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Washington - A revitalized President Barack Obama Tuesday bluntly said America must reinvent itself and unite to survive in a fast-changing global economy powered by rising giants like India and China.
Obama's confident State of the Union address mixed straight talk with a patriotic call to action, as he rode a tide of improbable political momentum less than three months after a Republican mid-term election rout.
The president spoke to a television audience of millions from the House of Representatives, seeking to unleash a torrent of innovation to transform the economy after the most brutal meltdown in generations.
Obama conjured up a sepia-tinted vision of an America left behind after globalization changed the rules overnight, bemoaning the loss of a working class lifestyle bankrolled by a decent paycheck and benefits.
"The rules have changed. In a single generation, revolutions in technology have transformed the way we live, work and do business," Obama said, noting that rising powers like India and China were now highly competitive.
But he added Americans should not give up the fight.
"Yes, the world has changed. The competition for jobs is real. But this shouldn't discourage us. It should challenge us," the president said, citing US pathfinders from the Wright Brothers and Thomas Edison to Google and Facebook.
"We need to out-innovate, out-educate and out-build the rest of the world.
"We do big things. Our destiny remains our choice," Obama added in a speech punctuated by multiple ovations that sought to consign two years of economic gloom to the past, as his 2012 reelection race stirs.
Yet no new initiatives were unveiled for immediate job creation, with unemployment pegged at 9.4%.
With its offer to redo corporate tax rates, the address also seemed another tack to the political center ground where US presidential races are won.
But the speech was sparse on policy nuts and bolts, and the idealistic call for unity appeared at odds with ugly Washington politics.
Obama dealt only sparingly with one of the most divisive issues, the $1.3 trillion US deficit, though he said the budget gap needed to constrained, and partially embraced recommendations of a bipartisan fiscal commission.
The president also warned that Republican plans to cut investments in education or innovation were like "lightening an overloaded airplane by removing its engine."
