TIME
The coalition that got Barack Obama elected President just two years ago has been shattered. Gaming out the trajectory of the next two years can be done any number of ways, but Obama's efforts to rebuild a politically robust alliance will be the most telling. It may be the biggest challenge of his career — and he will need happenstance along with skill if he is going to get it done.
A survey of the political landscape shows that many groups who were part of the 2008-09 Obama coalition have turned on him. Liberals believe he is an overcompromising wimp. (See blistering recent columns by progressive icons Paul Krugman and Frank Rich of the New York Times for a taste of what the left thinks of "their" President now.) The business community considers Obama ignorant about markets at best, a socialist at worst (O.K., some business people entertain an even harsher assessment). The media, after aiding and abetting his ride to the White House, now see the President as incompetent and overwhelmed. The independents and Republicans who backed him for office currently feel he is too liberal and too weak to do the job. These trends are all worse in Washington and among opinion leaders than they are in the country at large, but the views of elites are clearly shaping how the President is perceived by the nation in general. (See "Judging Obama's First Year, Issue by Issue.")
With unemployment high and promising to stay there, it is nearly impossible in the short term for Obama to shift opinion and be seen as a successful President. But he can't achieve anything in 2011 and 2012, or get re-elected, unless he can win back support from some of his core groups.
The already tiresome debate about what Obama should do to launch a comeback tells only part of the story. Yes, he needs to show people what he stands for, fight for what he believes, compromise with Republicans when it's sensible, reshape his circle of advisers and focus on job growth and deficit reduction. But those are all tall orders, and they run counter to Obama's instincts, the political realities of American politics for the last generation, or both.
(More here.)
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