BY WILLIAM F. GAVIN

Recently, after days of fasting and contemplation (well, to be truthful, just as I was finishing  my second glass of chardonnay last evening), I had a revelation: contrary to firmly-held beliefs among Republicans, President Obama is not a socialist or a Kenyan or a Chicago pol with a bogus college degree, or even much of a doctrinaire left-winger.

He is, instead, a skilled hypnotist.

We all know what effect he has  had on his many cultists in the news media: glazed eyes, instant obedience to his suggestions, loss of inhibitions leading to a total abandonment of professional standards and ethics, and a kind of goofy grin like the one we find on the face of Alfred E. Neuman of Mad magazine fame.

For years now, we all have known Democratic friends who, when Obama’s name comes up, no matter what the context, automatically start cursing Fox News, berating the NRA, and damning the rich. These symptoms of total submission and surrender of independent thinking on the part of folks who boast of their intelligence and commitment to reason can be explained only by an insidious hypnotic power that Mr. Obama possesses. I think all the experts agree with me on this one.

But the more I think about it, the more it seems that Mr. Obama  has also fiendishly manipulated Republicans into doing silly things through the power of hypnosis. Remember when South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson suddenly yelled out “You lie!” during the President’s speech on health care in 2009?

When he came out of his spell, Mr. Wilson apologized, but the damage had been done. Obama, giving a so-so speech on a plan that a majority of Americans did not understand and did not want, looked like a victim, and gained sympathy. Why would a Republican give Obama that kind of boost unless hypnosis was involved?

And who can forget Mitt Romney’s little discourse on the 45% of Americans lusting for food stamps and other free goodies?

It might be argued that when Mr. Romney’s analysis was made, President Obama was not in the audience and therefore could not have hypnotized him. But, see, (let me pour just one more half-glass of chardonnay) that’s the point–Obama can hypnotize people even when he is not with them!

On The Shadow, the great radio program of yesteryear, the announcer used to say that crime-fighting Lamont Cranston–the Shadow–could “cloud men’s minds so they could not see him.” Exactly my point.

Obama has gotten into the heads of Republicans so much that we don’t even know he is doing it. The GOP  today obsesses about Obama in a way that has not been seen in American politics since the days when “That Man in the White House” got into the heads of Republicans from 1933 to 1945 and made them so angry they couldn’t think straight.

And so long as a political party is in that condition, the hypnotist wins. Stupid, deeply personal attacks are made on him, turning off a part of the electorate, bizarre motivations are attributed to every move he makes, giving his media zombies the chance to make him look victimized, and, too often, anger is the only emotion some voters see or hear from Republicans.

I am reminded of  the Duke of Wellington, just before the battle of Waterloo. He looked at his soldiers, tough cockneys from the worst slums in Europe, and even tougher Irish, Scots, and Welsh. He turned to an aide and said: “I don’t know if they will frighten Napoleon, but, by God sir, they frighten me.”

I have gotten a similar feeling when I hear Republicans say personal things about Obama. They are not frightening Obama, but anger frightens voters if it is the only emotion they see.

Let me quickly point out that I am not immune — I have also fallen under the anti-Obama spell. After Romney’s defeat in November, I went through the five steps of healing, tried political grief counseling, and thought of consulting Dr. Phil. I wrote anti-Obama screeds (as late as last week, on this site) but my new vision has taught me this:

Obama isn’t the issue. He is a mile wide and an inch deep, always has been. He is already in the history books, but I think his chapter will be entitled: “Strange Interlude,” or, given that his public persona, so full of disdain for us and confidence in himself, is just a facade, maybe “The Potemkin Presidency.” We had a clear chance to defeat him in 2012 and we blew it, partly, I believe, because we were so obsessed with him personally and not concentrating on the grunt work needed to defeat him.

So—and I include myself in this—let’s break his spell by concentrating on the facts of the recent scandals, toning down the rhetoric while getting ready for the long haul, and constructively using all that wasted anger-energy in reconciling differences within the party. Forget about Obama. He is, right now, an entirely irrelevant  person. Our task is not to take him on or to show how angry we are. Our task is to save the country. And the way we do that is by sticking to our principles, staying on the offense without being offensive and defending our values without  scaring voters.

In the meantime, if  the president  invites you to one of these White House dinners he has recently inaugurated, and he starts putting a flashing object before your eyes and  tells you that you are very sleepy . . . so very sleepy—run home, take a cold shower, and have a good night’s sleep. There’s constructive work to be done.

Editor’s Note: William F. Gavin was a speech writer for President Richard Nixon and long-time aide to former House Republican Leader Bob Michel. Among his books is his latest, Speechwright, published by Michigan State University Press.