What are They Thinking?

President Obama was in Maine yesterday and used the occasion of his visit to continue to mock opposition to his health-care bill. I've posted on this before, but have begun to think that perhaps this behaviour is not mostly indicative of some character flaw on the president's part, but rather a product of some deliberately pursued White House strategy. If it's the latter, I can't for the life of me figure out the logic of it. In sports, before the big game, coaches and players are typically boringly careful when interviewed not to give their opponents something to post on the locker room wall. Or, conversely, they're always on the lookout for the same in order to give their own team something to get fired up about. It's only seven months until the November elections and with opponents of the president and the Democrats already irate, this can only make them angrier still, and all the more likely to turn out in large numbers. So, I ask, what are they thinking?