A blur of waving flags greeted President Barack Obama's victory speech at an election night event in Chicago, Illinois.
Editor's note: David M. Kennedy is professor of history emeritus and director of the Bill Lane Center for the American West at Stanford University. He won a Pulitzer Prize for "Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945."
(CNN) -- As yet another presidential election cycle ends, it's a good time not only to tally wins and losses, but to reflect on the nature of the American political system and why it so often disappoints voters and presidents alike.
Think of the extravagant hopes and promises that attended Barack Obama's election in 2008. Obama surely had good historical grounds for thinking that the seismic financial upheaval of 2009 presented him with opportunities to transform America for the better.
And so it did, to a degree his own reelection campaign somewhat mysteriously chose not to emphasize, by creating the political space for major legislative victories like the Affordable Care Act and the Dodd-Frank financial reforms.
But those achievements fell measurably short of candidate Obama's aspirations, and were matched by precious few other initiatives that met the expectations arising from the 2008 campaign.
Opinion: Five things Obama must do
This time around a chastened Obama notably failed to offer a grand vision for the American future and instead contented himself with delegitimizing Mitt Romney and dwelling for the most part on small-bore issues.
What is it about the American presidency, anyway?
See the president's full victory speech
Gergen: Win shows desire for moderation
2008: Barack Obama wins the White House
Every four years, Americans become besotted with presidential politics. Indeed, in the media-marinated age of the "perpetual campaign" the besotting has no fixed cycle, quadrennial or otherwise. Though for more than a century near majorities of eligible voters have not bothered to cast ballots in presidential elections, none today can escape the saturation news coverage, ubiquitous advertising, and relentless prattle of the chattering classes that attend the contest for the White House.
No other country spends so much of its time choosing its top-level political leadership. The British and the Australians usually get the job done in less than six weeks. The French, as a rule, take no more than three. Canada's longest campaign ever, in 1926, lasted just 74 days. And no other people pour such vast buckets of money into their electioneering as the Americans -- some $6 billion in the current round. Perpetual presidential politicking is as American as apple pie -- and a darn sight more expensive.
And as for the candidates, what makes them run? In a nation long schooled to believe that any child can grow up to be president, an astonishing number of men of outsized ambition (and at least a few women) have taken the lesson to heart.
News: Romney only prepared a victory speech
They have devoted virtually their entire adult lives to seeking the presidency. They have plotted, maneuvered, schemed, bargained, cajoled, begged, exalted and often humiliated themselves in pursuit of the prize. Once in hand, the long-coveted office has sometimes made but more frequently broken them.
Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt, two examples of the relatively few presidents who can be counted as successful, largely realized their grandest aims -- though in both cases the presidency cost them their lives, one by assassination, the other through catastrophic overwork and consequent self-neglect.
More often, in the case of otherwise accomplished and respected men, the presidency has merely cost them their reputations. For the likes of Ulysses Grant, Herbert Hoover and Lyndon Johnson -- each of them celebrated masters of their pre-presidential domains -- the presidency proved a career-killing heart-breaker. Sixteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue has been the scene of many bitter disappointments, as well as some tragedies of epic, Shakespearean proportions.
In light of that dispiriting history, why would anyone wish the travails of the presidency upon himself? As President James Garfield put it in 1881, after just a few months in office: "My God! What is there in this place that a man should ever want to get into it?"
Yet men have wanted it, desperately, including Mitt Romney and Barack Obama. Both of them might answer Garfield's question by saying, simply, that the Oval Office is a matchless place from which to serve one's country.
But as Garfield and other presidents -- including Obama -- learned, the American presidency is a truly peculiar institution, with less power in actuality than folklore has it.
The president and vice president are but two of the 537 elected officials in Washington. Surrounding the White House is a political playing field mined with enough vetoes to stymie even the most ambitious of men.
News: GOP expands majority in governor's mansions
Yes, modern presidents oversee a vast 21st-century machinery of state whose operations touch almost every corner of American life. But they share executive authority with 50 governors; and many government entities, such as the Federal Reserve system, are formally independent of presidential control. The president has no official voice in the legislative process, save for his own veto, which can be overridden by congressional super-majorities. He can nominate federal judges and Supreme Court justices, but they must receive Senate confirmation, and in any case serve for life in a proudly independent judiciary. He is the commander in chief, but the Constitution reserves to Congress the right to declare war.
It is not simply the lust for power, however constitutionally jacketed it might be, that fuels men's and women's appetites for the office; it deserves to be acknowledged that love of country is among the reasons that so many good people, including Obama and Romney, have pined for the opportunity to serve.
