"I hadn't given him enough credit for the economic measures undertaken at the very outset of the administration...we've already forgotten how worried everyone was back then."

One can treat every illness by feeding the patient a pound of aspirin;
there is a pretty good chance that for a short while he will look OK.
Saving the economics by pushing an infinite amount of money into
the hole to save status quo is this sort of treatment.

From von Hammerstein's manual on military unit command:

"I divide my officers into four classes; the clever, the lazy, the industrious, and the stupid. Most often two of these qualities come together. The officers who are clever and industrious are fitted for the highest staff appointments. Those who are stupid and lazy make up around 90% of every army in the world, and they can be used for routine work. The man who is clever and lazy however is for the very highest command; he has the temperament and nerves to deal with all situations. But whoever is stupid and industrious is a menace and must be removed immediately!"

Everyone in the administration is pretty industrious. None is clever and lazy.

"The problem Obama faces, alas, is that you don't get much political credit for preventing non-events. He'd be blamed if the 2008-09 depression had gotten worse, but he gets no applause for preventing any number of Very-Bad-Things-That-Might-Have-Occurred-But-Didn't."

This encapsulates the reason that I think Obama will be ranked very highly by history, but at the same time is really f***ing things up right now.

To me the most salient thing about Obama's character is that he is a poker player. You win in poker over a long series of hands. A good player tries to maximize his probability of winning any given hand, but does not try to go for broke. Over time the percentages add up; the guys who took big risks for big payouts have to fold, and you take home their money.

I have no doubt that the percentages will add up for Obama over four or eight years. But the scale of problems at the moment is such that he needs a couple of big, big wins.

Confusion of substantive and political critiques of the Obama administration's policies and record is practically a given in the environment today. It is worth separating the two -- worth it for observers of the administration, and even more so for the administration itself.

Walt's interlocutor at Cornell is largely correct. President Obama inherited the worst economy since the 1930s, a real crisis that without forceful action could have been much worse. He also inherited two wars, one of which had begun to go very badly. He inherited massive federal deficits, a tax code unreflective of recent changes in the American economy, crippled Departments of Justice and Interior, and a lengthy list of other burdens from one of the least worthy Presidents in American history. The comprehensive lousiness of that President, and of much of his administration, was the reason Obama got elected in the first place.

Obama made two critical mistakes right at the start of his administration. First, he underestimated the severity of the recession resulting from the financial crisis of 2007-08. A product, as was George W. Bush, of the modern permanent campaign culture, Obama compounded that error by following standard campaign procedure -- never admit a mistake -- and persisting in discussing the recession as a cyclical phenomenon that would soon (or eventually) turn around. This, more than anything, is what has made him seem out of touch to many voters who may not be able to explain what is happening to the economy, but who can see for themselves that it is very much worse than it looks from Washington.

This is the political consequence of Obama's first mistake. Substantively, it's now clear that the first stimulus bill he sponsored was too small and too heavily weighted toward "the usual suspects": tax cuts and increases in spending programs the government was pursuing anyway. Campaign procedure, once again, demands that Obama not admit this, leaving him now to react to Republican criticism without an effective response. It's no more than fair to point out that doing what his Republican critics now suggest -- no stimulus, no support for financial markets and so forth -- would have produced much worse results than Obama did. The substantive record is better than the political one.

The second mistake Obama made was to forget why he got elected. He and his people, like most liberals and nearly all people with an Ivy League background, think very well of themselves. Told all their lives that they are special, brilliant, elite in every sense of the word, they believe it implicitly. Obama in particular, even now, brings up his personal "story" (and sometimes his wife's) as part of the answer to every question. He and his inner circle regard it as inspirational. For most Americans, it isn't.

The political bottom line is that the American electorate does not make a black man President unless they are massively unhappy with the alternative. Obama and his team allowed the Republican Party's identification with George W. Bush to fade from public memory, throwing away his greatest political advantage. Franklin Roosevelt ran against Herbert Hoover Republicans for years after 1932; Jimmy Carter paid dividends to Ronald Reagan throughout Reagan's Presidency. George W. Bush, by contrast, was allowed to disappear. The Republican Party desperately needed a clean slate after eight years of Bush. Obama did his best to provide one.

