Earlier this month New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd seemed to sour on President Obama (“One and Done?”):



The leader who was once a luminescent, inspirational force is now just a guy in a really bad spot.


But with yesterday’s column (“Sleeping Barry Awakes”), Ms. Dowd is back in the bag (I mean fold). All it took was his Thursday speech, delivered with great emotion and more than a soupcon of anger, to get Dowd to see reason:



WOW, what a relief.



The president was strong and House Republicans were conciliatory….



The president’s supporters had a single reaction to the fiery address to Congress: It’s about time. But as before when Obama had tried to pivot to jobs, an emergency intervened: Democratic surrogates on TV had to talk about the 9/11 plot before being able to talk about the jobs plan.


Yeah, drat those 9/11 commemorations.


Like most of the mainstream media, Dowd remains mostly in Obama’s pocket, though his situation is so abysmal that even she must acknowledge it. Yes, the president is beset with problems: 



There was only one teensy-weensy problem: The president is weak and House Republicans are obstructionist.



Congressional Republicans, heeding polls indicating that their all-out assault on President Obama was risky, finally tempered their public comments after the jobs speech on Thursday and stopped acting like big jerks.


There are two things to note about Dowd’s Sunday column: (1.) The people who support Obama–and that would be the media–may wish his policies had worked better, but that is a secondary issue. They will still try to help the president be re-elected. (2.) Their analysis of the president’s plight is all wrong.


Dowd seems to think that the problem is that the president is no longer “master of his own narrative.” She says nothing of the bad policies that have led to so much suffering in the country. She either doesn’t understand policy or she just doesn’t care. The idea that it’s policies, not lackluster speeches, is not something Ms. Dowd is willing to face. So prepare for the mainstream media to work hard for Mr. Obama in 2012. They may be less effective than in the past, but they will be there for him.


Ain’t love grand?