When are people going to stop underestimating Obama?
First, it's Obama doesn't have what it takes. Then it's he might have what it takes but he doesn't have the experience. Then it's "white guilt." Now it's he's just lucky.
Perhaps David Broder never heard that luck is when opportunity meets preparation.
WASHINGTON -- It made no sense when Barack Obama left the country on his nine-day overseas tour for some of my fellow columnists to describe it as a high-risk venture.
Foreign leaders, who can read the polls as well as anyone, would go out of their way not to embarrass a man who may, six months from now, be president of the United States.
Obama prepares thoroughly for the big occasions. He is almost always well-briefed, and he was traveling in sharp company -- with Sens. Jack Reed and Chuck Hagel -- so you knew he would be thoroughly ready for these meetings. The chance of a major screw-up was minimal.
And, as millions of Americans who watched the primary campaign learned, Obama is invariably articulate and well-spoken. There would be no verbal gaffes.
So where was the risk? It existed mainly in the minds of some journalists and, perhaps, in the musings of Obama staffers who wanted to hype the journey.
Acknowledging all that, it is still the case that Obama has pulled it off in great style and thereby enhanced his credentials for the Oval Office.
What he could not have guaranteed was the role that luck played in the surrounding events and the cast of supporting players. When, on the first day of the trip, he stepped onto the basketball court at the air base in Kuwait and sent his first three-point shot cleanly through the basket, you knew the gods had decided to favor him.
