Interesting thoughts on the likability of Obama being a major political asset, especially as he is going through some serious fights these first days in office — worth reading for the quote at the end of the second paragraph.
The change in that mood is almost magical: In late October in the Journal-NBC poll, 12 percent of respondents believed things in the nation were “generally headed in the right direction,” while some 78 percent judged things were “off on the wrong track.” In the latest poll, completed on March 1 after four moths of worsening economic numbers, 41 percent of us now see things “headed in the right direction,” as opposed to 44 percent answering “off on the wrong track.”
What we do not yet know is whether Barack Obama is blessed with Ronald Reagan’s famous Teflon coating, which enabled him somehow to deflect blame for bad times or policy. Of the Gipper, political philosopher Dan Buck once noted: “If Ronald Reagan drove a convertible with the top down through a car wash, Jimmy Carter would get wet.”
What we do know is that voters today — just as they did with Reagan — like Obama more than they do his policies. And that’s good news for Democrats.
via Could Obama Be Another Gipper? by Mark Shields on Creators.com – A Syndicate Of Talent.