President Obama, Step Aside

President Obama, I think it's time to give up playing President, and let the adults do the dirty work.

Your party is in disarray. Democrats have lost another Congressional seat in a 3-to-1 Democratic District. A landslide victory in a Nevada Congressional district underscores the obvious: you are not popular, and the country wants change, but they do not want you to be a part of it.

What better move for you and your party than to step down, not run for reelection?

You said it yourself: Who would want to be President for two terms, anyway? Most presidents peter out after their first term, and even if they win reelection, they are reduced to lame-duck fixtures after the sixth year, when the electorate often throws members of his party out of office in larger numbers.

Don't worry if you need help to accomplish this humbling task. President Lyndon Johnson, the failed architect of the Great Society, declined on nation television to seek reelection in 1968. His poor showing in the New Hampshire primaries sealed his withdrawal from the Presidential race that year.

Yes, many on the left will say that you are all but handing the Presidency to the Republican candidate if you do not seek to be reelected. Yet consider the bright side for your party. At least you will soften the shellacking that the Democrats will endure in the 2012 Congressional elections. Your party's caucus must defend twenty-three seats, whose current Senators are not sitting very well with their constituents. In contrast, the Republicans only have to safeguard ten.

If you withdrew your renomination for the Presidency, at least your Democratic colleagues in Congress would not be running for reelection while trying to distance themselves from your failed economic, domestic, and foreign policies.

Unfortunately, after nearly three years in office, the American people have become aware of your greatest personal trait --er, liability -- your elite vanity. You came into office as the "Change we have been waiting for". You still hold determinately to that title, in spite of the ever-widening repudiation you and your party are suffering. From lobbying for the Olympics in Chicago, to attempting to broker peace in Israel, to receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, only to continue waging unpopular wars in the Middle East, you have not lived up to your promises nor your self-imposed potential.

Still, my appeal is still worth the attempt. So, please President Obama, for the sake of your pride, your party, and the American people, please step aside. Let some other hapless Democrat make an attempt to run for the Presidency. At least that individual will have the moniker of staving off the smashing defeat and defection of independents and disaffected Democrats into the opposing camps and salvaging a competitive political party for the next twenty years.