Via Matt Yglesias ,

The new CQ study gives Obama a higher mark than any other president since it began scoring presidential success rates in Congress more than five decades ago.

Yglesias thinks that legislative success won’t lead to electoral success in the 2010 mid-terms because to get these legislative victories, he’s had to alienate his base on the left thereby eroding support among the die-hard activists needed to work for democratic candidates to keep them in power.

He’s probably right. At least that’s what history would say. But I can’t shake a nagging feeling that our assumptions of a Republican landslide won’t come to fruition. I still hold to the view that this president is playing a different game than his opponents. The fact of his legislative successes is testament to this. While he has received non-stop criticism for his handling of health care, he’s about to get near universal coverage (imperfect bill, I know). He seems to be able to “grind out” policy debates until the opponents run out of steam.

This grinding has undoubtedly taken its toll on his popularity. CNN has his approval rating at 46%, an all-time low for him.

It seems to me that what makes Obama a special politician is he has a keen sense of politics as narrative. He seems to have these periods where he doesn’t seem in control of the message, where he’s allowing others to define him (e.g. 3 am phone call). But when this happens, he has a unique ability to respond to what others might consider a political crisis (Pastor Wright, Nobel Prize, etc.) and actually coming out stronger for it. I have a hunch he’s playing some kind of “rope a dope” with his political opponents, but I’m not sure how it’s going to end