President Obama remains in a fairly strong — but no longer commanding — political position. The RCP poll average of Obama’s job approval rating is 56 percent. But if one carefully tracks the evolution of public sentiment since Obama assumed office, one would notice several trends — nascent but discernible — that should concern Obama and encourage conservatives.

The first has to do with the basic philosophical orientation of Americans. A recent Gallup poll found 40 percent of Americans described their political views as conservative, while only 21 percent as liberal. Gallup also found that Americans, by a two-to-one margin, say their political views in recent years have become more conservative rather than more liberal. And a Pew survey released in May found that since the election, there has been “no consistent movement away from conservatism, nor a shift toward liberalism.”

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