President Obama is faced with a tough battle as he tries to kick off a reelection campaign while faced with a weak economy and high unemployment. The president has tried several different tactics to work around this problem, such as a recent weekly address in which he spoke of how the economy is affecting people:

President Obama is right; some people are suffering from a recession still even though technically the long recession ended a few quarters ago.  In cities like El Centro and Merced, Calif., unemployment is well over 20%.  Meanwhile, in cities such as Lincoln, Nebraska and Bismark, North Dakota, the rate is under 5%.