To sum up: we see here contours of the 2012 reelection. Obama’s handlers accept that there is no record to run on after inauguration, and earlier hope and change vacuities no longer earn mass audiences. They grant that in his unguarded moments Obama reverts off the teleprompter to his Chicago DNA of waging puerile class warfare. They even agree that his twenty-something speechwriters cannot be trusted not to slip into the teleprompter something stupid like the ahistorical Cairo Speech or faux-Teddy Roosevelt diatribe

◼ Being There — the Obama Sequel - Victor Davis Hanson

President Obama went into a deep slumber in December. When he woke up this January, he found himself back even in the polls, with neither a press conference nor another overhyped presidential televised address to be heard. Sleep, quiet, and solitude — all that appears wiser than campaigning, visibility, and speaking, both for Obama and Americans. In short, the president has really hit on something: an Obama going into a Rip Van Winkle somnolent state might just mean waking up again as president....

But he can increasingly remain mute, while, on late Friday afternoons and amid raucous Republican infighting, dumping appointments and executive orders as a quiet leftist.