James Fallows offers his current evaluation of Obama in the current issue of The Atlantic. Unlike most pundits, Fallows acknowledges the difficulties involved in assessing Obama's performance thus far. Often, we - and history - change our mind when a president serves a second term. Fallows thinks that Obama really was not ready for the presidency in 2008, but that is true of many of our presidents. He believes that Obama has grown in these three years and will continue to grow should he win in November.
Fallows contends that in many ways Obama's situation is much like that of Harry Truman. Truman won in 1948 by portraying the legislature as a "do-nothing" Congress, a strategy that Obama now seems to be adopting. However, I think there is a world of difference. Admittedly, I was a kid when Truman ran and now I'm an old man. My sense - and I think history's sense - of Truman was of a man who really believed in something beyond his re-election. Obama has not demonstrated that quality to me.
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