South By North Strategies, Ltd.

Writing in The American Prospect, Robert Kuttner asks is President Obama’s preference for “Zen leadership” is beneficial.

Hands off, above the fray, turning the other cheek, representing decency and common purpose, conserving rather than wielding power, uncomfortable with popular movements he doesn’t control — by some alchemy, this style of leadership is expected to produce the voter approval that puts polite pressure on the other party to join the quest for consensus. Reciprocity and compromise then result in effective government and popular adulation.
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This has been Obama’s operating theory of power. For the most part, it hasn’t worked.
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At times in American history, a detached and bipartisan presidency did work. Republican Dwight Eisenhower had his staff collaborate closely with Democratic Speaker Sam Rayburn and Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson. Ike, the war hero, loomed benignly as a figure above party.
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As late as the 1990s, there were still moderate Republicans — and no economic catastrophe. Today, we live in drastically different times, ill-suited to Barack Obama’s operating theory of a conciliatory, above-the-fray presidency. At best, it may save his own re-election ….  Either way, the cost is Obama colluding in the shift of our politics further to the right and the weakening of the president’s own party.