By JOHN HARWOOD

Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania challenged President Obama last week on behalf of steel workers, and helped underscore the administration's ambivalence about trade.

During a public meeting between the president and Senate Democrats, Mr. Specter asked whether Mr. Obama would upend existing agreements with China in response to trade policies in Beijing that he said amounted to "international banditry."

"Arlen, I would not," the president replied. "What I don't want is for us as a country, or as a party, to shy away from the prospects for international competition."

But Mr. Obama also noted his "much tougher" line than his Republican predecessor on enforcing existing trade agreements — including slapping tariffs on imported Chinese tires.

It is little wonder that Mr. Obama's message on trade has gotten muddled.

Like every president of the last generation, he has maintained the rhetorical embrace of free trade. But even as he insists that Washington cannot afford to wait for a new health care system, energy policy or set of Wall Street regulations, Mr. Obama has been willing to wait on asking Congress to approve pending trade deals.

Given the opposition from his labor union allies, that stance conserves Mr. Obama's political capital at a time when so many other priorities hang in the balance on Capitol Hill.

But it also undercuts Mr. Obama's top priority: reducing the nation's 9.7 percent unemployment rate. And as a result, even some fellow Democrats believe that Mr. Obama is leaving new jobs on the table.

Contrasting Clinton

The last Democrat in the Oval Office before Mr. Obama made trade the center of his economic agenda: Bill Clinton, in his first year in office, bucked union opposition to win passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement, with help from Congressional Republicans.

Mr. Obama, by contrast, has sent mixed signals since the 2008 Democratic primaries. While candidate Obama courted blue-collar votes by criticizing Nafta, his economic adviser Austan Goolsbee was depicted in a Canadian official's government memorandum as having privately ascribed such rhetoric to political maneuvering.

As president, Mr. Obama has not moved to renegotiate Nafta. The administration recently tempered the impact of "Buy America" provisions in last year's economic stimulus legislation by agreeing to treat Canadian companies the same as American ones on some projects.

And in his State of the Union address, Mr. Obama embraced a goal espoused by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce: doubling American exports in the next five years, which the administration says would create two million jobs.

Commerce Secretary Gary Locke last week laid out details of the initiative, including promotional, logistical and financing help for small and medium businesses. "A positive sign," said Myron Brilliant, a trade analyst at the chamber.

Yet the administration has still not resolved the longstanding dispute that is keeping long-haul Mexican trucks out of the United States, despite what is called for by Nafta. The Teamsters union has resisted that step, on safety grounds.

Nor has Mr. Obama asked Congress to ratify three trade agreements negotiated during the Bush administration, with Colombia, Panama and South Korea. His negotiators continue to seek more concessions — in the case of South Korea, better terms for American auto companies.

"The administration is not interested in putting forth an agreement that's unfair to U.S. companies," Mr. Locke said in an interview.

Pressure All Around

Mr. Obama was also pressed on trade in his recent public meeting with House Republicans — but from the opposite direction. Representative Peter Roskam of Illinois blamed Democratic resistance in Congress for blocking the "no-cost job creation" that those pending trade deals would bring, and asked the president whether he would work with Republicans to push those deals through.

"You're right, there are conflicts within and fissures within the Democratic Party," Mr. Obama acknowledged. But he remained vague on next steps.

If that tentativeness avoids a fight with organized labor, it may also conflict with Mr. Obama's larger economic goals.

Unless the South Korea, Panama and Colombia trade deals are implemented, "the president will have no hope at all of keeping his promise to create two million new jobs," said Jim Bacchus, a trade lawyer, former Democratic congressman from Florida and onetime World Trade Organization official.

Chamber officials calculated that failure to implement those agreements would cost the economy 383,400 jobs. But they remained hopeful that, eventually, the White House would move forward rather than abandon them.

"I think the administration will wait until the political environment is a little bit better, which means after the midterms," said Mr. Brilliant, the chamber trade analyst. "The words are encouraging, but we need action."

David Broder

It was toward the end of President Obama's riveting visit on Jan. 29 with the House Republicans in Baltimore -- a rare 90 minutes of candor on both sides that produced the most fascinating and revealing politics in memory -- when Rep. Peter Roskam of suburban Chicago was called on for a question.

"Oh, Peter is an old friend of mine," Obama said. "Peter and I have had many debates. . . . Peter and I did work together effectively on a whole host of issues."

As I learned on a visit to the congressman's Capitol Hill office last week, when Roskam moved from the Illinois House to the state Senate in 2000, he found Obama already serving there. They were both assigned to the Judiciary Committee and, after taking each other's measure in a sharp debate on health care, they collaborated on death penalty reform, ethics legislation and other issues.

"You took on some big things," Roskam reminded the president. "One of the keys was you rolled your sleeves up, you worked with the other party and ultimately you were able to make the deal." By contrast, he continued, over the past year House Republicans have felt that "they've really been stiff-armed by Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi. Now, I know you're not in charge of that chamber, but there really is this dynamic of, frankly, being shut out. . . . I think all of us want to hit the reset button on 2009. How do we move forward?"

This was the kind of straight-talk question that made the session at the GOP House retreat so special. Obama responded frankly and well. Rhetoric is a problem on both sides, he said, because "what we say about each other sometimes . . . boxes us in, in ways that make it difficult for us to work together. . . . So just a tone of civility instead of slash-and-burn would be helpful."

In hopes of improving communication, Obama promised to "bring Republican and Democratic leadership together on a more regular basis with me," and the first of those monthly meetings with Senate and House leaders of both parties is scheduled for this week.

And in response to Roskam's specific question, the president pledged to be "talking more about trade this year," which he did last week, though he still has not pushed Congress to ratify the trade agreements with Colombia, Panama and South Korea that were negotiated by his predecessor.

The session in Baltimore, which followed the shock of the Democrats losing the Kennedy seat in Massachusetts, has produced some signs of a changed tone in Washington. But to my surprise, Roskam told me that he has had no word from anyone in the White House since his overture to Obama.

This tells me that, even after Baltimore, the president and his people may not realize the degree to which Republican frustration with Pelosi's management of the House has created opportunities for Obama -- if he is willing to engage as directly as he did in his Illinois Senate days.

Roskam recounted to me the story of two of his own minor amendments to the health-care bill that were rejected by his Ways and Means Committee along with dozens of others he deemed reasonable and bipartisan. That is a common experience for Republicans and a source of grievance.

"It's really up to Obama," Roskam said. "He's at a crossroads. My question to him was not an admonition. It was an invitation" to govern differently in this second year.

Looking at the campaigns in Massachusetts and Illinois, the first two states to vote this year, it is clear as can be that voters are trying desperately to figure out how to change the dynamics of Washington. They will support candidates in either party who offer hope of stifling the poisonous partisanship and addressing the real-world problems of jobs, deficits and health care.

But Obama does not have to wait for the voters to change Congress -- which they will do, come November. He can, as his friend from Springfield days reminded him, start that change now by being himself.

Washington, DC – U.S. Representative Judy Biggert (R-IL-13) today announced new legislation designed to ramp up Congressional oversight over failed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. During the recent financial meltdown, taxpayers were forced to take on the costs and risks associated with the government sponsored entities (GSEs), including an estimated outlay of $291 billion last year alone, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office. . .