I trust President Obama

[DirkGently]

15. Every issue is not about "Obama."

First off, bit silly to suggest anyone has never deserved any criticism. No human being in the history of history has made it through a day without earning criticism of some kind.

But it's beside the point when raised in the context of something like NSA spying or drone killings or what have you. These are processes that defy any just or democratic rationale. As the partisans here are so fond of saying, the President cannot "wave a magic wand" and fix these things.

He is responsible for his failure to increase transparency, for the adoption of clearly horrendous Bush administration policies and legal interpretations, and plenty more.

But the broad issues simply do not belong to him. He sits at the Complaint Desk, because "President" fills that role. But criticism of the NSA, the FBI, and the CIA do not magically become personal attacks on one person because he happens to be a Democrat sitting in office.

It's also utterly specious to answer questions about constitutionality, fairness, and the democratic process, with complaints that people have been "too harsh" in commenting on Obama. That's not a rebuttal of any kind. It's like someone saying civil rights concerns are nonsense because of those two "New Black Panthers" Fox News dug up, or men worrying that some feminist somewhere might be a "man hater."

It's a dodge. Take personality and politics and whose name calling is theoretically more unkind out of it, and you are left with issues that we need to solve, and to which Obama and OTHERS need to respond.