Barack Obama reminded House Democrats once again this morning that he may be the President of the United States, but he is not the leader of America.
The Democrats’ stunning loss of Teddy Kennedy’s Senate seat in Massachussets two days ago did not affect Mr. Obama any more than a demented little old lady in a nursing home.
Just because the historic defeat plunged the precarious centerpiece of the President’s agenda, healthcare reform, into serious doubt, don’t expect that to bother Mr. Obama more than an after-supper hiccup.
He is neither a deep nor a compelling thinker, as we shall shortly see.
This morning when several Democrats — including old Washington buzzards like Elijah Cummings of Baltimore — petitioned Mr. Obama to tell them how to proceed on the wildly unpopular healthcare bill, he said succinctly, “Not now.”
Wandering, Groping Through the Darkness
That arrogant brushoff is nearly as shocking as the loss of the Massachusetts Senate seat for the first time in 58 years.
Imagine that you are a junior executive in a company undergoing a major revamping. You knock on your boss’s door for input at a crucial juncture. He waves you off.
“He has got to bring the Senate and the House together,” said Mr. Cummings, sounding fruitlessly desperate. “He has got to help all of us pave a way to get it done.”
Wrong.
The remarkably detached, and I believe disinterested, Mr. Obama does not have one stick of strategy in his spacious head for rescuing healthcare reform.
You can correctly argue that he did not have an alternative strategy in the event of an upset loss in Massachusetts. That amounts to gross negligence for a putative leader.
‘We Have No Idea’
In the President’s defense, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said:
The President believes the best strategy is “giving this some time, by letting the dust settle, if you will, and looking for the best path forward.”
Huh? Come back when?
Digest Mr. Gibbs’s message — we don’t know what to do. You guys figure it out.
This is hardly surprising. Mr. Obama refused to get involved in the run-ups to the House vote on healthcare in November and the Senate vote last month.
We are told, with almost sincere gravity, how much Mr. Obama cares about each of the 25 main items on his agenda. But he never cares quite enough to become directly involved.
He is neither a big-picture nor a detail person.
When we challenge the glossy but unproven assertions of his attributes by his handlers, we are referred to Mr. Obama’s speeches. If you have heard/watched him speak one time, you don’t need to a map to navigate all orations thereafter. There is a numbing sameness. Compare two 5-minute segments from any Presidential speech he has delivered. You have heard this before. Your lips will move in sync with his.
If Mr. Obama becomes a failed President, he can always start a new career as a stripper. A cinch he will not be any more overexposed than he has been for the past 12 months and 2 days.
CBS reported this morning that President Look at Me has given 411 speeches, 42 news conferences, participated in 23 town hall meetings and 28 political fundraisers, visited 30 states and 21 countries, meeting with 174 foreign leaders. This is my favorite statistic: President Look at Me has given 158 interviews — 2, I believe, to Fox News, and 156 to reporters who idolize him.
Daily, Mr. Obama is behaving like the rookie he really is instead of the cardboard image secretly fashioned by his handlers. They guaranteed us — without evidence — he was a cool, astute, firm, charismatic leader of men.
Utterly lacking in imagination, bereft of a vision, incapable (so far) of communicating clearly, he wings it when it comes to a plan for governing.
There is no style, no script, just a broad, generic agenda.
Mr. Obama may be our first ADD President, jumping from one subject to the next, sans logic or explanation.
Track his behavior since healthcare came to the fore.
Throbbing with uncertainty, he has lurched, he has wobbled, then he retreated from view when confronted with the next thorny decision.
Dithering is his strong suit.
Remember how painstakingly long he dawdled, creaked and swayed on the troop increase request for Afghanistan, from steaming hot August to freezing November?
How long will it take him to give direction to the poor House Democrats who had the door slammed in their drawn faces this morning? Dozens of them may be voted out of office in November before Mr. Obama waffles, lunges and then gives another heavily clouded response.
We don’t even know where he stood before Massachusetts.
With sympathy, it can be reported that when House Democrats petitioned
