Back in 2007, John Fortier and I did a book called Second-Term Blues on how George W. Bush had governed after his reelection. John and I started with an essay on the usual characteristics of second-term presidencies, and measured Bush against them. This is a good time to do the same with Barack Obama.
We identified a set of characteristics that defined presidents reelected to a second term from FDR on. Let’s look at them. [cont.]
Norm Ornstein