Americans aren't looking for a model to admire or to emulate; they are looking for a President of the United States. They didn't make Barack Obama President because he had a great story: the single mother, the multiple autobiographies, the Harvard education (especially the Harvard education). They made him President because the last one let the country down so badly. By taking this for granted, and by underestimating the scope of the recession, Obama made many of the political problems he and his party face right now.

A final point: Obama has made substantive errors in individual policy areas. Most of them will not have immediate political consequences. That doesn't mean they never will, or that they are not important in their own right. There are a lot of Americans, though -- Stephen Walt is one of them -- whose perspective on some of these questions reflects a level of parochialism and even immaturity that does them little credit. The level of passion displayed by American advocates of both the Israeli and Palestinian causes is perhaps the most obvious example of people mistaking an issue of great interest to them with one of transcendent importance to the country.

Progressives aren't simply 'whining' about the lack of a public option. There are several issues that the Administration elected on their own to enact, under no real congressional or public pressure:

-Legalization of warrantless wire-tapping
-Targeting US citizens for assassination without charge
-Escalating the war in Afghanistan

Two domestic attacks (Umar Farooq Abdulmutallab and Faisal Shahzad) were not prevented by the 1 million plus payroll in the new surveillance state, but by the bombers' own incompetence and a few alert citizens (thank god for that, these two points were hardly raised in the media, only that we need more surveillance). If either of these attacks had succeeded, it would've been a disaster. Obama cannot take credit for their prevention.

Just judging his record of 'achievements' he's actually done (in opposition to his own campaign pledges) is more than enough to 'whine,' let alone what he failed to accomplish.

DON'T VOTE, let every party keep getting thrown out of office every two years.

Many criticize Obama deeply for the appearance that he is capitulating to Netanyahu on settlements and other important issues.

Isn't his performance on Israel/Palestine similar, that without the degree of pressure and scrutiny that he has directed on Netanyahu, that things would likely have been worse?

That there would not have been a 10-month slowdown on settlement construction (I don't know anyone credible that declares that there was no slowdown, not perfect but substantive), that there would be no communication on final status issues between Israel and Palestine.

The peace talks cannot possibly yeild a peace. That is not their intended product. Their intended product is a proposal to be ratified or not by the Palestinian population and Israeli knesset.

Its a very different standard, to creatively develop a document that is so confident of meeting each parties' needs, that it can be successfully presented to their communities' for their consent.

I don't believe that the two-state solution is objectively dead. That can only occur if the communities are so ehtnically integrated in each jurisdiction that a super-majority is not evident.

Or, if in both communities, the populations favor a civilist democratic government, in contrast to nationalist.

KEY HEALTHCARE REFORMS
Cost: $940bn over 10 years; would reduce deficit by $143bn
Coverage: Expanded to 32m currently uninsured Americans
Medicare: Prescription drug coverage gap closed; affected over-65s receive rebate and discount on brand name drugs
Medicaid: Expanded to include families under 65 with gross income of up to 133% of federal poverty level and childless adults
Insurance reforms: Insurers can no longer deny coverage to those with pre-existing conditions
Insurance exchanges: Uninsured and self-employed able to purchase insurance through state-based exchanges
Subsidies: Low-income individuals and families wanting to purchase own health insurance eligible for subsidies
Individual Mandate: Those not covered by Medicaid or Medicare must be insured or face fine
High-cost insurance: Employers offering workers pricier plans subject to tax on excess premium

According to the published excerpts from
Bob Woodward’s new book, Obama’s War,
President Obama was frustrated by the failure of the Pentagon
(SedDef Gates, JCS Chair Mullen, and CENTCOM chief Petraeus)
to give him an exit strategy for leaving Afghanistan.
But somewhat like the familiar story of the drunk
looking for his lost keys under the lamppost,
wasn’t Obama looking in the wrong place for an exit strategy?
The Pentagon certainly can start wars, continue wars,
and perhaps achieve victory in a war.
But if, as General McChrystal said,
there is no way to win a military solution to this conflict,
why expect the Pentagon to provide an exit strategy?

In Woodward’s book, and more generally in dealing with Afghanistan,
where is the search for a diplomatic solution?
Why did Obama, instead of tasking Defense for a solution,
not task State?
And why does the media not point out that this is the problem?

Skipping ahead, is not the real problem that
the objectives of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama do not agree.
We know what Hillary wants: feminist power in Afghanistan.
As long as Hillary is SecState, it seems
there is no real possibility for a viable, stable solution.

If American wants out of Afghanistan,
is it not necessary that Hillary be politely and gently shoved aside,
and someone put in at State who can broker a solution
that all those “beastly sexist Afghan men”
who, unfortunately for the feminists,
seem to have both resolve and staying power,
will accept?

I do strongly agree with your opinion on how every one just mentions the mistakes the president does.I am one of those people that from start since he won the elections believe he was entering dangerous territory. first of all our economy down the drain , people worrying that we will have the great depression repeating its self thats a lot to take. Not only that, knowing that people are expecting him to fail because i do believe that many people out there expect Obama to fail as a president. So far he has not done a bad job but their is more to be done in two years not a lot can be done and some people expected a miracle to be done by now. Things need to be done a bit at a time to be able to bring back stability to our nation. I do think Obama can make a change it will just happen slowly in time. There is so much that must be fix not only our economy but many other things too. All this needs to be done one at a time and just hope for the best.

Having voted for president Obama with a deep desire to see radical change away from the Bush administration's heavy-handed, self-righteous, divisive and morally repugnant foreign policy, I have been greatly disappointed in the stunning lack of change these past two years. You pointed out in your talk at Cornell that Obama's foreign policy team has been a big part of the problem. I would emphasize that as the key factor. Yes, the issues are complex, but he might have actually been able to move more quickly and radically away from Bush's policies if he had chosen others. The strategy of keeping his enemies close has backfired in a major way. Gates and Jones in particular were awful choices if the goal was to live up to the rhetoric of the Cairo speech. Domestic concerns did take over the agenda given the state of the economy, but if he had placed some better people in those key foreign policy positions, something closer to his own campaign promises might have been accomplished in the meantime.
I am hoping against hope that Obama's domestic policies will prove, in the long run, to have paid off. Unfortunately, given our media's impatience and insatiable appetite for controversy and criticism, things are really looking down. We are in sore need of someone to point out the accomplishments of this presidency - they ought to be recognized. Unfortunately, as you have pointed out, much of that story consists of educated guess-work about what might have happened if ... The really sad thing is that, in terms of foreign policy, the best that can be said of Obama is that he is not Bush or McCain - at least he has pulled out of Iraq and is pushing for peace in Palestine. Unfortunately, he is either unable or unwilling to really live up to his own rhetoric.

Well, just as we should be better at "giving our leaders credit for the bad things that don't happen on their watch," we also have to be careful not to accept their word that without them we'd all be living back in caves. And frankly the idea that without all those bailouts we'd be living back in caves—or the 1930's—seems to me to be the post-hoc product of a tremendous outgassing of self-interested propaganda by those self-interested leaders. And yet, in keeping with its shallowness (and partisan bias too I'd say) our main-stream media has just incredibly swallowed this propaganda without blinking an eye.

In the first place even *IF* it's true that the bailouts staved off a "meltdown" (whatever that is, never really defined one notes), for all we know because of the fundamentals that brought us to that brink and because those fundamentals haven't been changed all those bailouts did was postpone things for a worse crash which will force such fundamental changes.

But, in the second, what IS meant by this supposed "meltdown," and if indeed something like that would have happened how the hell can anyone say that the effect would have been short-lived, and vastly beneficial? After all we clearly live in a far more fast-paced economic world than before, so that in the wake of a "meltdown" one would expect the sharks to be in the water immediately, picking up the profitable pieces of the melted-down and mis-managed firms and etc. and proceeding to run them sensibly.

Instead, *and amazingly what no-one really denies,* what we did was bail out and indeed in a way enshrine a bunch of insanely irresponsible people and firms, and thus prevented other people their chance at doing it differently and better. You run a small bank with great ideas and you want to get large? Oops, sorry, you and your ideas can just go pound sand because despite the near-criminal management of this or that of the big banks and their insolvency, the gov't bailed 'em out so they can still underbid you and prevent you and your ideas from ever seeing daylight. Or, in other words, sorry, the encrusted elite win again ... solely because they are elites.

Wanna real blunt taste of the opposite, unexamined philosophy? Go Google that recent talk that the billionaire Charles Munger, VP of Berkshire Hathaway gave at the U of Mich. We should, in his words "Thank God" for those bailouts, and they certainly bailed out him and the Warren Buffets of the world.

But what about the little folks and bailing them out of their misbegotten mortgages and etc? Ah, sayeth Munger, "if you just start bailing out all the individuals instead of telling them to adapt, the culture dies.”

In other (inexplicable) words, the culture of the little "individuals" must remain one of responsibility and paying their debts and living with their decisions. But God forbid that one should insist on that same culture for the mega-firms. Because somehow—and here's the inexplicable part—they are always to get the do-overs and are to be relieved from their decisions and this irresponsible culture is somehow ... good.

Pfui, I say. Pfui when Bush did his bailouts and pfui when Obama did it. There were eight million ways to have bailed out the true far more innocent *victims* of the corporate irresponsibility seen without bailing out the *perpetrators* of that irresponsibility. E.g., if you were truly worried that if a couple of the big banks went down people could not get good (productive) loans for good economic activity, then make the gov't a lender for awhile to make those good loans until sense returned (probably quickly) and bankers started to realize the profits they were missing.

Instead what I suspect we'll see is that we've now consecrated a kind of officially supported, corrupt and inefficient economic oligarchy of the kind one sees in crappy little Third-World countries where no big concerns ever die as they should because they've got their government sto, essentially, always help them quash the competition.

It's disgusting. Beyond disgusting; obscene. Call it ... the Munger Philosophy. And I wouldn't bet a dime against the idea that just like those Third World kleptocracies the cost of following the Munger Philosophy means that we will just have a bigger crash sometime later, except that there's no World Bank big enough to step in and save us from the full effects of same.

So it's a little early to be praising Obama, it seems to me, and his solicitude for the Mungers of the world and their special "culture."

Some people got problems with the muslim World like Weekly Standard and Lieberman "they don't like Muslims"wether is Iran Or Indonesia

read this
THE WEEKLY STANDARD has obtained excerpts from the prepared text of Sen. Joe Lieberman’s speech, “The Future of American Power in the Middle East,” to be delivered Wednesday at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, D.C. It should cause quite a stir.

Here is what Lieberman will say:

“Some have suggested that we should simply learn to live with a nuclear Iran. In my judgment, that would be a grave mistake. And as one Arab leader I recently spoke with pointed out, how could anyone count on the United States to go to war to defend them against a nuclear-armed Iran, if we were unwilling to go to war to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran? Simply put, having tried and failed to stop Iran’s nuclear breakout, our country will be a poor position to contain its consequences.”

“It would also be a failure of U.S. leadership if this situation reaches the point where the Israelis decide to attempt a unilateral strike. If military action must come, the United States is in the strongest position to confront Iran and manage the regional consequences. This is not a responsibility we should outsource. We can and should coordinate with our many allies who share our interest in stopping a nuclear Iran, but we cannot delegate our global responsibilities to them.”

“The single most important test of American power in the Middle East today is whether we succeed or fail in stopping Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons capability, and how we fare on that test will surely affect our standing in the rest of the world.”

“It is time to retire our ambiguous mantra about all options remaining on the table. Our message to our friends and enemies in the region needs to become clearer: namely, that we will prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapons capability -- by peaceful means if we possibly can, but with military force if we absolutely must.”

It is absurd to credit Obama with "staving off an even deeper collapse of the U.S. and world economy" when his effort on that front was a "stimulus plan," which he signed into law February 17, 2009, and the National Bureau of Economic Research has determined that the recession ended in June of that year, only four months later.

Why does that make it absurd? Because economists almost universally agree that the effects of increased government spending do not show up in the economic data (in other words don't do anything) until about 6 months after the spending begins, and the spending in the Obama plan had not even begun to any significant degree by June, which was only three and a half months after the plan was signed into law.

So what does this mean?

It means Obama did NOT make things better, he instead took an economic recovery which the market was producing all on its own, as markets will do if they are allowed to, and essentially choked it off to leave us with what we have had since then -- an utterly lifeless "recovery."

Although your blog post makes a lot of good points about making sure we appreciate the good things that the president does, I have one major disagreement with it. Why should we be giving the president credit for not making the economy worse? Why should we give the president credit for not having a worse stimulus package? Isn't it his job to make sure things don't get worse? In the real civilian world, you are expected to make something better at your job. Increase sales of your product. Give great health care. If you make things worse (to a certain extreme), like turn off customers or make patients' conditions worse, you face the risk of being let go. However, with the president, he is guaranteed his job for 4 years (except for radical circumstances) so if things get worse, his popularity rating just drops. I believe it's important to support the president and acknowledge when things do go right, but I don't think there's missing credit. We'll give him credit when he gets something right, but I won't give him credit for making sure the bad things don't happen. In my mind, that's his job. That's the bare minimum we expect when we elect a president.

I think emilyw's framing of the problem is incredibly short term. To view Obama's presidency as an insulated performance would also blame him for the fact that there are still two wars going on, that North Korea and Iran are proliferating, even that Cuba is communist. Each was a long term trend that predated Obama's time in office. Obama has taken steps toward the resolution of these issues, and more importantly moderated the severity of the problems, and adjusted the rate of deterioration of these situations, if not started to improve them.
International politics isn't sales. To some extent you are selling ideas to international and domestic constituencies, but you also are acting in the context of an infinite number of factors of varying significance. It's like blaming the salesman if he prevents someone else from getting the sale or if the item makes a neighbor jealous. A salesman is expected to make a sale, and a president is expected to take contradictory actions by diverging constituencies. Which is more complicated?
Yes, the economy hasn't fully recovered. But hasn't Obama's handling of this recession been better than that of the Bush administration? It's when we have short-sighted, Herculean expectations of our leaders, and only give them credit for vast triumphs instead of little victories, that our political system splits into extremist camps. That's why we elect a president and then oust his party from control of congress because we think both actions will fix the same recession.

I see where both EMILYW and MITCHOCH are coming from in their altering viewpoints. I think the best way to frame the issue is to establish parameters and thereby allow members of either party to analyze this question most objectively. Whether or not you support Obama, it is difficult to dispute that he ran on a campaign of change. And, as pointed out in numerous posts, true, measurable, positive change has yet to come. Based upon this I believe Obama's reputation is where it should be and he is being given the little credit he deserves. If a candidate is going to emphasize change and win on those grounds, voters expect him to deliver. And, while it is clearly easier said than done, when Obama fails to deliver, his record fails as well. Had Obama not emphasized change in the way he did, perhaps more credit could be given. However, given the campaign promises he made to the American people, he has simply not done enough. No candidate stands before the American people and professes, "I will do my best to just not make things worse." But, as pointed out in this post, perhaps in order to be honest and credible that is exactly what they need to be doing.

