WHALEN: Obama’s Osama optics

OPINION:

There’s a scene in the movie “Bull Durham” where pitcher “Nuke” LaLoosh, jubilant over retiring the side in order, is dressed down by catcher “Crash” Davis.

“Can’t I just enjoy the moment?” gripes the pitcher.

To which his battery-mate acidly replies, “The moment’s over.”

Which brings us to President Obama’s Afghanistan visit (typical for this spendaholic administration: the government flying Air Force One on a 14,000 mile-round trip, at considerable taxpayer expense, to make a 15-minute speech all the more theatric).

The surprise drop-by was Mr. Obama’s “moment” - to take another bow for Osama bin Laden’s eradication and sell a cynical public on the merits of staying the course in that combat theater.

Still, that’s all it was - a moment. A nice speech, yes, but temporary gratification. Once the pre-dawn klieg lights were dimmed, so, too, was the public’s piqued interest. Which is why Republicans should relax. Like baseball, presidential campaigns are lengthy affairs, and many innings remain in this contest.

Two takeaways from Mr. Obama’s address:

First, it was a reminder of the power of incumbency. The White House had no trouble amping the moment’s drama, then getting its man free airtime on all the networks. That’s in contrast to Mitt Romney’s media availability the same day in New York City, accentuated by the prolonged heckling of a shrieking bystander. There’s a stature gap in the race, as there is any time a challenger takes on an incumbent - and it showed that day.

Second, the trip - and the days leading up to it, with Washington playing partisan hacky sack with SEAL Team 6 - underscores Team Obama’s strategic choice to wage this campaign frame-by-frame, rather than the grander mosaic of change and hope that swept Mr. Obama into office four years ago.

This isn’t a president seeking a second term on the power of transformative ideas or a stellar record. Instead, Obama-Biden 2.0 is a scavenger’s delight: picking fights with Rush Limbaugh over contraception and Republicans in general over student loans and the public safety net; throwing Mr. Romney to the dogs; politicizing the bin Laden raid to make his opponent seem trigger-shy.

Arguably, such machinations seem beneath the dignity of the office. They also are terribly pragmatic. Any day spent bickering over the bin Laden raid (one suspects the reason why the president’s campaign released that attack ad on Mr. Romney - it’s catnip for the media) is one less day the White House “loses” playing defense - trying to pump up a flatlining economy; trying to reanimate a president who, like that Tupac hologram at the Coachella music festival, seems an empty image of his former rock-star self.

There’s only one problem with this hodge-podge strategy: It won’t last. I can personally attest to this, having worked for another president who sought a second term amidst a slow economy - and thought his foreign-policy credentials would get him a pass on the domestic front.

Twenty years ago, George H.W. Bush was in the same straits as Mr. Obama. Sure, the nation was in a recession. But this was the man who made the tough call on Operation Desert Storm (remember the victory parade and the 90 percent presidential approval rating?) Besides, the Democrats had an obviously flawed nominee. Or so the Bush White House assumed.

Here’s what the former president learned the hard way - and why, if there’s another clandestine trip in Mr. Obama’s future, it should be to Houston, to hear it firsthand from Mr. Bush. First, that Desert Storm “bounce” had a shorter shelf life than most MREs - just as the bin Laden “bump” quickly fizzled. Second, the electorate wasn’t shopping for a trigger-puller in 1992. Then, as now, the national obsession was the economy. And here, the Obama White House has a problem, as the closest it comes to an economic strategy is tax hikes and class warfare.

If you didn’t care for this latest presidential mission, I have bad news: There’s probably more of the same ahead. Mr. Obama is the king of optics - though also an economic court jester.

But optics aren’t an agenda and visuals no substitute for genuine vision. The president may continue to have good innings, as he did in Afghanistan, but a strong challenge from Mr. Romney in the later innings will change the game.

And what happens then? Absent concrete ideas, a raison d’etre that doesn’t resonate beyond the liberal base and his biggest success a fading memory, Mr. Obama may have to call on the SEALs once again. This time, for a rescue mission.

Bill Whalen is a research fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution.