I still don't believe that was the issue. Install by fiat, removed by fiat. Very simple. Announce a lot of sadly mistaken policies have changed course, part of the mantra of change.
That is not what happened. Obama increased the drone attacks, exactly because torture and illegal detention were not working and lead to more trouble than they were worth. So now he authorizes shoot to kill orders on suspicion of wrong doing? No prisoners, no jails, no courts, no political problems. After all the only people who scream live in Pakistan and Afghanistan and nobody understands them.
Where are these vested interests? The drone manufacturers and private contractor industries? The neocons in the Pentagon and State Dept?
I do not believe the concept of structural constraint. Bush felt none of those constraints in violating practically every constitutional and legal constraint on his criminal actions.
The sphere of action where I do believe there are constraints is the economic sphere where Obama gets his campaign money.
Anyway, he represents `the organization for the prevention of harm to the Status Quo'. (Thanks Joanna)
So, I'll stop arguing. Except to say, Obama is responsible for his actions, like everybody else should be. Arguments from intention don`t count, as in the childish excuse, Johnny made me do it, Dad, honest.
CG