I’m a little torn on how I feel about Obama’s administration thus far. He has done a few admirable things, most notably getting the (watered down) healthcare reform bill passed. It is also safe to say that he has “prevented” any major foreign policy disaster. But, I’m with EMILYW in that preventing major disasters is kind of the bare minimum we expect from a President. MITCHOCH, I think you should try and avoid putting words into EMILYW’s mouth. She’s not implying that it’s Obama’s fault for the two wars going on, or any of the other things that you mentioned. She’s simply stating that Obama has not made noticeable improvements on many of the major foreign policy issues of our time, something which I agree with.
I also think that your attack on her metaphor of comparing Obama’s job to a “normal” job like sales is unfounded. She was simply stating that, like sales, a job like the presidency comes with expectations, much like a standard job. Unlike a job like sales, you don’t have one or two bosses giving you a positive or negative performance review, you have a whole nation. Though the presidency is infinitely more complicated, I believe that the analogy holds. In fact, I’ll take it a step further. Like a job interview, in his campaign, Obama, like JTOLMATSKY said, campaigned on change. These issues are incredibly complex and difficult to “fix”, but Obama set these expectations for himself before he was “hired”, and if he doesn’t meet them, well, the people he works for (the American people) have a right to be angry.
Moving on from that conversation, I think it’s very interesting to see how Obama has lost support among some of his previously most loyal constituents. I was a staunch Obama supporter (and would still support him over pretty much any republican candidate), but my support for him has definitely declined since he’s taken office. Another interesting example to look at is the LGBT community. They were mostly fervent supporters of Obama’s campaign, but as time has gone on, many of them feel like he’s abandoned them. DADT has still not been passed, ENDA lingers in committee, and AIDS funding is lacking. Many in the LGBT community are advocating abandoning support of the Democrats in favor or 3rd parties like the Green Party. Obama needs to work on regaining the support from the people who used to be his most fervent supporters, or 2012 is not going to be pretty.

KYLEALBERT - Your analysis of what has been lacking is very interesting. Although we have not faced an economic crash, I'm sure their are other issues that seem to be slipping out of our control, maybe just not as publicized. The issue I feel like I don't quite understand though is if there's an alternative candidate. Realistically, a 3rd party like the Green party will not get elected in the near future. Also, any campaign promises they would make on the same issues would be just as shallow. Obama along with many other candidates preach change on x,y, and z bills on the campaign trail because that's their stance on those issues. I think this could also be a flaw in JTOLMATSKY's analysis: Obama's message of change needs to be viewed realistically. Candidates discuss every issue so the public know how they'll vote on bills when/if they come up over the four year term, not because they really will be able to tackle every bill in their first year or two.
The problem is that each bill costs political capital. Pushing through a such a monumental, despite water-downed, health care bill prevents Obama from trying to push other agenda items too shortly after. Bills require arm twisting and negotiations. Obama needs to pick and choose the agenda items he pushes very careful because if one goes awry it could jeopardize other items.
Although there are flaws with giving Obama credit for staving off these more threatening issues, I think it's credit well deserved at this point in his presidency. He must stabilize the economy and tie lose ends on other conflicts before he can be expected to really reform.

I tend to agree with the post. First, a response to EMILYW's claim that Obama deserves no credit for not making the economy worse. Obama did not simply not make things worse; he halted the largest recession since the 1930's and *knock on wood* seems to have avoided a double-dip. Two weekends ago it was announced that we are technically no longer in recession and the economy is in fact, growing. Now unemployment is still a problem, but for where I see it, Obama does deserve credit for how he's handled the economy.
I think MITCHOCH makes a valid point that it is easy to overlook the fact that Obama has made some strides in foreign policy. People see that there is a problem,and because Obama has not solved it yet, he takes the blame. Nevermind that he is making some progress and that these problems were inherited not created by Obama and his administration.
Lastly, regarding Obama's campaign on change, it should be noted that anything BUT a campaign on change would have been a ridiculous strategy following the extremely unpopular Bush administration. Both candidates campaigned on change. Obama's campaign just used the word as an effective marketing technique as well. Though knowing this, backlash should be expected when specifically promised changes do not come to pass. However, it is also important to note that maybe some changes could have taken place were Obama's term not plagued by an inherited economic crisis.

I almost completely agree with ALYSSAZ's analysis, but think it's not really relevant to what JTOLMATSKY is saying. Any candidate that attempted a purely realist prediction of the changes they could make probably wouldn't be perceived well by the public. Candidates need to express their views on a litany of issues, even if once elected they are unable to create meaningful change in many of them. The reason it's just not responsive is there's a delineation between discussing your views on a issue or saying what you would do and (as KYLEALBERT points out) campaigning to a population on the basis of promises of substantive change. It may seem like a meaningless question of framing - but campaign promises set the benchmark. Saying your views is obviously key, but when you take the next step and tell a people this is what I WILL do, that generates a commitment, creates the perception of obligation (and implies a sense of betrayal when that obligation is not met) and establishes some hierarchy of priorities that constituents can look to when predicting how one's election would play out. Promises (as opposed to what one would do given a situation) establishes a contract of sorts with the public, and betraying that democratic contract can be politically damning.

