In 2013, there were 6,261 black homicide victims in the US — almost all killed by black civilians.

The real story of the Ground Zero mosque is that the project only became feasible because of the appalling and astonishing fecklessness of the officials who were charged with the reconstruction of the site and the neighborhood all the way back in 2001.

This, of course, has no chance of passing. But then Tuesday night'€™s State of the Union address could be the first one in history deliberately designed solely to generate a Pavlovian rage response in members of the opposing party.

This has always been the way of presidential politics. The president rises above the fray while his surrogates go on the attack. They throw the spears and fling the mud; he sits upon the throne.

While negativity is politically useful, it is also demoralizing unless it is accompanied - and to some extent overshadowed - by elevated and inspiring ideas about the American future.

For Obama to save himself, he should be thinking about the example of an unlikely Republican predecessor: Richard Nixon.

Making recess appointments when the Senate isn't in recess is neither rational nor moderate. It's a raw misuse of executive power by a president whose love of government is his most vulnerable spot with the electorate.