2:01 p.m. – President Barack Obama touted an economic resurgence Friday, calling 2014 the “strongest year for job growth since the 1990s” and pointing to rising middle class wages, increased energy production and lower gas prices.
At a year-end news conference before he departs for a holiday vacation to Hawaii, Obama said a 57-month streak of job growth, producing 11 million new positions.
“As a country, we have every right to be proud of what we’ve accomplished: More jobs, more people insured, a growing economy, shrinking deficits, bustling industry, booming energy — pick any metric that you want; America’s resurgence is real. We are better off,” Obama said.
He said gas prices are 70 cents lower this year than they were last Christmas, and the Obama administration’s bailout of the automotive industry is “effectively over.”
“Yes, there were crises that we had to tackle around the world — many that were unanticipated,” Obama said. “We have more work to do to make sure our economy, our justice system and our government work not just for the few but the many. But there is no doubt we can enter into the new year with renewed confidence that America is making significant strides where it counts.”
He said he is “energized” and “excited” about the final two years of his presidency.
“We are better positioned than we have been in a very long time, and the future is ready to be written. We’ve set the stage for this American moment,” Obama said. “My presidency is entering the fourth quarter. Interesting stuff happens in the fourth quarter. And I am looking forward to it.”
Those comments came in his opening remarks.
Just weeks removed from huge Democratic losses in the midterm elections, Obama’s allies say he appears liberated. A President derided as overly cautious for much of the last six years — especially since the Republican wave of 2010 — is suddenly no longer hesitant to use every lever the Oval Office has to offer. He’s brokered a diplomatic breakthrough with Cuba, halted deportations for more than 4 million undocumented workers, green-lit Environmental Protection Agency restrictions on ozone emissions, endorsed net neutrality and extended talks with Iran to curtail its nuclear program. And that’s just been in the first six weeks since Democrats lost the Senate.
Obama is likely to face questions about a number of those issues at his year-end news conference — and more. Just hours before Obama was scheduled to start, the Federal Bureau of Investigation announced that it has pinned blame for the hack of Sony Entertainment on North Korea, raising questions about cybersecurity.
He could also face questions about Russia. The country’s ruble has tumbled to historic lows, and its central bank raised its interest rate to a stunning 17 percent this week — a downturn due to dropping oil prices and harsh Western sanctions on the country’s oligarchs and its banking, energy and defense industries imposed as a result of the country’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region. Yet Russian President Vladimir Putin used a three-hour news conference of his own on Thursday to insist that the country wouldn’t back down.
Shortly after the news conference ends, Obama and his family will hop on Air Force One for a holiday vacation in Hawaii.