The tipping point

The good news for Team Obama is that, in the main, these voters like and admire the president. They like his intelligence, his discipline, his level-headedness, his normalcy, even his sense of humor. They like his family. They were proud of themselves for electing him. They think he has been good for brand America on many levels. They appreciate that he is relentless in his pursuit of Islamic terrorists. They don’t want to just throw him under the bus.

But they are leaning toward dismissal. They share a keen sense of disappointment. He doesn’t seem to grasp that the overwhelming issue (in their minds) is overwhelming, crushing debt. They can’t understand why he isn’t doing everything he can to reduce the cost of government. They can’t understand why he hasn’t cleared the path for economic growth, especially in the area of energy. They’re unnerved by his lack of leadership on fiscal and economic issues generally.

And they don’t like it that he doesn’t listen. When the voters of Massachusetts elected Scott Brown – as pure a referendum on Obamacare as one could imagine – the president pressed ahead with the Affordable Care Act anyway. The very name – Affordable Care Act – seemed almost an affront. When the voters in 2010 said “enough” to new spending, Obama ignored the message and derailed the subsequent budget negotiations with Congress. When the voters of North Carolina said “no” to same-sex marriage, the very next day the president endorsed same-sex marriage.