Trust and serve your base

Trust and serve if you wish to succeed. This is the advice Robert Scheer has given Barack Obama at this crucial juncture:

The Obama revolution, and there was the hope of one, might still succeed. But only if Barack Obama follows the model of the incredibly successful Reagan revolution and heeds the political base that made his presidency possible.

The problem with Scheer's advice? If Obama were to heed it, that is, if the president were to choose to follow the lead of his "base," he could manage this only by contesting and defeating the powerful interests which backed his candidacy during the campaign. How likely is it that Obama would take on let alone defeat the FIRE sector or, for that matter, the security-surveillance sector? It is not very likely at all. That strategy might end with a real revolution — a coup d'état that produces a dictatorship. Obama would avoid destabilization at all costs. The path Scheer advocates is the one a great leader would chose. Obama, on the other hand, merely wishes to be a successful president during a time of crisis.