If only Obama were more like LBJ

The best that can be said for Obama is that he treats everyone with about the same degree of distance. One important Democrat used the term “cuckoo-clock events” to refer to White House receptions where Obama robotically appears, says a minimal amount of words and then disappears. He does not mingle — or, if he does, it is as little as possible. Bill Clinton, in contrast, was the host from hell. The party never ended.

There are real consequences to Obama’s odd approach to politics. He is not much loved by his own party. He may be respected — he’s clearly smart and impenetrably calm — but you hear few expressions of warmth. The base that the president is now engaged in securing should already be in his thrall. That it is not is partly a reflection of the president’s emotional distance and his lack of political passion.

In 1957, the photographer George Tames snapped four shots of Johnson, then the Senate majority leader, working over the diminutive (and 90-year-old) Sen. Theodore Green. In the first picture, Johnson and Green are simply face to face. By the fourth shot, Green has been backed into a table and Johnson looms over him — physical, intimidating but oh so effective. This was called the Johnson Treatment and it was politics reduced to what it has to be — human relations.