The unsustainable Obama

Michael Goodwin:

One of President Obama's favorite words is "unsustainable." It also happens to be the perfect description of his standing with the American people.

Polls consistently find he is personally more popular than his major policies. That situation is unsustainable - something has to give. The first law of politics says the two must eventually get in sync.

Bet that Obama's popularity will give. In part that's because, even if he wanted to, he can't undo the big policies the public doesn't like, especially his adding to the deficit and his aggressive push to get government more involved in private industry.

Another reason is that Obama doesn't want to change course and ridicules those who think he should. At a Democratic fund-raiser Thursday, the President reportedly mimicked a robot as he called criticism of his policies "predictable."

His partisan audience yukked it up, but the last laugh may be on Dems who follow their audacious leader too closely. Dem gains in the last two elections came primarily from conservative-leaning districts and some members already are worried about re-election. If the tide turns against Obama, they could be in trouble.

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Nearly 70% of those polled are worried about Washington's intervention in the economy and 58% said Obama and Congress should focus more on the deficit. Most disapproved of Obama's decision to close the terrorists' prison at Guantanamo.

Similarly, the Pew Research Center found Obama's approval on the economy has declined from 60% in April to 52% now.

A third poll, by the New York Times and CBS, found 60% of Americans believe Obama doesn't have a plan to deal with the deficit. Less than half approve of how he is dealing with health care and automakers.

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Not only does he not have a plan, he does not have a clue on dealing with the deficits. Well, he does seem to think he can spend his way out of it, but not anyone else is buying that, especially people who used to buy treasury securities. Voters would like to like this guy but his policies will keep on making that harder and harder to do.