Obama's Iran disclosure gives him lift

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By Jon Ward

ANALYSIS:

For months, the image of President Obama as weak had gained currency, as his drive toward health care reform looked increasingly troubled and his attempts to gain concessions from foreign allies and competitors appeared to be going nowhere.

But Mr. Obama's disclosure Friday that Iran had a secret nuclear facility and that he had known about it since taking office introduced a new way of looking at many of his decisions since January.

"You have to go back and look at the nine months and all the moves he's made since then, and that he knew Iran was lying to him, and he still went ahead with it," said Joe Cirincione, president of the Ploughshares Fund, a Washington advocacy group devoted to eliminating nuclear weapons from the world.

"He played Iran perfectly, to isolate Iran, unite all the other countries around him, with an open hand to Iran, and then he springs the trap."

Not only did the president look strong, he looked cunning.

Now, a question for the White House is whether it can capitalize on this moment and direct this sense of momentum toward its domestic agenda, namely health care reform.

The president's top advisers, after returning to Washington from the Group of 20 summit in Pittsburgh, acknowledged that Mr. Obama had cut a compelling figure during a week of maneuvering to hem in Iran's nuclear program.

"The president played a strong and effective leadership role this week on the world stage, and I think Americans appreciate that," said David Axelrod, one of the president's closest advisers.

But he would not say whether he thought there might be a ricochet effect on to health care.