During the election, the budding economic crisis was being billed as one of the worst financial situations to face our country. Perhaps even worse than the Great Depression itself. While creating legislation for what would be named TARP, Senate Majority leader Harry Reid called on both candidates, Senators McCain and Obama, to get involved in the bailout. Later that week, McCain made the decision to cancel his appearance at the presidential debates in order for both candidates, at the behest of Reid, to go to Washington and help out with the bailout package.

The media and Democrats immediately and roundly criticized Senator John McCain, a war hero and former POW who never broke even under the horrific torture of the Vietcong, as being afraid to debate then-Senator Obama. Some claimed McCain was looking for an easy way out. The Obama Campaign commented that the debates will go on with or without McCain, as presidents should be able to do "more than one thing at a time." The media ignored the fact that Reid called for the candidates to get involved, and instead focused on Barney Frank's contention that McCain's move on the issue was a campaign ploy and that the candidates were not needed. Frank assured us that the TARP legislation was well in hand, being worked out perfectly fine without McCain or presidential campaign politics getting involved.

Fast forward a few months, President Obama and Democrats in Congress have demonized TARP as being yet another terrible legacy of the Bush administration. Obama made the following impassioned comment during his "state of the nation":

Now, I understand that, on any given day, Wall Street may be more comforted by an approach that gives bank bailouts with no strings attached and that holds nobody accountable for their reckless decisions, but such an approach won't solve the problem.

Not an ounce of irony to be found in his mouthing of that statement. Yet, when President (then Senator) Obama had the opportunity to change things in the first implementation of TARP, he instead decided to continue his endless campaign for President. Time and Obama's own comments have shown that Obama and Barney Frank were wrong. The TARP legislation was obviously not well in hand and in fact had many flaws. What President Obama is really saying when he criticizes TARP, is that his decision to continue campaigning was the wrong one. The media had it wrong when they pounced on McCain and his so-called campaign ploy to seem relevant. The verdict is in; TARP legislation would have benefited from the input of the two most important members of the two biggest political parties in America.

More importantly, the last 6 weeks of the Obama presidency has proven yet another premise of Obama's comments during that episode equally wrong - that presidents, or more accurately President Obama, should be able to do more than one thing at a time.

Since taking office, not a day has passed without President Obama touting some new policy, spending program or government overreach. Obama made grand claims about excluding lobbyists from his cabinet, only to back off this stance when reality made this difficult. Obama's cabinet picks have had more dirty laundry than any new President in recent history. Obama's 787 billion "reinvestment" plan was sub-contracted out to Nancy Pelosi, loaded with pork, and absent of real stimulus. Obama promoted Geithner's mortgage and housing plan, only to have the markets flip out at its utter lack of detail and questioning Geithner's readiness for the job once the plan was introduced. Obama's ten-year budget is full of fantasy and pork (8500 earmarks?!?), whose real costs are totally unknown. His health care plan is a mere down payment on government health care, but does not address the real questions around how to "fix" our medical system (electronic medical records isn't it). Not to mention the seemingly endless slide of the stock market, that even Bill Clinton recognized was not being helped (if not sabotaged) by Obama's Fear and Change rhetoric (which although Obama's largely gotten a pass on this one, Bush was severely attacked by the media for the same thing during 2001).

President Obama's forays into foreign policy have been equally as stuttering and ill considered. He engaged Russia on Iran, and was quickly rebuffed. He made noise about closing Guantanamo without having a real plan for doing so, and some terrorists have gotten off scot-free as a result. North Korea's Kim Jong Il and Iran's Ahmadinejad have already started to test the new president and his all-carrots-no-stick approach. He's pissed off our allies in Pakistan with missile attacks. And most recently, Obama kicked off his relationship with UK PM Gordon Brown with an inappropriate gift consisting of 25 DVD's.

Obama's scattershot promotion of his massive policy changes has been sweeping and ill considered. Rather than focus on making a single good policy, Obama has instead created 100 policies that are not fully fleshed. Meanwhile, as the stock market has dropped over 1600 points under his watch (over 3000 points since his election) his principal advisers are busy demonizing entertainers such as Rush Limbaugh, Rick Santelli, and (former Obama supporter) Jim Cramer for questioning the wisdom behind these policies. While Obama blames the prior administration for the current stock market decline, whines about inheriting this mess, and suggests that he doesn't care about the "gyrations of the market" (which reflects a forward looking view by investors of our economy), Americans are losing their nest eggs, and the world is losing confidence. Rather than make good on his campaign promises for greater bi-partisanship, he's been attacking GOP straw men -- as opposed to actual GOP stances -- with relentless fervor. Adding insult to injury, while Campaign Obama criticized President Bush for telling people to buy stuff after 9/11, President Obama's own stimulus plan and tax cuts are designed precisely to get people to buy stuff.

While some in the media are suggesting that Obama is more popular than ever, a closer look at his polling numbers reveals he is actually polling worse in job approval than former President George W. Bush during Bush's first term and first six weeks as President. Americans and the "chattering classes" are starting to realize that while a president should be able to do more than one thing at a time, Obama and his Democratic cohorts in congress don't seem to be able to do more than one thing at a time very well at all.