Just half a year into his term, with multiple crises on which to capitalize and the sorry alternative experience of Republican rule still fresh in recent memory, Obama's approval rating has dipped below 50%. As for health care reform, the centerpiece of his current agenda, only 56% seem to even favor health care reform (and that would possibly include those of us who support real reform, moving toward a separation of medicine and state). And less than 50% support Obama's plan. No wonder, even with a supermajority in the Senate, Obama is having trouble getting it passed as easily as he expected.

This is wonderful news. Americans are still skeptical about leftwing social democracy and the corporatism it always serves to conceal. Unfortunately, Obama is every bit the warmonger Bush was, and few are talking about the fact that this has been the bloodiest month in Afghanistan since the war began. Even if he fails to get away with nationalizing medicine, he will continue to get away with foreign murder. Even though most Americans, especially Democrats, oppose the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, this opposition has not translated into loud and adamant protest or a lessening of the U.S. warfare state. Let's hope the slight majority opposition to Obamacare is not similarly incapable of resisting more national socialism in health care.