Though President Obama‘s first term was characterized by anemic economic growth, decreasing household income, prolonged joblessness, an unpopular health law, foreign policy blunders and bitter partisanship, the electorate seemed stubbornly unwilling to lay any of it at his feet. As late as July 2013, 35 percent of Americans assigned George W. Bush a “high degree” of blame for the economy versus only 19 percent who named Obama alone.

Now the spell appears to have been decidedly broken. The benefit of the doubt Obama enjoyed for more than four years has been depleted. The Benghazi, IRS and Veterans Affairs scandals; the disastrous rollout of Obamacare (and the revelation of presidential dishonesty); the molasses economy; the Syria “red line” fiasco; the feeble response to the Ukraine mess; the new EPA taxes on coal; and the utterly tone-deaf treatment of the Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl trade have combined to convince the country that Obama is out of his depth. A Fox News poll found that 55 percent of voters believe that Obama has made the country weaker. CNN found that 61 percent disapprove of his handling of the economy, along with 63 percent who disapprove of his handling of the health care law, and 57 percent who disapprove of his management of foreign policy (the poll predated the Bergdahl trade).