Well, you could argue that Obama's stimulus package wasn't aggressive enough, and wasn't TARP a Bush initiative?
obama couldnt pass an aggressive stimulus in the current political climate.. the republicans have a very strong hold on the national discussion right now and its all about spending and the debt.. the kind of stimulus needed would be the size of TARP or bigger.. nobody is willing to spend that kind of money right now.. TARP was a bush initiative but people , the republican presidential candidates in particular, are bringin up TARP as an argument against obama.. calling it a failure, that the government shouldnt have interfered with the workings of the market, that it was a trillion dollars soent that did no good.. etc .. and doing nothing to make it clear that it wasnt obama's plan and even if it was TARP, while it didnt get us back to the eocnomy we had in 2005, it did keep us from having a much much MUCH worse situation than we have now.. regardless of whether or not we should have bailed out those companies/banks..
the point being.. the economy isnt obama's fault.. and if TARP and the stimulus hadnt been passed the economy would be in a much worse place than it is now.. while maybe we could have boosted the economy to a better place than it is now... to do so would have required a far left socialist stimulus package spending trillions.. or a far right deregulation of industry allowing massive pollution, breaches to workers rights, excessive tax breaks for corporations, etc... neither of those options would have gained enough support to pass..
Nope. Sorry. Obama is a smart guy, a policy guy, and he likes consensus, but he doesn't have the 'time' of a good economy behind him like Clinton. It's really put his lack of leadership in the White House in bas relief, particularly with people like Larry Summers. He's just so lucky that the current crop of GOP opponents are incompetent. 
again with the lack of leadership. no. he could have tried to use the bully pulpit and pushed hard for his ideology but it would have taken years, maybe two full terms before he gained enough public support to actually get anything done.. what he has done is work with what he has and made significant progress on many different issues in the face of very tough political opposition... get behind the guy.. we need intelligent people to voice support..... not be "hip" anti-establishment douchebags.. but your right about this field of republicans.. their debates are pathetic ..
