How does Obama win a second term?

Recently there was a poll that showed Obama losing a second term in office. It got me to thinking of what it would take for Obama to win in 2012. I realized that it really won't take much. He just has to do as little as possible to put himself in the battles of the House and Senate. As long as he doesn't interject himself into the legislative process he's going to seem like he's neutral and the uninformed voters will give him the benefit of the doubt.

Obama is no dummy. He's going to appear to be outside the fray and as a result it will be the Republican's who are struggling to demonstrate results after getting the "will" of the people. When they fail to do that because the Senate shoots down everything the House passes the Republican's will be forced to try and make Obama the fall guy in order to pull off any kind of win in 2012. That's going to be a very hard thing to do if Obama manages to keep his mouth shut.

So now the pressure to stop Obama is on the Republicans. How do they manage the legislative process and defeat Obama in 2012? The road is perilous and involves finding their candidate for President early and unanimously. There needs to be a consensus candidate that emerges in the next 6-9 months and he/she needs to have universal support by the Tea Party faithful, and the GOP stalwart, while appealing to those who aren't socially conservative but want to see America with a path to fiscal sanity. Right now that candidate hasn't come forward. In addition to that they will also need to demonstrate that they can get democrats in the Senate to pass legislation that falls in line with Republican promises. There's almost no chance that happens if Obama doesn't want it to happen. His power in the Senate was seen when they managed to pass the Healthcare overhaul against all odds. So Obama is going to have to walk a fine line of influence in the Senate and neutrality in the process. He needs to create a strong backbone in the Senate while not appearing to be the brace that keeps them from bending. If he manages that, I don't see him losing against any of the Republican front runners unless things gel behind one candidate.

Tell me how you see Obama in office in 2013.

Let's Compare: Obama's Katrina.

There has been a lot of comparisons between the Bush Administrations response to hurricane Katrina and the Obama Administrations response to the DeepWater Oil Leak.  I'd like to do an informal analysis of the media's coverage of these events.  I'll be short on citations (I'm lazy...they do exist but I don't want to take the time to find them) but since most of you lived through both of these events the analysis should still make sense.

First...Bush warned residents of the Gulf States in a Nationally broadcast speech to leave for higher ground.  He had already dispatched National Guard members to ready the evacuation (again three days before landfall).  This is a good example of how urgent the situation was regarded by the administration.  The urgency demonstrated by the Obama group is a little different.  On April 24th evidence of the leak is reported to Homeland Security.  Three days later when updates are showing significantly higher leak issues than on the 24th (from marginal leak on the 24th to potential of over 110000 gallons per day on the 28th) the President...with opportunity to show his administrations response at a Midwest tour decided to ignore it in his speech that day.  Now, nearly 2 months into what will eventually be the biggest oil spill in American history, President Obama is finally out to correct the issue.  Of course his sitting on the sidelines for well over a week while Gov. Jindal begged to get help and approval to set up barrier islands to protect the fragile coastal lands of Louisiana was just one example of laziness, ineptitude, carelessness or general unresponsiveness in general, or quite possibly all of the above.  The Presidents "ass-kicking" is a little late and his search for said "ass" should start and end in the oval office.

But you don't have to take my word for it.  The public has spoken.  The White House in a recent poll on the handling of this tragedy shows that 69% polled rate the response negatively.  Again for comparison purposes that is higher than the 62% rating given to the Bush White House for its handling of Katrina.  Let's see how well President Obama wears that  label.

NOTE:  The crude reference used above is quoting a President of the United States in a broadcast interview at an hour when children may have been present for his speech.  Make you own judgement on the appropriateness of that for yourself.  I'm personally not impressed.