Obama confident of second presidential term

Washington - With some recent opinion polls showing that his popularity ratings have improved, US President Barack Obama has exuded confidence that he will be elected for his second term during the November presidential elections.

"Five years from now when I'm not President anymore, I'll buy one (Chevy Cobalt) and drive it myself. Yes, that's right," a confident Obama said in his address to the United Auto Workers here amidst applause from the audience of "four more years" yesterday.

Riding on a nationwide wave, in November 2008, Obama created history by becoming the first African American to win presidential elections. On January 20, 2009, he was sworn-in as the first non-white President of the United States.

 
"The fact that he is confident that the American people believe or will believe when he presents his case that his vision for where we need to go to grow the economy, where we need to go to create jobs, where we need to go to further secure America's national security interests is the right vision -- and that debate will be engaged and that theory will be tested in November," the White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters here in a press conference.

"But he is confident, although he is certainly aware that when you're in the kind of economic environment that we've been in for the past three-plus years that this will be invariably a very competitive election," he said responding to questions.

"He intends to make his case to make clear what his vision is, to explain the decisions that he's made and the policies that he's put into place, and why he thinks they were the right ones to get this economy into a situation where instead of hemorrhaging jobs at 775,000 per month, it's been growing steadily," the US official said.

 
A total of 3.7 million jobs have been created so far in the private sector, Carney said, adding that Obama looks forward to the time when the other party has chosen its nominee to engage in that debate directly with his opponent.

"But he will continue to make the point that there is still time between now and November to get things done for the American people," he said.

The US official claimed that the people do not want Washington to freeze and stop acting on their behalf, adding that within this time period efforts would be on to enhance economic growth and create jobs.