Rasmussen reports a sea change in how the public views the Obama presidency.  And at 58% his popularity is good but not messianic.  About where Bush 43 was at this point, if not a point or two lower.

More and more, staunch and blinkered supporters of Obama are realizing they’ve been sold a bill of goods.

As many feared, Obama the celebrity seems more interested in the trappings of the office than the actual job.  If he sticks it out for the whole term (singular) it will be the longest he’s held any position.  At the pace he’s setting now, he is single-handedly rehabilitating Jimmy Carter’s reputation as the worst president ever.  Still a close second though.

I didn’t expect another totalitarian update so soon, but this crisis is definitely not going to waste for the fascist wing of the White House.  I mean that in the strictest sense of the word - the government has no business taking control of the market to the extent they are planning.

With job approval numbers around 50%, it’s safe to saythe new administration is on its way to record low numbers, even by media-aggravated Bush standards.  Pre-empting American Idol tonight may not be the way to turn those numbers around.

Remember that blue-ribbon panel appointed to solve the economic woes?  The White House hopes you don’t, because after all the foofrah, they haven’t done squat.  My guess is they won’t either, until they’re shamed into holding a public meeting.  It’s all about feeling good about doing nothing, and creating the appearance that you care.

Asked about Obama’s right to solicit candid suggestions, Shapiro said, “If he wants private advice, he should pick up the telephone. He can call anybody he wants. If he wants to form a presidential advisory committee, they ought to meet in public.”

Even 60 Minutes is starting to figure it out.

Byron York has a good piece on the growing sense that hey, maybe we elected a far-left liberal after all.

The president is skipping this year’s Gridiron dinner and musical comedy shindig. Can’t say I blame him, but the press types are bending over backwards to rationalize the fact that they’ve been used and now abused by the guy they dragged over the finish line.

Members emphasize that Obama’s absence hasn’t changed any songs or the lineup. Associate member Annie Groer said that, even without the president, “it will be no less a schmooze-fest.”

As for Obama’s choice, Groer said, “I don’t see it as an insult. I think his priorities are perfectly in order.”

Right - having served your purpose, your usefulness is at an end.

And to think they called John Kerry a flip-flopper:

On Wednesday, only two days after he lifted President Bush’s executive order banning federal funding of stem cell research that requires the destruction of human embryos, President Barack Obama signed a law that explicilty bans federal funding of any “research in which a human embryo or embryos are destroyed, discarded, or knowingly subjected to risk of injury or death.”