During a briefing with a group of reporters Tuesday on Capitol Hill, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) referenced a brutally pessimistic statistic from an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll — only 3% of respondents picked "strong" as a term that best describes the nation.
And just 31% say the country is better off since President Barack Obama was elected in 2008.
Pelosi said that Obama needs to do a better job of defending his record. He can start tonight, she said, by putting everything into context.
"People forget," Pelosi said. "And maybe we're not clear in presenting, and I think the President has to do this in a stronger way, looking at those polls.
"Five years ago, in September of 2008, before the President was elected, Ben Bernanke was in my office telling House and Senate Democratic and Republican leadership that we weren't going to have an economy by Monday if we didn't act immediately. Are we better off now than we were then?"
According to Pelosi, the answer is yes. And though it's almost certain that Obama will characterize the nation as "strong" in his address Tuesday night, Pelosi and other members of House Democratic leadership think that, beginning now, Obama needs to start explaining why.