Obama's 100 days

President Obama's first 100 days have been "illuminating," said the Chicago Tribune in an editorial. A lot can change after the ritual observance at this early point in a presidency—it certainly did for George W. Bush, who was praised for his low-key leadership before 9/11 changed everything. But we do know that "the calm, thoughtful mien he displayed on the hustings was the real Obama."

"The most important thing we now know about Barack Obama, after nearly 100 days in office," said Joe Klein in Time, is that he intends his presidency to mark "a radical change of course." And not just from the path of his predecessor, or the 30-year Reagan era, "but also from the quick-fix, sugar-rush, attention-deficit society of the postmodern age."

"For now, most Americans seem to consider that Obama is the right man for troubled times," said Leonard Doyle in Britain's Telegraph. But not all of his policies are popular, "and opinion polls also reveal uneasiness with his decision to shut down the Guantanamo Bay detention facility within a year." And the "cat calls from the right" are just beginning.

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Obama's still popular enough to fend off his critics, for now, said National Review in an editorial. But some of his policies are already in trouble—Card Check unionization is "dead in its present form, and cap-and-trade is on life-support." His big-spending, liberal over-reaching is giving conservatives "new energy and new unity," which could mean that Obama's "hubris will prove his undoing."