Arnie Parnes suggests in an article for The Hill that “The One” finds himself in a world of No. 2 without the people who helped him during his first term.
With his poll numbers falling and his second-term floundering so far, Obama has sought help from the former aides who helped catapult him to the presidency.
When the president held a recent strategy meeting on the Syria conflict, for example, he invited former political adviser David Plouffe, former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, former chief speechwriter Jon Favreau and former National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor to attend.
Ex-advisers like Plouffe, Gibbs and David Axelrod routinely participate in calls with current White House staffers, and Obama has invited the first-term all-stars to strategy sessions on other issues too, former aides said.
One former aide described Obama’s trusted inner circle from the first term as “the originals,” and speculated that if they were still at the White House they could have helped prevent some of Obama’s second-term blunders, such as the decision Monday to give a fiery speech criticizing Republicans just hours after 12 people were gunned down a few miles away at the Navy Yard.
“I don’t think he would have made that kind of mistake in the first term,” one former administration official said on Tuesday. “Sometimes it feels like there’s a void over there. There are some new, extraordinary folks over there, but it definitely leaves something to be desired.”
