All the challenges have not overcome so far

Barack Obama, arriving a year ago at the White House, had aroused hope unprecedented not only in America but in the world. After the Bush years, America's first Black President was in the eyes of the world breakdown. To describe this trend, the term "obamania" made fury. A year after, this fol hope has given way to a certain disappointment, as evidenced by the fall in his popularity rating, 70 in January 2009, fell to 50 percent of favourable opinions. Some doubt on the immense capabilities to reinvent America it loaned him to is available, not only in his own country but in Europe, also even in the Middle East and other regions of the globe.

For many, this disappointment is the gap between the control of the speech of the President raise the dream of a world best, American, and the difficulty to act against the "thickness of the world", according to the concept of political scientist François Heisbourg. A difficulty especially strong that America is no longer the cold war superpower, but only the strongest power in a multipolar world shared with other powers such as China, the India or the Brazil. This requires Barack Obama to the United States of America at the time of the "relative strength".

This difficulty is compounded further by the American political system of the balance of power, which means that any law - especially when it leads to a reform of scale - be negotiated by the Executive with the Congress, even when the President is in the majority in both houses.

To make it even more difficult its own governance, Barack Obama chose to act by consensus using "bipartisan spirit" of Republicans and Democrats. This method has the advantage of highlighting the radicalism of a fraction of the opposition in the eyes of the American public, but the risk to little satisfactory compromise for the most fervent supporters of Barack Obama.

And yet, despite the impression of doubt, few Presidents can avail themselves of all changed the deal in a short period of time. The change of course is all the more remarkable that he intervenes in the middle of an economic recession unprecedented since the great depression of the 1930s.

Before the French diplomatic Press Association, Hubert Védrine refused to any early judgment on the Barack Obama Presidency. What was the balance of Roosevelt ten months after his arrival to the Presidency, wondered the former Minister of Foreign Affairs Nothing! And Ronald Reagan

For Obama, the year 2009 ended on a "historic" success in the United States to opponents its health insurance reform. Finally, the Senate adopted legislation on health which must still be adapted to that of the House of representatives. Through compromise, is the election promises, but Obama is successful reform of the medical protection for the first time since the establishment in 1965 by President Johnson to Medicare (insurance for the elderly of 65 years and more, and those suffering from acute renal failure) and Medicaid (for the most disadvantaged Americans). Bill Clinton had failed to reform the health care system during its Presidency in the 1990s, to the beginning or the end of its double mandate.

On the international scene, Barack Obama has made eleven months that setting the scene, but it has certainly broken with the years Bush and neo-conservatism. The concept of "pre-emptive" war, which gave an ideological veneer to America to engage in its war against Saddam Hussein, is Iraq adventure, with Obama, relegated to the dustbin of history.

Similarly, his speech in Cairo last June was not only marked a total shift from the policy of his predecessor, George w. Bush, but he had a real effect to initiate a reconciliation between America and the Arab-Muslim world. In Iran, its policy of tense hand considerably hampered the regime, that of primary anti-Americanism, played on the rope of nationalism. That seems more difficult today.

All the challenges have not overcome so far. An international, is Obama gone too far or not far enough with Israeli ally by requiring the decision of the Israeli settlements in the West Bank In this region, the Obama hope has not completely disappeared. "The lifeline, it is him or no one, now or never", writes Professor Elie Barnavi, former Ambassador of Israel in France, in his last book. Will the dispatch of additional troops and the announcement of a withdrawal date be sufficient to stabilize the Afghanistan

Inside, despite signs of recovery, the American President will remain confronted the issue of unemployment and the explosion of public debt. Above all, 2009 was the last year where Barack Obama could still hide behind the disastrous balance on the front exterior and interior of its predecessor. 2010 looks to Barack Obama as a year full of pitfalls. And to each failure, it will be judged by the American public as Manager. By saying in 2009 "Obamamania goodbye", America returned the harsh realities and, with it, the world.