Not a perfect man and I will not be a perfect president: Obama

Obama asserted that he would have to work hard to address some of the challenges that his administration has been facing of late

Acknowledging that he is not a perfect man and would not be a perfect president, US President Barack Obama today asserted that he would have to work hard to address some of the challenges that his administration has been facing of late, including the drop in his popularity.

"You know, there are going to be ups and downs during the course of my presidency. I think I said early on when I was running, I am not a perfect man and I will not be a perfect president, but I'll wake up every single day working as hard as I can on behalf of Americans out there from every walk of life who are working hard, meeting their responsibilities but sometimes are struggling because the way the system works isn't giving them a fair shot," Obama said.

"And that pledge I haven't broken. That commitment, that promise continues to hold; the promise that I wouldn't be perfect, number one, but also the promise that as long as I've got the honour of having this office, I'm just going to work as hard as I can to make things better for folks," Obama told reporters at a White House news conference.

"What that means specifically in this healthcare arena is we can't go back to the status quo. I mean, right now everybody is properly focused on us not doing a good job on the rollout. And that's legitimate and I get it," Obama said in response to a question.

"I am going to have to do some work to rebuild confidence around some of our initiatives.

"Part of this job is, the things that go right, you guys aren't going to write about. The things that go wrong get prominent attention; that's how it's always been. That's not unique to me as president, and I'm up to the challenge. We're going to get this done, all right?" he said.