As for the question of whether anyone could have done better, I don't think that's particularly relevant to whether or not Obama's administration thus far has been a success... The implication is not necessarily if there could have been a better president, Walt's other posts have been in the context of congressional midterm elections, which are obviously less monolithic.

That being said, I don't view any of this as mutually exclusive with JTOLMATSKY's comment or what Walt is saying in the slightest. Walt (to my understanding) is just saying that while Obama has been unsuccessful in many areas, he does deserve credit for things he has managed to do. I don't really understand how such a statement is so contentious. Walt acknowledges that Obama hasn't done anything in many areas that he campaigned on changing.

I feel as if what people are having trouble with two central distinctions:

1. It's important not to make blanket statements - we can criticize Obama for his explicit failure/backing down/avoidance in a number of areas (Afghanistan, climate change, DADT, etc.), but we need to recognize his successes for what they are. Recognize that Walt is only framing this success specifically in those areas, he's not saying that Obama's help on now non-crises reconciles all of the Obama Administration's problems, its limited to "credit where due."

2. Not making things worse and preventing things from getting worse are two very different things - When Obama inherited the White House, the economy was in free-fall. Obama has curbed that seemingly assured catastrophe on many levels. JTOLMATSKY seems to write in the context that "Obama is good" because he "didn't make things worse." I too, would disagree with such a view. But such a view is definitely NOT what Walt nor MITCHHOCH are operating under. A world without the Obama Administration would have meant economic catastrophe. A world with it staved off the worst impacts. That's all it is.

I also tend to agree with Walt that Obama's record, both in domestic and foreign policy, is better than it looks. But as the man with the most public position in the US, and even the world, the fact that he appears to be doing worse than he is stems not just from the public's shortsightedness, but from his own failure to communicate. As a man who ran an extremely organized and successful campaign, using all types of media to his advantage, he has done a pretty terrible job of capitalizing on his successes and convincing Americans that he's moving along the right path. Instead, he has become so insular and sometimes invisible that more people believe he is a Muslim than did when he first entered office, and same with those who believe he's a socialist. He needs to paint himself in a different light if he is to be viewed more positively.

But, as I said in the subject, that's only partly his fault. Obama governs within a partisan system so deeply divisive that nothing gets done to the extent that he (and his voters) would hope for. He faces 41 Senate Republicans who have used the filibuster so often it's unconstitutional - after all, it's supposed to be MAJORITY rules (50%!), not a 41% minority (and yes, the Dems did this too, but not nearly to the extent we see today, when literally every bill needs 60 votes to pass). Obama's image has been so baselessly tarnished by dissenters for political gain (or higher TV ratings) that anything said in his defense is immediately drowned out by a loud and sensationalist minority.

That is not to say, though, that Obama has done everything right. He deserves reproach for certain policies, but, remember, he has only been in office for less than two years. The problems he is dealing with have built up for at least 8 years, and in some cases for decades; to expect him to fix it all in less than 2 years is completely unreasonable. Although I agree with jtolmatsky that he campaigned on such a strong platform of change that he brought these high expectations on himself, to think that any candidate could win the '08 election on a platform of anything BUT change is fantasy.

To sum up, a good candidate must state his plan for changing all the issues voters are concerned about, while a good president must thoughtfully and pragmatically address these issues while showing voters his successes along the way. At this point, what Obama really needs is some good PR.

I agree with the student that made the remark that government officials get remarks made about them when they don’t fix a problem fast enough like promised, but do not get recognition when they do something good. I agree that Obama is doing everything he can to fix our economy and that people should recognize that. When government officials do something good for our country we should recognize that and give them credit. It is a busy job to run the country and everything should be supported of the president no matter who it is. They were elected into the position so obviously they know what they are doing.