"On Friday, the president’s Chicago campaign team sent a message that little is off limits..."

"... using a searing video to raise doubts about Mr. Romney’s toughness in a national security crisis. They followed that up on Tuesday with a hard-hitting, kitchen-sink television commercial accusing Mr. Romney of sending jobs overseas and of sheltering his personal wealth in Swiss bank accounts. And then, in a seamless transition, Mr. Obama was in Afghanistan on Tuesday afternoon, vividly reminding Americans of the weighty responsibilities that he shoulders as the nation’s commander in chief and — by way of the one-year anniversary — of his decision to approve the raid that killed Osama bin Laden."

From a NYT opinion piece called "Romney Confronts Power of the Presidency," by Michael D. Shear. An alternate headline might be "Obama Embarrassingly Deploys the Power of the Presidency for Campaign Purposes."

When they shift back into campaign mode on Saturday...

Back?

Mr. Obama and his wife, Michelle....

A silly locution, found only in the New York Times.

... will bring to a close the first week of the general election campaign with a pair of huge campaign rallies in Ohio and Virginia that are intended to rekindle memories of his 2008 campaign.

I think this is a terrible mistake, going huge as a way to bring back the hugeness of 4 years ago. It's huge already to be President. You can't pile hugeness on top of that. And the hugeness of the past was something that built up, beginning from an unlikely underdog position, marked by the word "hope." This actually could work. How do you bring that feeling back? It's an intimate feeling, a sense that this new person has emerged. But a President holding 2 giant rallies? Going small is what would remind us of the past.

But the NYT's Shear is promoting the idea that Romney's in trouble, Romney's going to get it, because the President has the power of the Presidency to unload on the candidate who's so far only had to fight off midgets (or as Shear puts it — apparently without much knowledge of Bible stories — Romney's been "the Goliath in a field of Davids"). This appropriation of the power of presidency becomes an issue. It's an ugly thing when we can see it. Shear ends his piece with what is obviously going to be the Obama side of that issue:

The weaving of campaign and official business is the hallmark of presidential reelection campaigns, perfected by previous administrations of both parties. And Mr. Obama’s team will be no different in making use of the trappings of his office.

Mr. Obama’s team will be no different? Other's have "perfected" the "weaving"? I'm not seeing perfect weaving (or "seamless transition"). I'm seeing really crude and clumsy weaving and seams all over the place.