Paul Krugman is writing about "'Obama paradox' — the supposedly mysterious disconnect between the president’s achievements and his numbers."

But the discrepancy he's talking about is:

The administration has had multiple big victories in Congress, most notably on health reform, yet President Obama’s approval rating is weak. What follows is speculation about what’s holding his numbers down: He’s too liberal for a center-right nation. No, he’s too intellectual, too Mr. Spock, for voters who want more passion. And so on.

Wow. I remember when the discrepancy was he's so much more well-liked than any of the policies his Congress is enacting. I'm going to adopt the hypothesis that there's no discrepancy at all.

Krugman goes on to say that people are mainly just unhappy about the painful economic realities, and Obama should just do things that will improve the economy and not worry about what people will say and think about the specific policies. Just do what will work, let that happen, and the people will be happy again.