If you had forgotten why Barack Obama handily won the 2008 presidential election, last Wednesday was a good reminder.

In an address before Congress, Obama eloquently and powerfully laid out his argument for health care reform. Even the most casual political observer had to wonder what took Obama so long to speak in this fashion.

For months now, the president has said little specific about health care reform. Instead, his administration has been talking quietly with assorted segments of the health care industry, working to hammer out the sort of compromises necessary to make reform real.

The legislative aspect of reform had been left mainly in the hands of Congress. Supposedly, Obama did not want to be seen as lording over lawmakers, preferring that they craft the initial legislation.

On something as massive and sweeping as health reform, you can be sure that any bills passed by the House and Senate would have substantial differences. Presumably, it was the president’s intent to begin the hard bargaining on reform when a House-Senate conference committee sat down to negotiate final legislation.

And that legislation might differ markedly from both the House and Senate versions.

But in retrospect, Obama’s legislative aloofness backfired. Critics — and it became apparently that the primary target for many of them was Obama himself, not health reform — dubbed the legislation Obamacare, attacking it as expensive, bureaucratic and, of course, socialistic.

When the facts weren’t dramatic enough to scare the American people, the critics fabricated them (think death panels). The effort paid off, as public opinion turned against reform efforts and Obama’s polling numbers wilted.

Then a funny thing happened.

Obama spoke to Congress. And a survey by CNN/Opinion Research Corp. found an instant — and substantial — shift by viewers back toward Obama and health reform.

Prior to the speech, 53 percent of respondents said they backed Obama and his health reform efforts. After the speech, support was measured at 67 percent.

It was as if many Americans simply wanted their president to tell them the whole thing mattered, that he had something of substance to say to counter the critics.

Speaking of critics, a yahoo congressman from South Carolina took some of Obama’s spotlight went he loudly accused the president of lying during the speech. Rep Joe Wilson’s outburst became a focal point of news coverage in the aftermath of Obama’s address.

A chastised Wilson quickly apologized, then he proceeded to make the rounds on media that embrace the ideological right. In these forums, he hardly sounded sorry.

The point that prompted Wilson’s outburst was Obama’s declaration that health reform legislation did not provide coverage for illegal aliens. Language in the bill appears to support Obama, but there is also general wording that embraces health care for all.