Stretching the art of compromise

In winning the Nobel Peace Prize and sending more troops to Afghanistan, president Obama had to “tap dance” more furiously than ever. He's already lost score of his staunchest supporters, including my wife, and he's puzzling the rest. While I'm still on board and giving the man the benefit of the doubt, I've come to the conclusion that he's much better at delivering speeches than acting courageously. The outcome of the Afghan conflict is the gamble he's chosen to take and will define more his political survival than his presidency.

Sure, he inherited a hell of a mess from his predecessor and had his finger stuck for almost a year in the proverbial crack on the dike, but he's been acting more as a consummate politician than a fearless leader and that precisely where he's about to lose me. I must give him credit for pushing health care reform as far as he did, but his positioning on the political board game will demand more and more from him, given his ambiguous choices; will he be able to keep dancing as the orchestra pushes up the pace?