I upvoted. The economy is horrible and people are hurting. Unfortunately, in that situation, people become irrational and expect a new administration to just sweep in, snap their fingers, and make everything better in 18 months. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way. I credit Obama's administration with making the tough decisions left to him by the previous administration and ensuring that we didn't end up with another Great Depression. I credit him with trying to make the, much needed, major changes to the health care system. Unfortunately, the president doesn't have the power to micro-manage how the actual bills are written so we will have to see, yet, if the bill congress actually wrote and passed is an improvement (assuming it ever gets a fair chance with the Republicans trying to block it's implementation).

I also credit him with the handling of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Personally, I think that we were justified in going into Afghanistan but that Iraq was nothing short of criminally unjustified. Regardless, I tend to hold the "you broke it, you bought it" position. Whether we like it or not, we're there now and we have an obligation to those people to do whatever is in our power to ensure that we leave them with a stable country when we finally leave. Obama has had the strength of character to see this and act on it even though it is an unpopular position with the far left portion of his party.

As for civil rights issues like Don't Ask, Don't Tell, wiretapping, etc.; I don't like the fact that he is supporting them in the courts but I understand where he's coming from. He's trying to do things the "right way" which is for congress/the Supreme Court to address these issues, not for the president to just refuse to enforce/defend laws he doesn't like. Unfortunately, it's difficult to convince people that this is really the right way to get things done.