OK,for many of us there has been a building frustration with Obama.

[Jackpine Radical]

What actions could he take in the next 2 years to regain your faith, trust and enthusiasm?

Be realistic. For example, there's no way he could put through a single-payer health care program.

I'll start.

He could get us out of our useless wars.
He could come to terms with Guantanamo in a humane and internationally acceptable way.
He could propose major cuts to the defense budget (even though they wouldn't get through the House).

[Common Sense Party]

1. I thought you said 'be realistic.' n/t

[ChairmanAgnostic]

2. I never got my unicorn.

A good start would be exiting the Middle East.
MAJOR defense cuts are already coming, out of necessity, with some being proposed by the GOP, no less.

a serious jobs program would be nice - and no one has proposed one (except Sanders, Kucinich and a few others)

[Jefferson23]

3. If he only stops going further right, i.e Social Security cut concerns..

if he fights off the rhetoric and lies about SS he'll have achieved some trust.

The list you have, I have given up on, not because I believe they are impossible to achieve, but b/c I
have seen no evidence that Obama wants any of them bad enough.

[xchrom]

4. shrug -- it's not about obama anymore.

he will continue to govern as he has.

for me at this point it's about the direction of the democratic elite -- the neoliberalism and that single narrative that
seems to be all pervasive.

i'm more interested counter movements -- the kind of thing that tried to get blanche out of office.
getting the union voice heard, getting rid of the whole robert rubin, gheitner, summers, daley oligarch types as the sole voice of
wisdom, etc.

[LiberalEsto]

5. Put Social Security in a Lock Box

and refuse to let anyone mess with it.

[DrDan]

6. come out squarely in favor of no SS cuts

[ProSense]

7. Here,

from a post last week:

Ten things that will help speed the recovery and level the playing field

1. Stimulate job creation
   
   
2. Fix the mortgage situation
   
   
3. End corporate welfare (subsidies for polluting industries and tax breaks for outsourcing jobs to other countries)
   
   
4. Invest in America's infrastructure
   
   
5. Complete withdrawal from Iraq and end the Afghanistan war
   
   
6. Address climate change
   
   
7. Increase the federal revenue stream, ending tax cuts for the rich and raising the cap for payroll taxes.
   
   
8. Increase the minimum wage
   
   
9. Fix trade policies
   
   
10. Fix the tax code

[impik]

8. "Many of us"? How many?

[ljm2002]

15. Me, for one. n/t

[Godhumor]

9. Sorry, if anything, I have been growing happier with him

Hopefully, it will continue.

[phleshdef]

10. The Iraq war is being responsibly ended. Afghanistan is fair game for criticism.

Yea, yea, I know, we still have troops in Iraq. But whats going on there is what a withdrawal, not being done in desperation, looks like. The Iraq withdrawal plan is mostly going as promised and its just petty at this point to attack him over it. He has been doing the right thing on Iraq and the war there for all intents and purposes is over.

I do wish they would have went with the Biden plan on Afghanistan and I think criticism there is valid.

Its dishonest to say he hasn't "came to terms" on Guantanamo. Both parties in Congress have been the culprit on this from day one. He proposed shutting it down, but the necessary fundings and prisoner transfer approvals that need to pass the house are not passing the house. You also just said that he should propose major cuts in defense even if it won't get through the house. Thats fair. But if thats sufficient action from him in your eyes as far as defense cuts go, then that should be sufficient enough, in your eyes, as far as closing Gitmo goes.

The only valid item you mentioned is ending the war in Afghanistan. Thats the only area where he has the power to do the right thing and isn't doing the right thing. The other items, he has either done the right thing or he can't do the right thing because of other powers in government standing in the way.

[rurallib]

11. Push for no cap on SS taxes and

for a public health care option.

[lamp_shade]

12. He could end world hunger and "many of us" would piss and moan about it.

[ThatPoetGuy]

13. He could take a stand.

He could try to communicate.

His first two years were marked by a number of bureaucratic accomplishments, but an utter failure to explain the necessity for these changes, or the vision behind them.

This left us with a listless liberalism and a galvanized conservatism.

Still, the right's hatred for Obama will lead them to make the same mistakes the left made. We made it about Bush. When the levies failed, when Katrina was mishandled, when bridges collapsed, we made it about Bush. We should have made it about conservatism. The destruction of New Orleans and collapsing bridges were the result of conservative policies, not one man. We could have discredited the worst ideas of our time, and instead we were focused on hating Bush.

[treestar]

14. It's not his fault about Gitmo

Other people, namely certain Congresspersons, must be pressured.

[Enrique]

16. you have more faith than I do

just your posing those possibilities takes a faith that I don't have. It looks to me like you're asking him to become a different person.

[mmonk]

17. This is hard.

I don't want to be criticized. The charter school, cutting teacher qualifications experiments hurt a lot of what I worked for the past twenty years. The budget cuts coming with the social security payroll tax cuts are really bothersome. Defending the Bush administration crimes in court and the continued abuse of the state secrets privilege. These ships have sailed. Nothing really. I know the Republicans are bad now to the point of extreme. It is what it is so I guess nothing. I know my vote will not match my convictions or beliefs no matter what.

[stranger81]

18. At this point I'd settle for not escalating useless wars.

But it's the same old same old, no matter what letter is behind the president's name.