So I tend not to jump to conspiracy when stupidity and timidity serve just as well as explanations. The latter two tend to fall in line with human nature more than grand subtle Machiavellian schemes. There have only been a few humans in history really capable of pulling stuff like that off and as smart as I think Obama is, I don't think he's that good. For instance, Fox New is pro-Republican, pro-conservative, pro-business, etc... but subtlety is not really their strong suit. It's pretty blatant. In fact most of the successful propagandists of the 21st century have been effective, but not terribly subtle because you don't really need subtlety.
So Obama is hardly stupid, however, his pattern fits historically very well with the Democratic inability to be effective. Democrats have always been more difficult to organize effectively than Republicans. It's just the nature of the party. The Republicans really managed to make liberal a dirty word in the 90s and the Democrats have been scared of that label ever since (which is why it's so effective). Thus Democratic presidents will only go so far and Obama spent all his political capital from winning the election on TARP and health care (and his fellow Dems were so scared to spend their own capital on those, so they essentially shot themselves in the foot) so that in the end even to get what he got through, he had to make major concessions to a political party very, very much in the minority (something the Republicans never had to do even when they had smaller majorities than the Dems enjoyed for the last 2 years).
So a good chunk of the stuff left undone really boils down to Dems being timid on legislation more than anything else. Even so, in the last month (December) they finally pushed through a lot of stuff, though as I said Obama had to make concessions on tax breaks to do it. There were some Dems who railed against the compromise, but frankly where was their anger over the last couple of years? So I didn't feel they had much room to criticize since it was the only way Obama could push through things like the Repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, health care for 9/11 workers, and unemployment benefits for laid off workers. The conviction you credit Bush with and the lack thereof for Kerry has been the classic Democratic problem and to me Obama's lack movement on some these issues is easily understandable under that context.
Obama really couldn't be a Mubarak, the Dems aren't simply aren't organized enough, the Republicans even as a small minority had seemingly more power at times, and the courts can overturn anything unconstitutional. It's why we have the 3 branches of government so that one man/party cannot control everything. Other countries, like Britain, simply rely on tradition, but there the Prime Minister and the controlling party if they haven't had to form a coalition can do pretty much whatever they want. However, tradition (and common law) puts a brake on the worst impulses.
However, while the whole "all politician lie" truism is true to a certain extent, one should keep in mind that the role of a president is mostly reactive. Hence a lot of the times the presidency is reacting to situations they weren't expecting (like a spill in the gulf or 9/11) and not being proactive and carrying out the policy they had originally intended. Thus giving the impression of not being true to their word. If you actually look at what Obama has said he would do and what he's tried to do, he's actually been better than most in this regard, if a little slower than some of us would like. The are some fact-checker websites you can check out for yourself on this.
Boehner is indeed a Republican but is not really a Tea Party person. In fact the Republican leadership (like Boehner) is having trouble controlling their Tea Party members who don't see eye to eye with the established Republican party. I find he's annoying, but unfortunately many of the Republicans I used to have respect for seem to have become vastly more conservative in the last few years to fit the current political climate within the party. McCain, Graham, etc ... have all taken sharp turns to the right to fend off ultra-conservative candidates in Republican primaries. A shame, for while I sharply disagreed with them, I had respect for the integrity of their positions before.
As for the 2000 election, the media did indeed point out all the coincidences and screw ups here. Trust me, in the States, we heard about nothing else for months on end - it was wall to wall. I suppose the more calculating Republicans consider the 2000 election to be revenge for the 1960 election.
As for Vietnam, I don't think anyone, not JFK, not Johnson, not Nixon really wanted to be there. It was more a case they all felt they had inherited this situation and they all felt they had to be there and do something - a case of group think that it was necessary to combat communism without realizing that the people there didn't see in the light of some global war of ideals, but as a civil war to unite their country. But since we had invested in it already we had to make sure it succeeded so we sent more and more and more over, until it became the horrible conflagration it became. Unfortunately due to JFK's death we'll never know how he would've viewed it in retrospect, but both Johnson and McNamara never forgave themselves for Vietnam - there is a brilliant documentary on it called "
Fog of War". If you like that period of time in American history, I highly recommend it - truly fascinating and in many way depressing to watch. Johnson at the time, the presidential records show truly hated being there but felt he had to soldier on. McNamara at the time thought the war was winnable and is now broken by his mistakes.
Anyway, same to you, good conversation, but I think we've completely derailed the thread now. :)
