Our Petulant President

Peter Baker of the Times delivers shock and awe in assessing the Democrat debacle last night:

President Obama Left Fighting for His Own Relevance

WASHINGTON — Two things were clear long before the votes were counted on Tuesday night: President Obama would face a Congress with more Republicans for his final two years in office, and the results would be seen as a repudiation of his leadership.

But that was not the way Mr. Obama saw it. The electoral map was stacked against him, he argued, making Democrats underdogs from the start. And his own party kept him off the trail, meaning he never really got the chance to make his case. “You’re in the Final Four,” as one aide put it, “and you’re on the bench with a walking boot and you don’t get to play.

The Republican capture of the Senate culminated a season of discontent for the president — and may yet open a period of even deeper frustration. Sagging in the polls and unwelcome in most competitive races across the country, Mr. Obama bristled as the last campaign that would influence his presidency played out while he sat largely on the sidelines. He privately complained that it should not be a judgment on him. “He doesn’t feel repudiated,” the aide said Tuesday night.

We get more details about the non-repudiated Obama's state of mind a bit later, introduced by grim news about his fading star:

Just two years after Mr. Obama’s re-election, the midterm results underscored just how far he has fallen in the public mind. Nearly six out of 10 voters on Tuesday expressed negative feelings about his administration, according to exit polls. For every two voters who said they had cast ballots to support Mr. Obama, three said they were voting to express their opposition to him.

Joe Biden was looking forward:

“We have to be more direct and clear about exactly what it is we’re looking to do,” Mr. Biden said.

But Barack was studying the rear-view mirror:

But Mr. Obama was focused on the odds against him. His staff researched it and told him that no president in more than a half-century had as many Senate seats open in states lost by the president. “This is probably the worst possible group of states for Democrats since Dwight Eisenhower,” Mr. Obama told WNPR radio in Connecticut on Tuesday.

The President couldn't even find a surrogate to push that factoid? What's next, drunk-dialing old donors?

This next passage stunned me, and apparently the Times editors as well; it appears in my Dead Tree edition and elsewhere on line but has been dropped from the current Times version:

Obama is not the first second-term president to lose seats in his last midterm election, nor is he the first to find plenty of explanations for why that was not a judgment on his tenure. There is something about this point in a presidency that brings trouble - the last four two-term presidents all faced arguably the greatest crisis of their own creation about this time.

Richard Nixon resigned just three months before his second midterm. Ronald Reagan became caught up in the Iran-Contra scandal, which was revealed in the days after his. Bill Clinton was impeached barely six weeks later. And George W. Bush faced a war that he was on the verge of losing. And yet Reagan, Clinton and Bush also rose to the occasion during the remainder of their terms, surpassing their problems to score important achievements in their final years.

Bush's late-term accomplishments?!? I'll be happy to credit him with the surge in Iraq, although I am surprised that the Times does. But what about the failure of immigration reform and the near-collapse of the financial system? Surely the Times is not scoring those as Wins for the Good Guys (I have it 1-1 on my scorecard).

Maybe I am forgetting something, althugh it appears the Times would rather forget that Mr. Baker wrote this. Let's chalk his moment of madness up to Obama Disillusionment Syndrome.

Comments

[Iggy]

Hows that Slurpee tastin' Champ?

[centralcal]

yoo hoo, anybody here?

[Eric in Boise]

Looking for humility and contrition from El Jefe is like trying to find a good 22 oz. porterhouse down at Star of India.

[Jack is Back!]

This is why I don't see him reaching across the proverbial aisle. He is a wounded narcissist and he will not go easy into the night or even the day.

[Peter]

Perhaps Bush's greatest accomplishment is that he has never stated what he really thought of Obama; a Gandhi-esque satyagraha that even the chimps have to acknowledge is notable.

[Captain Hate]

“You’re in the Final Four,” as one aide put it, “and you’re on the bench with a walking boot and you don’t get to play.

Imo the problems with 404 began in earnest when he organized his fellow bench warmers and whined to the basketball coach about wanting more playing time. The coach should've kicked him off the team instead of giving into Gaylord Focker's bitching.

[centralcal]

I just love Iowahawk!!

David Burge ‏@iowahawkblog 3m3 minutes ago

[centralcal]

bummer

David Burge ‏@iowahawkblog 3m3 minutes ago

strolls around battlefield shooting the wounded

[Jack is Back!]

CC,

...his own wounded.....FIFY

[Peter]

OT, I guess you can convince a jury of just about anything.. LUN (warning: Slim's chimps link)

[Threadkiller]

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/nov/5/hurt-america-faces-most-dangerous-two-years-150-ye/

[Jack is Back!]

Mitch goes first today:

CSPAN ‏@cspan 7m7 minutes ago
#Election2014 LIVE today on C-SPAN:
McConnell - 2pm ET http://cs.pn/1u07GSQ
Obama 2:50pm ET http://cs.pn/1EihOcN

He has a chance to make BHOhOh a stumbling, mumbling idiot in front of America if he does his part correctly. Make him commit to gridlock from the outset.

