If it weren’t for that, Obama would be delighted to stay on the sidelines because his whole reelection strategy requires going on semi-hiatus from the presidency. That’s why he’s been AWOL on the budget battles. It’s why he’s completely ignored his own deficit commission, and it’s why he’s been saying as little as possible on foreign policy. It’s also why, last week, he accepted an award for government “transparency” in secret.
The White House has learned the hard way that it overexposed its biggest asset during his first two years in office, using him for countless supposedly “game-changing” speeches that changed little or nothing. He gave the most press interviews in presidential history, according to CBS’ Mark Knoller. In 2009, he had 411 public speeches, comments and remarks, and 491 in 2010. But in 2011, we have what Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus calls a “Where’s Waldo presidency” where “you frequently have to squint to find the White House amid the larger landscape.”…
The fact that Obama’s decision to intervene in Libya has produced no rallying around the president might also indicate that he should keep his head down. Or it might show that his bizarre approach to the conflict is as confusing to average voters as it is to everyone else.
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