In his State of the Union address on Capitol Hill Tuesday night, U.S. President Barack Obama called on stepped-up efforts to spur job creation and bolster a sustained economic growth to secure a top spot in global economic competition.

JOBS AT STAKE

“We are poised for progress. Two years after the worst recession most of us have ever known, the stock market has come roaring back. Corporate profits are up. The economy is growing again,” Obama said, adding that Americans never measured progress by those benchmarks alone.

“We measure progress by the success of our people. By the jobs they can find and the quality of life those jobs offer,” he said, calling it “our generation’s Sputnik moment.”

U.S. Labor Department figures showed that the U.S. unemployment rate reached 9.4 percent in December 2010. Since December 2009, total payroll employment in the United States had increased by 1.1 million, or an average of 94,000 per month.

However, economists held that this pace was far from being robust enough to reduce the stubbornly high unemployment rate in the near future.

“At stake is whether new jobs and industries take root in this country, or somewhere else. It is whether the hard work and industry of our people is rewarded,” Obama said.

OUTPACING OTHER COUNTRIES

Obama said the world’s largest economy is competing with other countries in a changing world, and that the nation needs to take on new challenges to win the future, as the world and business rules had changed dramatically due to technology revolutions.

The nation had to out-innovate, out-educate and out-build the rest of the world to enjoy a better position and compete for the jobs and industries globally, he said.

“We will invest in biomedical research, information technology, and especially clean energy technology — an investment that will strengthen our security, protect our planet, and create countless new jobs for our people,” the president said, adding that the United States is aiming to become the first nation to have 1 million electric vehicles on the road by 2015.

Obama stressed the importance of the clean energy sector for the nation’s economy and future. “I challenge you to join me in setting a new goal — by 2035, 80 percent of America’s electricity will come from clean energy sources,” he said.

Within 25 years, Obama said, the nation’s goal is to give 80 percent of Americans access to high-speed rail and within the next five years, the United States would make it possible for businesses to deploy the next generation of high-speed wireless coverage to 98 percent of all Americans.

EXPORTS, TAXES, DEBTS

“To help businesses sell more products abroad, we set a goal of doubling our exports by 2014, because the more we export, the more jobs we create at home. Already, our exports are up,” he said.

He also said recent agreements signed with India and China would support more than 250,000 jobs in the United States.

With the nation’s spiking public debt inviting criticism both at home and abroad, Obama said, “I am proposing that starting this year, we freeze annual domestic spending for the next five years. This would reduce the deficit by more than 400 billion U.S. dollars over the next decade, and will bring discretionary spending to the lowest share of our economy since Dwight Eisenhower was president.”

When talking about the nation’s tax cuts package passed last year, Obama believed that it could help the U.S. middle class and boost business investment, but the nation could not afford a permanent extension of the tax cuts for the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans.

He reiterated his stance of simplifying the nation’s individual tax code, and called on both Democratic and Republican parties to “make the hard choices now to rein in deficits” in an effort to beef up investments the nation needs most to win the future global competition.

TOUTING DIPLOMATIC GAINS

Obama touted his diplomatic achievements. Hailing the approval of the new START treaty with Russia, Obama said he believed it was a major success in “resetting” the relationship with Russia and marching toward a nuclear-free world.

He also expressed determination to keep pressure on Tehran and Pyongyang over their nuclear programs. “On the Korean peninsula, we stand with our ally South Korea, and insist that North Korea (the Democratic People’s Repubilc of Korea) keeps its commitment to abandon nuclear weapons,” he said.

Moreover, Obama mentioned his efforts to revitalize NATO, strengthen alliances in Asia and build new partnerships with nations like India.

SKIPPING MIDDLE EAST PEACE

Despite giving a laundry list of diplomatic efforts, Obama avoided touching upon the Middle East peace process, one of his top diplomatic priorities since inauguration.

After nearly year-long painstaking mediation by the United States, Israel and the Palestinians finally resumed their direct talks in Washington on Sept. 2, 2010.

But that optimism was short-lived. Israel failed to extend a 10-month moratorium on West Bank settlement activities upon expiration on Sept. 26, whereas the Palestinians insisted they would drop out of the negotiations should settlement building continue.

As a result, the talks grounded to a halt after only two rounds. And the United States announced in December it had abandoned efforts to push Israel to extend the moratorium.

Worse still, the U.S. State Department admitted on Monday that a leak of the Palestinian documents containing offers of major concessions to Israel will make the Middle East peace efforts more difficult.