Dawidziak: Barack Obama has a big task for big speech

When President Barack Obama takes the stage tomorrow evening, his political advocates and opponents will be on the edge of their seats. More important, the undecided moderate voters on Long Island and in the swing states will be listening.

Let's face it. For voters on the left, both in Charlotte and across the country, he won't be able to say anything wrong. For conservative Republican voters, he won't be able to say anything right. It's only the undecided middle that counts. And rest assured, that will be the target of his message.

Obama's acceptance speech is the only real main event. Sure, there will be subplots. How did San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro do in delivering the keynote address? In the battle for the Hispanic vote, the Republicans did well showcasing prime-time speeches by New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, Texas Senate nominee Ted Cruz and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

Will Michelle Obama "out- women" Ann Romney? Vice President Joe Biden is sure to rouse conventioneers to a fever pitch, and everybody's going to want to hear former President Bill Clinton speak. But whether this convention goes down as a success or a failure is all tied to Obama.

He's got to come up big. Not that he's any stranger to coming through when the heat is on. From the keynote address at the 2004 convention, he has a history of great speeches. However, this just might be the most important one of his political life, simply because he's fighting to save it.

Obama hasn't had a great two weeks and desperately needs to change perceptions of his presidency and policies if he's going to win. His approval rating (nationally and on Long Island) slipped 4 points this week. And roughly two-thirds of voters say the country is on the wrong track.

Part of this is due to the less-than-enthusiastic economic outlook presented by Democratic spokespeople on the TV news talk circuit. A large part of it, however, is a product of what Romney did right in his acceptance speech. While it wasn't a great speech, and it was almost totally lacking in specifics, he did accomplish one major goal: He effectively cast the last four years as a record of fiscal failure. While acknowledging Obama didn't create the mess, Romney argued that the president has shown that he is totally incapable of dealing with it.

And that brings us to tomorrow evening. In the battle for the middle, Obama will very likely echo Romney's sentiments that this race is about two different visions for America. He will try to cast the Republicans as not caring about the middle class. He will try to scare the American voters about what a GOP victory would mean. All good talking points, but he needs to do more . . . much more. He needs to lay out why he deserves four more years. He needs to tell voters why they can have confidence that his re-election will lead the country to prosperity.

It's not impossible. When Franklin Delano Roosevelt was elected in 1932, the country was in the Great Depression. Everybody knew FDR didn't cause it, but four years later most of the economic indicators hadn't improved. Yet he was able to convince voters that "prosperity was right around the corner" -- it wasn't -- and he was re-elected in 1936 in one of the biggest landslides in U.S. history.

When Obama took office in the midst of an economic meltdown, there was much discussion of how his key aides were studying 1932 and how Roosevelt's people did it. For Obama's re-election chances, starting with tomorrow evening's speech, the aides better be studying 1936.

Michael Dawidziak is a political consultant and pollster.