Obama’s background as a community organizer may be hampering him as president. While his supporters still like him, they’re not so sure he has what it takes to bring about the hope and change he promised and excited the base. A community organizer empowers people to do things for themselves, and in government, you have to lead and order and direct, and that’s not Obama’s style, even though Republicans call him autocratic and Rush Limbaugh calls him “Ayatollah Obama.” Obama has had a lot of success in politics and academia, and on the mean streets of Chicago, by reaching consensus, and he expected to apply that life lesson now that he’s at the pinnacle of power, and it didn’t work.

I’m loath to admit it, but I think there’s been a failure of leadership in this White House. Why else would a party on the verge of extinction less than two years ago be poised to take over one or perhaps both chambers of Congress? Hillary Clinton would have been tougher than Obama as president, but Republicans would have found her vulnerability and exploited it. I don’t think Obama’s supporters have buyer’s remorse, but they’re struggling to understand where Obama lost the magic and became the piñata for all the country’s ills. Republicans and the business community have been so successful in blaming Obama that if the next two years are like the last two years, he won’t get reelected.