We are told Barack Obama has problems with his base. The New York Times headlined: "Liberal Revolt on Health Care Stings White House." Politico headlined: "Left rebels against health reform" and "Under Obama, the Left feels left out." At The Washington Post, a David Broder column carried the headline: "The president, abandoned by his party." And that's only in the past week.

It's hype. Obama's current Democratic approval rating, 84 percent, is above Bill Clinton or Jimmy Carter at the close of their first year in office. More Democrats approve of Obama than Republicans approved of Ronald Reagan (81 percent) at the close of Reagan's first year, according to Gallup polling.

In fact, Obama's Democratic approval has slid only a few points all year. Indeed, the further left on the political spectrum, the stronger Obama's support. Conservative Democrat approval: 77 percent. Moderate Democrat: 83. Liberal Democrat: 86.

The least of Obama's problems is with his base. Obama's rating among independents is in the low 40s. His support among Republicans is in the teens. It was not wayward Democrats who dragged Obama's public approval rating below 50 percent.

The support Obama enjoys within his base is average, compared to the eleven post-war presidents. But consider that Obama's Democratic rating ties John F. Kennedy at the close of year one. Of course, JFK was far more popular with everyone else.

So we have reality, as the Pew Research Center found, that 84 percent of liberal Democrats believe Obama is doing an excellent or good job "in standing up for the traditional positions of the Democratic Party."

And then we have the hype. Why the gap?

Blame a few prominent liberals and a political media that cannot resist drawing outsized conclusions from them. Former Democratic Party leader Howard Dean was the most well-known voice. Last week, Dean urged the Senate to kill the health care bill and expressed tepid enthusiasm for Obama's reelection.

This so-called liberal hullabaloo centers on the health care legislation. MSNBC's liberal primetime lineup came out swinging. Both Keith Olbermann and Ed Schultz opposed the bill. They saw the price of compromise as too high. Schultz went so far as to say to Obama on air, "your base thinks you're nothing but a sellout - a corporate sellout."

Leading liberal blogs echoed the sentiment. Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas twittered, "Time to kill this monstrosity coming out of the Senate."

Only days later, the Senate passed the health care bill with unanimous blue support—60 Democratic votes. Olbermann, Dean and Moulitsas failed to cow even a single liberal senator. Of course they failed. No political party would choose to fail at legislation so large, so consuming, because politicians are occupationally obsessed with political costs; and more political capital is riding on this bill than perhaps any legislation in decades.

It's also worth noting, most Democrats support the legislation. About six in 10 Democrats have steadily favored the health care bill for the past seven months, according to Pew, compared to a minority of the public overall.

Enter MSNBC's Chris Matthews, who knows what it takes to get big bills passed. Matthews on liberal health care naysayers: "I consider them Netroots. And if I see they vote in every election, or most elections, then I'll be worried. But I'm not sure they're regular, grown-up Democrats. I think a lot of these people are troublemakers ... They never ran for office, they're not interested in working for someone in public office. They get their giggles out of sitting in the back seat and bitching."

Moulitsas responded on Schultz's show. He said Matthews echoed "Beltway conventional wisdom" and was "trapped in this bubble." Moulitsas' latter remark could be called Freudian; many top political operatives have for years viewed ideological bloggers, like Moulitsas, as trapped in a bubble.

Back in 2007, Joe Biden was the only Democratic candidate to skip the YearlyKos convention of liberal bloggers. That brought the ire of Kosland.

"They say it's their party. Like hell it's their party! They are part of the party, like labor," Biden told me not long after. Biden was, obviously, correct.

Dean was always of Kosland. Dean's primary 2004 base were college educated liberal whites. That is also the general demographic makeup of the activist liberal bloggers. And liberal bloggers indeed were the loudest Deaniacs at the time.

Liberals are certainly not perfectly pleased with their man. Pew finds only a fifth of liberal Democrats believe Obama is listening most to the party's base. A majority believes Obama listens more to moderates. About a half year ago, liberal Democrats were divided on the question, 41 to 42 percent respectively.

But tension between Obama and liberal activists is inevitable. Expecting such, in an essay one year ago, I noted a 1983 survey of 350 conservative leaders. It found that almost two-thirds of respondents believed that Reagan had not carried out a conservative agenda.

Like Reagan, leaders in the president's base will express frustration. And like Reagan, that base will be there for Obama in the next presidential campaign.