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President Obama on Friday offered a political rebuttal to his critics, one that, by default or design, he may turn to again and again in the 12 months before the election. In essence his message was: Look beyond all the bleak economic numbers and give me credit for a gradual and improving trend.

Asked during a news conference at the conclusion of the G20 meeting in France if he believes he has been an effective leader when it comes to the economy, the president said the facts and data furnish the answer.

“In terms of my track record on the economy -- well, here's just a simple way of thinking about it,” Obama calmly responded. “When I came into office, the U.S. economy had contracted by 9 percent -- the largest contraction since the Great Depression. Little over a year later, the economy was growing by 4 percent, and it's been growing ever since.”

What the president did not say was that while the recession technically ended in June 2009, the robust rebound the White House expected to see instead became a crawl.

Obama’s message in Cannes -- that he deserves credit for leading the country up from a hole the size of the Grand Canyon, even if everyone is still trudging toward the surface -- betrayed how vulnerable the president knows his record may be on Election Day.

He denied during the press conference that his re-election bid is on his mind. “The least of my concerns at the moment is the politics of a year from now,” he said in answer to a question. “I'm worried about putting people back to work right now, because those folks are hurting and the U.S. economy is underperforming.”

A Reuters/Ipsos poll released Friday showed for the first time showed Mitt Romney ahead of the president in a head-to-head matchup, but within the poll’s margin of error. The two men were basically in a dead heat in the survey, even as Obama’s job approval numbers have inched up since he began aggressively campaigning against what he calls a do-nothing Congress, especially the GOP leadership in the House.

Separately, a USA Today/Gallup survey of battleground states released Thursday also showed Obama and Romney neck-and-neck in key states that will determine the election outcome a year from now.

Republican presidential candidates, including front-runner Romney, are making the case that Obama has made the economy worse, not better. The president is developing his stump arguments around that question.

He was attending the G20 as the leader of the largest economy in the world. His European counterparts greeted Obama as both a student -- he was receiving a “crash course” in Eurozone politics, they told him -- and as something of a battle-scarred teacher, someone who has been fighting the undertow of the U.S. financial crisis since he was sworn in.

“I have sympathy for my European counterparts,” Obama said. The G20 gathering was consumed with drama over whether Greece and perhaps Italy and other deeply indebted countries that share the euro will take politically painful economic steps required to receive financial assistance and avert economic collapse.

“We saw how difficult it was for us to save the financial system back in the United States,” the president added. “It did not do wonders for anybody's political standing, because people's general attitude is, ‘You know what, if the financial sector is behaving recklessly or not making good decisions, other folks shouldn't have to suffer for it.’ ”