A truce for the exhausted political class

The budget agreement was also notable for the role played by President Obama — which was pretty much none at all. He was marginal to the deal, which had almost nothing to do with his policy priorities.

Given the inherent powers of the office, a president is never fully or finally irrelevant. President George W. Bush, for example, was at a low ebb of popularity and political influence when he pursued the troop surge in Iraq. For a consequential foreign policy decision, or at a time of national crisis, the chief executive makes a sudden return to indispensability.

But Obama now risks permanent damage to his standing as a leader. His main legislative achievement, the Affordable Care Act, is broadly tarnished or politically toxic. Polls indicate growing questions about Obama’s credibility and competence — mainly because of the contrast between the way Obamacare was sold and the way it has been implemented. (In a recent NBC News/Wall Street Journal survey, just 37 percent of Americans gave Obama high marks for being “honest and straightforward.”) Though the midterm elections are still a ways off, control of the Senate could easily switch. A Republican Senate majority would make Obama the lamest of ducks.