By John Mulligan
Journal Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- Rhode Island's all-Democratic congressional delegation warmly praised the general shape of the economic plans in Wednesday's State of the Union speech but expressed enough specific reservations to suggest how tough a sales job President Obama may have with the Congress and the public.

On jobs, the four local legislators praised Mr. Obama's call for tax credits and a $30-billion infusion of small-business loans through community banks - the last an initiative that's "really going to go over big" in Rhode Island, according to Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy. The legislators spoke in telephone interviews after the speech.

Combined with some version of the $154-billion jobs bill that the House has already passed, Rep. James R. Langevin said Mr. Obama's program "absolutely is enough to make a dent" in the nation's 10-percent unemployment rate.

"Clearly, the president made jobs his priority,'' Langevin said.

Langevin said the small business tax breaks are "exactly the kind of shot in the arm'' that could spur slumping businesses to begin hiring.

In sum, Mr. Obama's jobs plan is "a multifaceted approach,'' Kennedy said.

But the Senate is far from taking up a jobs bill as big as the House version and Rhode Island's senators were somewhat less bullish on the president's new initiatives. "It's important'' that Mr. Obama gave job creation such prominence in his first State of the Union address, said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse. But he said he could not yet evaluate whether the president's initiatives on jobs are big enough.

Whitehouse said great care must be used in writing the tax credit lest businesses find ways to enjoy tax breaks for hiring that they would have done with no federal incentive.

Sen. Jack Reed praised Mr. Obama's approach and predicted that the use of bank bailout funds for small business loans will be popular in Congress. "We have to really plan to get back to full employment,'' Reed said. But overall, ``I don't believe anyone will say it's going to be enough,'' Reed said of Mr. Obama's jobs initiatives in the aggregate. If they are insufficient, Congress must do more, Reed said.

The Rhode Islanders were unanimous in hailing Mr. Obama's call for enactment of a sweeping health care overhaul, reprising the president's argument that it is essential to long-term economic growth. But they were less emphatic on how - or how soon - it might happen, now that Massachusetts Republican Scott Brown has given the GOP a crucial vote to block the health care proposals now before the Congress.

The Rhode Islanders all support legislation to curb global warming and the development of renewable energy sources and expressed a willingness to accept the dramatic expansion in nuclear power that Mr. Obama prescribed. But they were divided on the plan to expand offshore oil and gas drilling.

Energy production represents "the ultimate job creation," Langevin said, arguing that the full range of energy products should be considered. Reed and others noted that nuclear power is not implicated in global warming.

But Whitehouse and Kennedy were cool toward Mr. Obama's call for offshore oil and gas drilling. Whitehouse said some of that might be acceptable in offshore areas where drilling is already underway. But he said he would flatly oppose drilling near Georges Bank off New England. Kennedy said the further exploitation of petroleum products will exacerbate global warming.

While Reed, Whitehouse and Langevin endorsed the president's limited spending freeze as a modest but necessary step toward deficit reduction, Kennedy did not. But Reed warned, "It's going to force us to make some really difficult choices,'' often to curb programs that "have value and merit.''