Aside from her skills at being able to be in two places at once (Derry, New Hampshire and Jerusalem), Maureen Dowd is now a couples therapist, examining the relationship between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

Even newly armored by the spirit of Camelot, Barack Obama is still distressed by the sight of a certain damsel.

It’s already famous as The Snub, the moment before the State of the Union when Obama turned away to talk to Claire McCaskill instead of trying to join Teddy Kennedy in shaking hands with Hillary.

[…]

Last winter, after news broke that he was thinking of running, he winked at her and took her elbow on the Senate floor to say hi, in his customary languid, friendly way, and she coldly brushed him off.

It bothered him, and he called a friend to say: You would not believe what just happened with Hillary.

[…]

But Obama is the more emotionally delicate candidate, and the one who has the more feminine consensus management style, and the not-blinded-by-testosterone ability to object to a phony war.

As first lady, Alpha Hillary’s abrasive and secretive management of health care doomed it. She voted to enable W. on Iraq so she could run as someone tough enough to command armies.

So let me see if I have this right: Ms. Dowd thinks that Barack Obama is too sensitive to be president because he gets upset about Hillary Clinton giving him the cold shoulder, and she thinks Ms. Clinton is too abrasive and secretive, and underlying all of this is the issue of gender: men and women should behave a certain way.

Obama is right to be scared of Hillary. He just needs to learn that Uncle Teddy can’t fight all his fights, and that a little chivalry goes a long way.

If Ms. Dowd ever gets tired of writing her column, she can always get a gig on The View.