Written by John Turner   

It’s true that I don’t know for sure how to define the mind of President Obama. Among friends over the past couple of days I’ve heard numerous theories.

Has he been so conditioned by his upbringing that he can’t, at the moment of decision, stand firm on anything?

Is he so intimidated by being the first nonwhite president that he is constantly running away from the angry black man image?

Is he, in his heart, so much a creature of the establishment that he can’t perceive the rapaciousness of Wall Street and the Republican leadership?

Is he so full of himself that he thinks he can rise above political conflict and by his indisputable virtue eventually win over everyone?

Is he a wily Machiavellian who is weaving such a subtle trap for the Republicans that most of his erstwhile supporters can’t see it?

Is he in the grip of the delusion that independents are so enamored of bipartisanship that he can appease them all by appearing always to move toward the center, wherever the center happens to be?

There’s some evidence for each of these theories and I can’t, with confidence, dismiss any of them as the principal explanation. Still, I try to be mindful of Occam’s razor, and when I call it to mind the explanation that comes with it is that the president is a comparatively young, relatively inexperienced man who has been thrown into a maelstrom of unprecedented complexity. He is assaulted every day by conflicting advice and he has few advisors with genuine breadth of view. He is, in short, trapped in a bubble and he doesn’t know how to get out.

One could say that this is the situation all presidents find themselves in and that the great ones are possessed of a sharp intuition about how to analyze and control the forces seeking to take them captive. It’s not an absurd argument and it could be that Mr. Obama doesn’t have the elements of political greatness in him. I’m not ready to conclude that yet, though, I admit, I’ve been tempted over the past few weeks.

It does seem clear to me, however, that if Mr. Obama is to have a chance to create a significant and well-regarded presidency he has to find a way to get out of the bubble. There’s an irony about Obama’s bubble problem. He announced as he entered the presidency that he was very aware of it and was going to take steps to prevent its catching him up. I have no idea what those steps have been. I haven’t seen them.

I recall a conversation the present had with Brian Williams about a year ago. While they were driving in a car somewhere, the NBC anchor asked Mr. Obama whether he paid attention to the arguments on the cable news programs. The answer, for which the president later received congratulations, was that he didn’t. Nothing said on those programs, the president explained, could teach him about what was really happening in the world.

The blather on the news shows might not show the president what’s actually happening, but it could show him what major components of his electorate think is happening. And that’s information a president needs.

If the president converses only with persons who pass as serious, thoughtful, and well-informed, then he’s slicing himself away from most of the thought and talk in America. A president who is not fully aware of the irrational and balmy ideas circulating among the public, and who doesn’t work to interact with and manage those ideas to his own advantage, is in the bubble of bubbles. He may know about his own version of actuality, but he’s divorced from political reality. If you don’t keep up with what Rush Limbaugh is saying then you can’t convincingly refute it.

Obama needs sometimes to step out of his Apollonian dream and immerse himself in the bacchanal which is the country he’s trying to govern. It’s not the pretty place sentimental American boosters proclaim it to be. There are piles of bloody muck all over the land and if you ignore them they’ll continue to spread.

At this point in his presidency, Obama has failed, and in fact has obstinately refused, to tell the American people who his opponents are and what they’re trying to achieve. I saw the president on TV just a couple weeks ago saying that John Kyl, the junior senator from Arizona, is a conscientious public servant who is working sincerely to improve American security, this in response to Kyl’s attempt to block ratification of the Start Treaty. If Obama actually believes this then his head is further in the clouds than anyone has imagined. And if he doesn’t believe it, then he shouldn’t be telling lies to the public in order to appear sweetie face.

I know, there’s just so much time in the day, and the president can’t sit around all the time listening to Fox News. But if he doesn’t ever listen to Fox News, then he might as well open his arms to vicious men and say, “Eviscerate me!”

Might he have a Jesus complex? Might he think that by sacrificing himself to the forces of graft, greed, and bigotry he can spark an awakening in the country? Gosh! I hope not.