[Threadkiller]

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2014/11/celebrating_six_years_of_broken_promises.html

[clarice]

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/dan-sullivan-defeats-begich-in-alaska-senate-race/article/2555785?custom_click=rss&utm_campaign=Weekly+Standard+Story+Box&utm_source=weeklystandard.com&utm_medium=referral

[centralcal]

Nope, JiB - the wounded liberal Democrats.

[Rob Crawford]

So Obola is also blaming gerrymandering for his defeat in the Senate and governorships?

[Iggy]

--Posted by: Peter | November 05, 2014 at 11:48 AM--

Disgusting. Wonder if the jury would have been so "compassionate" if the kid had been healthy and normal instead of one those autistic weirdos who let's face it probably never should have been born in the first place.
She just performed a post-natal abortion.

[clarice]

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/ali-meyer/100-newly-elected-gop-senators-campaigned-repealing-obamacare

[NKreBootDeux]

Dave Burge/JiB are exactly right: Obama is strolling the battlefield and shooting his own wounded. When he announces open borders he'll be shooting the Dem faux centrists in the head, and when he recognizes pre-67 Palestine Borders he'll shoot Dem Lib jews in the head. Obummer will imitate Stalin's show trials: 'there will be fewer Dems.... but better Dems."

[centralcal]

Pradheep Shanker MD ‏@Neoavatara 3m3 minutes ago

@NoahCRothman 46% increase in Asian vote for the GOP, according to exits. Stunning. Probably made a difference in states like MD, I

[centralcal]

Cameron Gray ‏@Cameron_Gray 10m10 minutes ago

Press release from the great @rjchq: Exit Polls Show Jewish Support for GOP Continues To Grow Nationally http://www.rjchq.org/2014/11/rjc-exit-polls-show-jewish-support-for-gop-continues-to-grow-nationally/#sthash.QK82CnB4.dpuf … #tcot #jcot

[Frau Bahnhof]

Woot, woot! this one's for daddy -

[Frau Bahnhof]

My recommendation for high priority:

True the Vote

[NKreBootDeux]

Sullivan = Congrats daddy!

BTW, what do you think Palin is up to with her new guv-elect catspaw?

[Captain Hate]

She just performed a post-natal abortion

Almost everything in there doesn't make sense. She was a successful business woman and had adequate financial resources to care for her child *and* get adequate security to protect her from her exes, assuming their threats and actions were legit which I don't believe. Maybe she is nuts but no way should she skate on killing her own flesh and blood.

[jimmyk on iPhone]

Obama presser 2:50. ETA 3:30?

[Frau Bahnhof]

From Charles Hurt's article linked at 11:53:

And voters also rejected the loony-toon delusions of House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi. Honestly, the woman should be running a hat and wig shop in Haight-Ashbury, selling weed and prescription pills on the side. How it is that Democrats in Congress have taken her so seriously for so long will baffle historians for decades.

(h/t TK)

[NKreBootDeux]

jimmy@12:13-- he'll be on time today... just to spite everyone.

[Iggy]

I urge everyone to read Pagar's comment at the bottom of the last thread and never forget.

[NKreBootDeux]

BTW-- is pot now legal in DC-- did I see that? Obummer will be chooming legally!

[Jane]

Wow Clarice, that says it all.

[Danube on iPad]

Highlights of the night: Walker wins, Crist loses.

What office will Coakley seek next?

[Jane]

Speaking of that - who won the AG's office in MA? I liked that Miller time guy

[Frau Bahnhof]

My question is which election will Coakley lose next, DoT. She's on a roll!

[MarkO]

More good news. A naughty girl in a red dress on the sidebar is asking me "Seeking for True Love?"

[NKreBootDeux]

I got 'Blink Fitness'

[matt]

As a parent of a young man with Asperger's I would, if not Christian, likely take that woman's head from her shoulders. She is a monster, as was the jury that convicted her of a lesser charge than Murder One.

When college kids are trending that post-delivery "abortions" are acceptable,we are a very serious trouble. This attitude towards the sanctity human life is the most deeply evil philosophy in history.

Monsters like Khan and Hitler and Stalin and Mao do not compare to a society that accepts such evil as the norm.

[matt]

forgot an "of" in there.

[Porchlight]

I urge everyone to read Pagar's comment at the bottom of the last thread and never forget.

Ditto, Iggy. I copied it and saved it.

[Porchlight]

Happy Guy Fawkes Day!

Traditional Yorkshire gingerbread, called parkin, served on Bonfire Night.

http://britishfood.about.com/od/recipeindex/r/yorksparkin.htm

Actually anything with treacle (because it is "burnt" sugar) is traditional this day.

[Porchlight]

LOL, from Ace last night (I'm still catching up):

iLoveScienceSexually ‏@AceofSpadesHQ

Breaking: Harry Reid may retire in order to spend more time with strangers' children
8:44 PM - 4 Nov 2014

[Frau Scherzhaft]

Porch @ 1:35, that's the funniest thing today.