The deck is stacked against Obama.

Obama does not need to worry as much as past Democratic presidents about being labeled soft on national security – not after giving the order that led to the assassination of Osama bin Laden. No, his biggest concern is being labeled tone deaf on joblessness and debt.

Clearly, the Obama presidency hasn’t wiped out racial prejudices.

Most political journalists come to Washington because they’re snappy writers, big thinkers, or news breakers. Me? My ticket to the big leagues had little to do with talent. It was mostly about the governor I was covering, Bill Clinton.

Andrew Jackson was the first president to claim that the desires of the public overrode Congress’s constitutional prerogatives. Virtually every president since Jackson has claimed the mantle, even while lacking two ingredients of an electoral mandate: a landslide victory and a specific agenda.

Obama is capable – as evidenced by his first-term success with health care reform. But mandate-building requires humility, a trait not easily associated with him.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is the most influential woman in Washington – for what she has accomplished and for what she may yet do: win the presidency.

We should measure our children not by the mountains they conquer but by their efforts to climb. Oh – and let them pick which hills to scale.

Perhaps we should wait until his second term begins before carving Barack Obama’s face in Mount Rushmore. Is that asking too much?

It’s a bit unfair to accuse Obama of dividing the nation when the facts show that it already is.