Obama in Cedar Rapids

Every time President Obama returns to Iowa, he takes a few steps down memory lane.

After all, this is the state that launched his historic run to the White House. In fact, Cedar Rapids was the very first place he stopped in Iowa after announcing his candidacy in Springfield in 2007.

Obama, who was back in Cedar Rapids today, campaigning for a second term, mentioned that fateful day In Cedar Rapids. Feb. 11, 2007, to be exact.

“I don't remember what I said," Obama joked to today's crowd at Kirkwood Community College "I was just worried about screwing up.”

Well, thanks to the internets, we can remember what he said.

"I want to win," Obama said in 2007 at Kennedy High. "But I don't just want to win. I want to transform the country."

He said that sort of stuff a lot in 07-08. Sent tingles up some legs. But, well, uh, some stuff happened on the way to that grand transformation, on the road to no red states or blue states, only the United States.

The state's actually got redder. Yeah. The divides deeper. We may have been the ones we were waiting for, but now roughly half of us can't wait for Obama to stop being president. It's entirely possible that The One may be The One and Done.

So today, at Kirkwood, we saw a president, grayer on top, looking a little older, maybe even a little thinner, who no longer vows earnestly to change the world. He no longer promises to build post-partisan coalitions or erase political divisions.

Instead, he delivered a speech that was less a call to loftiness and more a pep talk to nervous troops about to climb out of a trench and march into a really nasty fight. Blue trenches and red trenches, and a scratching, gouging, clawing four-month struggle to gain just enough ground to win the war. Get fired up. Mind the razor wire.

"This election is about breaking that stalemate," Obama said, arguing that there are two visions for the country, his and one pushed by Republicans and "Mr. Romney."

“We're going to have two choices in this election,” Obama said. “One choice is to take us down a path of top-down economics. My vision, which says, when we grow best it's because our middle class is doing best.”

Put away the imperial Roman columns of Denver. Shelve the soaring stadium speeches. The hope is now more modest. The change, less galactic.

The president said he'll work to "reclaim basic security," so people can pay the bills, buy a house, get some health insurance, take a vacation, maybe stay at Howard Johnson's. Pump up high tech manufacturing. Sustain college aid to aspiring students. Maybe get an actual bill through Congress. Yeah, right.

Obama's stalemate of the day involves which parts of the Bush tax cuts, exactly, we should keep. The president wants to keep the cuts for the first $250,000 in income, while letting breaks for higher earners expire. Republicans want to keep them all, sustaining $1.2 trillion in tax breaks the president says wealthier folks don't need and won't create jobs. This is basically the same tax debate we had in 2008, speaking of stalemates.

“We tried it their way during the last decade. It didn't work," said Obama. Though, on taxes, he does want to keep most of what they tried.

So the goals were more bite-sized, but with more bite. And that seemed to suit the largely partisan crowd of 1,600 or so just fine. They packed the gym and raised the rafters a few times, especially when Obama flashed feisty defiance.

"Our health care law was the right thing to do," Obama said to very loud acclaim.

Dick Myers, a former state lawmaker from Iowa City, liked Obama's fight. "Can't circle the wagons. That's what Kerry did," said Myers, referring to his party's battered and eventually beaten nominee in 2004.

But will it be enough in a state that Obama basically has to win to stay in the White House, where a fair amount of his support has been transformed into disillusionment? Unknown.

"Iowa is the state that gave me a chance," Obama said. Now that chance is no better than 50-50. To the trenches.