OBAMA'S DWINDLING POWER

By DICK MORRIS

Superficially, the United States appears to have a presidential system, but in fact it more and more resembles a parliamentary form of government. When a president loses the approval of the majority of the voters and polls reflect that his ratings have fallen substantially below 50 percent, he loses his power. In this context, polls are like parliamentary votes of no confidence in European systems. While the government does not fall if it loses in the polling, it limps on until either its ratings improve or it is voted out of office at the next election.

Clinton was called "irrelevant" after the congressional defeats of 1994, when his ratings hovered in the high 30s. Bush seemed almost out of power in the last years of his administration, when his approval dropped to the low 30s.

Now Obama faces the loss of power that comes with dropping poll numbers. The two early symptoms of this creeping impotence are his inability to pass the union card-check legislation or to force action on healthcare before the August recess, once highly touted administration goals.

As is usually the case, the apparent .... Continue Reading