Bob Franken

The question wasn’t really as comprehensive as it could have been, but the Washington Post-ABC news poll was nevertheless startling: A majority of those responding, 52 percent of them, described Barack Obama’s presidency as a “failure.” Even one in four Democrats agreed to that word: “failure.”

We can debate whether that’s all that significant, or whether polls reflect more than just an instant of collective opinion, whether the methodology was all that it should have been.

We also should never forget how news coverage usually is superficial at best, or worse, ideologically incendiary, even ig...