(CNN) -- Think that President Barack Obama has done a back flip on Iraq and Syria, gotten that old-time religion and is now a convert to the "let's kill them wherever we find them" approach of his predecessors? Think again, or at least lay down until the feeling passes. Indeed, stripped to its essence, what the President has outlined isn't some grand strategy to transform the region or even to "ultimately destroy" ISIS; it's a much narrower transactional one to protect the homeland. And here's why: The speech the President gave is quite consistent with who he is and what his priorities have been all along, particularly relating to counterterrorism. Sure he's now morphed from a desire to avoid militarizing the U.S. role in Syria to a new willingness to do so. But the reason he's traveled down that road is critical.
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Has President Obama reverted to George W. Bush's policy on terrorism and the Middle East?
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Aaron Miller says the President instead is narrowly focused on preventing homeland terrorism
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He says Obama long ago put his faith in counterterrorism, including drone strikes
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Obama knows his presidency will be judged partly on whether he kept U.S. safe, Miller says
Indeed he must be perceived and in fact deliver on doing everything he possibly can to preempt and prevent @placeholder from striking here or in the region against Americans.