New poll shows Obama's support at 50-50

Some polls show Obama coasting with a 65 percent job approval, but not in Zogby’s tally.

“The numbers are going down,” Zogby told the Herald. “It’s not because of the gaffes, but a combination of high expectations and that things aren’t moving fast enough with the economy.”

As for the president’s love of the limelight, it could backfire, according to a media watcher.

“I thought he overexposed himself weeks ago,” said Tobe Berkovitz, associate dean of Boston University’s College of Communication.

“I wonder when the public will say ‘Instead of being in front of the camera, be in front of a spreadsheet.’ "

That 65% is the Gallup number while Rasmussen is lowest at 56%. Significantly, it isn't so much that Obama's approval numbers have been falling as much as it is his negatives have been rising.

And Obama is planning another press event tonight (as long as the teleprompter isn't on strike). I would never call what Obama is doing tonight a "press conference" - that would be an insult to the hundreds of White House correspondents who actually got to act like journalists sometimes in the past. If the past is any indication, his numbers will go up following his appearance.

But what should be concerning the Obama communications crew is that in a matter of days, our president says or does something that reminds people how far left he is or that he appears to be in over his head. And as the good professor says above, he is already overexposing himself to the public. He can't keep going to the well and expect a response from the people every time.

Couple that with news that Members of Congress have not been bombarded with phone calls and emails demanding they support Obama's budget despite the Administration's efforts to mobilize their huge grass roots network and the picture that is emerging is that the president has lost his moment, that he will have to earn whatever he gets from now on and can't rely on his pretty words and cadres of hypnotized Obamabots to get it for him.