The third stage is the rehabilitation story. After months of taking a merciless beating and enduring rampant speculation about a Democratic primary challenge and near-certain defeat by any Republican with a pulse, the president will have “earned” a second chance. The establishment will have had it’s fill of “I told you so’s”; the Republicans will have likely over-reached; and the media will be ready for the next plot twist. There is no myth in American life more powerful than the man who rises improbably, falls spectacularly on account of his own weaknesses, only to overcome them and rise yet again. And so the president will come roaring back, ready to fight another day.