within the last few days or even on Election Day, and they were closely divided between Obama and Romney. Nearly 1 percent of voters went for Libertarian Party candidate Gary Johnson, who was on the ballot in 48 states.
In an election offering sharply different views on the role of government, voters ultimately narrowly tilted toward Obama's approach.
"We have seen growth in the economy," said 25-year-old Matt Wieczorek, a registered Republican from Cincinnati who backed the president. "Maybe not as fast as we want it to be, but Obama has made a difference and I don't want to see that growth come to an end."
Notwithstanding his victory, Obama will lead a nation with plenty of people who were ready for a change.
"The last four years have been crap," said 73-year-old Marvin Cleveland, a Romney supporter in Roseville, Minn. "Let's try something else."
___
Follow Nancy Benac on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/nbenac

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President Obama tweet breaks record

President Obama shakes hands with Justin Bieber during Christmas in Washington, 2011. (Wire Image)

A photo of President Barack Obama hugging first lady Michelle Obama tweeted by the Obama campaign on election night has been retweeted nearly half a million times, likely making it the most shared tweet of all time. The tweet--issued shortly before Obama was projected by several networks to be the winner of Ohio--included the image under the caption, "Four more years."

Obama tweet breaks record

According to AllTwitter.com, the most popular Twitter message before Tuesday was a tweet by Justin Bieber for Avalanna Routh, a six-year-old fan of the pop star who died of cancer.

"RIP Avalanna," Bieber wrote on Sept. 12."i love you."

While President Obama's Twitter feed technically now holds the most popular tweet of all-time, Obama himself does not. Personal tweets from the president are signed "-bo," like the tweet, published several minutes before the photo, thanking his supporters. It read: "We're all in this together. That's how we campaigned, and that's who we are. Thank you. -bo"

That tweet was retweeted more than 141,000 times.

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