The Daily Plunge

Every new administration has bumps along the way but there’s a growing consensus on the right that Team Obama is winging it. The evil genius Karl Rove wrote an article on the subject last week. Karl listed several examples ranging from all the botched appointments and the stimulus itself.

Team Obama was winging it when it declared the stimulus would “save or create” 2.5 million, then three million, then 3.7 million, and then four million new jobs. These were arbitrary and erratic numbers, and they knew there’s no way to count “saved” jobs. Americans, being commonsensical, will focus on Mr. Obama’s promise to “create” jobs. It’s highly unlikely that more than 180,000 jobs will be created each month by the end of next year. The precise, state-by-state job numbers the administration used to sell the stimulus are likely to come back to haunt them as well.

This isn’t the end of the world, but with a crisis on Wall Street the perception of competence is vital. If Bush would have had a string of appointment disasters like Obama has experience the perception would have been “well, Bush is stupid.” So what’s the excuse for Obama? Why are so many in the press giving the president a free ride when the only legislative accomplishment so far is a stimulus bill no one likes? Johah Goldberg touches on this phenomena.

Two weeks ago — half of Obama’s presidency so far — there was a lot of talk of Obama as a “chess master.” Bob Herbert: “Mr. Obama is like a championship chess player, always several moves ahead of friend and foe alike.” Few can hold a candle to Mr. Herbert’s facility with clichés. But I think this is a real dynamic. No, I don’t mean that Obama is a chess master, but that some of his fans cannot tolerate the conflict between their opinion of the man and his obvious mistakes and short comings. This is the flipside to political paranoia; the belief that “your guy” can do no wrong.

While the press may try to isolate the president from criticism the American people will only be fooled for so long. Obama’s approval rating over at Rasmussen(the poll that nailed the election) has dropped to 58%. That’s only a few points higher than Bush when he was reelected in 2004. Every day that passes the economy becomes a referendum on Obama. The president cannot declare war on Wall Street and hope to revive the economy. If investors decide to hold on to their money and wait for a friendlier administration things could get even worse. I don’t think that will happen, but what if Obama truly is in over his head?