Last November, Democrats seemed to be justified in believing that their party had won a victory of genuine significance. The ideological differences between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney were clear-cut, and Obama was re-elected. Despite the advantage that Republicans initially enjoyed in Senate races, Democrats increased their majority to 55, and that new majority is more liberal than the old one. In races for the House, more voters cast ballots for Democratic than for Republican candidates, though Republicans kept their majority thanks in large part to gerrymandered districts. But if you step back now, look at government as a whole, and think about the likely course of politics in the next several years, things look different. In what was a bad year for Republicans, they emerged with enough power to stymie major Democratic legislative initiatives and to advance key items on their own agenda through the arms of government that they continue to control. In other words, the United States...

A lthough understatement is an attractive quality in most lines of work, politics is different. Framing achievements so as to get timely bragging rights for them is part of the job, if you want to keep it. Since most politicians are only too eager to claim credit for any positive development, this isn’t usually an issue; indeed, some political scientists try to explain everything politicians do as driven by efforts to take credit and avoid blame. But then there’s Barack Obama, who as president has succeeded in avoiding credit for things he has accomplished and taking the blame for things his predecessor did. Therein lies a tale—and a lesson. Obama’s biggest failures in the credit department are the subject of a new book by Michael Grunwald, The New New Deal: The Hidden Story of Change in the Obama Era . The tale Grunwald tells is about the 2009 stimulus bill, and it’s not hype to call the story “hidden”—though the crucial details, like the clues in a good mystery, have been hidden in...