Losing faith in Obama

From deep inside the Beltway, Elizabeth Drew reports that Barack Obama is not the man she thought he was. She alleges that, following the replacement of Greg Craig as White House counsel, disillusionment and even apostasy are rampant among unnamed Democrat insiders. The juicy bits (emphasis added):

President Barack Obama is returning from his trek to Asia Thursday to a capital that is a considerably more dangerous place for him than when he departed.

While he was abroad, there was a palpable sense at home of something gone wrong. A critical mass of influential people who once held big hopes for his presidency began to wonder whether they had misjudged the man. Most significant, these doubters now find themselves with a new reluctance to defend Obama at a phase of his presidency when he needs defenders more urgently than ever. [. . .]

The Craig embarrassment gives these people a new reason – not the first or only reason – to conclude that he wasn’t the person of integrity and even classiness they had thought, and, more fundamentally, that his ability to move people and actually lead a fractured and troubled country (the reason many preferred him over Hillary Clinton) is not what had been promised in the campaign. [. . .]

Yes, we knew, or should have, during the campaign that the supposed idealist Obama had a bit of the Chicago cut-throat in him, but there was little sign that he could be as brutal and heedless of loyalty as he was in the Craig affair. An unexpected climate of fear emanates from the Obama White House. [. . .]

The Obama’s themselves hang tight with a small Chicago crowd. Yes, he talks to others, and yes, a president’s time is very limited, but the Obama’s themselves seem as closed-off and unto themselves as does his inner White House circle. (Is this a coincidence? What is all this wariness about?) When the Obama’s go to someone’s house for dinner, almost invariably it’s to that of Valerie Jarrett, the old friend from Chicago who serves as a counselor and whom they see all day. Old Chicago friends fly in for weekends frequently. Old friends, who had helped launch him, helped them personally, have been left behind.

At the same time as the Craig imbroglio happened, many people who had defended Obama against charges that he wasn’t what he’d been cracked up to be were now becoming concerned themselves: though it was a relief to have a president who thought through crucial decisions about sending the country’s young to war, it was taking him awfully long to make up his mind about what to do about Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the decision-making was bafflingly leak-ridden (was this a deliberate airing of ideas or a loss of control over the process?); that the health care debate had in fact careened out of his control and it seemed less and less likely that, having used up almost a year of his presidency on it (his “deadlines” had become irrelevant, and so, in a way, had he), he would end up with a bill, if at all, that did enough net good. [. . .]

Meanwhile, serious people who had a lot of hope about him and who defended him are more worried than ever, and in this if anything over-communicative society the White House can’t write them off as “a bunch of Washington insiders.” So meanwhile, there’s a palpable mood change in Washington that could signify that Barack Obama is in deeper trouble than he was even a week ago.

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