Yet contrary to the balladeer's promises, in politics no less than in romance, love is not enough, and it rarely, if ever, conquers all.
Opinion: Obama will get little time to celebrate
This is the hard lesson that Obama has learned in the last four years as president. He is a devoted patriot who in his 2009 inaugural address praised the Founders, whose "ideals still light the world." He excited effusive affection among his countrymen on his way to winning the presidency in 2008.
But the last four years have seen no deepening love affair between the president and his people. On the contrary, the ardor of his supporters has measurably cooled, and some have jilted him altogether. His detractors have multiplied and hardened against him. And events have tempered even his extravagantly idealistic vision of his country.
The president's frustrations have derived not simply from the septic political climate of our times, but at least as much from a set of mechanisms carefully crafted by those same hallowed Founders more than two centuries ago.
Generations of schoolchildren have been taught to reverence the "checks and balances" the framers stitched so artfully into the Constitution. Less frequently noted are the liabilities that were integral to their design. They deliberately constructed the American governmental system so that it would be difficult to operate, the presidency in particular.
What do you think of the election results? Share your reaction.
Their colonial experience with the British crown and royal governors made them especially wary of executive power, and though the presidency was one of their cleverest innovations in that long-ago Philadelphia summer, they hedged it about with constraints and counterbalances to ensure that no president would ever accrue anything remotely resembling monarchical authority.
Small wonder that over the arc of American history only a handful of presidents can be said to have effected truly lasting transformational change -- Lincoln, FDR, Lyndon Johnson and perhaps Ronald Reagan make the short list, but few others do, and that's no accident.
Americans may yearn for strong leadership, but in their stubborn contrariness they do not want truly powerful leaders. They may want effective government, but they apparently like divided government even more, when neither party simultaneously controls House, Senate, and presidency -- the situation we've been saddled with for 31 of the last 43 years.
So it should not be surprising that Obama's accomplishments marked the narrow limits of the achievable. They triggered a vicious political backlash in the 2010 election, ushered in yet another round of divided government, and may yet prove but short-lived reminders of the young president's aspirations, not permanent features of the American landscape.
We are a democracy, and cannot escape the logic of the venerable maxim that we have the government we have chosen and that we deserve. Like it or not, Obama's first term confirmed that our inherited governmental system worked according to its design specifications.
The season of effective, vigorous presidential leadership had but the briefest half-life; the wheels of the constitutional machinery designed to hem the president in began to turn almost from his first day in office, as did the gears of our often perversely contradictory political culture. Within two years we had stalemate, and the blame game began in earnest.
Analysis: Obama won with a better ground game
But in the last analysis we have no one to blame but ourselves, and our inherited political system -- and we have no plausible reason to expect anything substantially different in Obama's second term.
From all appearances we are most probably in for a repeat performance of the last two years: a remarkably disciplined and decidedly intransigent Republican party dominating the House, a paper-thin and fragile Democratic majority in the Senate, and a diminished, dispirited, and check-mated president with little or no room for maneuver -- and this in the face of perhaps the greatest fiscal challenge in the history of the republic, an increasingly volatile international environment, and a raft of unfinished business like devising coherent national energy and immigration policies.
So why do we get so overheated about the presidency? Why don't we generate some heat about the antiquated system of which the president is but one, too often hapless, part? What is it about divided government, anyway?
If even as committed a change agent as Obama is doomed to four more years of nothing more than Lilliputian, small-beer tinkering; if the self-described greatest power in the world is so powerless to put its house in order, isn't it time for a thorough overhaul of our manifestly antiquated political machinery?
Follow us on Twitter @CNNOpinion
Join us on Facebook/CNNOpinion
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of David M. Kennedy.
© 2013 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
President Barack Obama, first lady Michelle Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and Dr. Jill Biden look ahead to a second term and vowed to fight for equal opportunity for all.
Flags fluttered in Chicago as President Barack Obama delivered his victory speech after being reelected for a second term.
First lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden hugged and will spend four more years in the public eye.
Red, white and blue confetti snowed down on President Barack Obama after a victory speech that promised brighter days ahead.
A supporter listened intently to President Barack Obama's victory speech in Chicago.
"We know in our hearts that for the United States of America, the best is yet to come," President Obama said in a victory speech met by prolonged cheers.
President Barack Obama embraced Vice President Joe Biden after delivering his victory speech at McCormick Place in Chicago.
With first lady Michell Obama at his side, President Barack Obama gave the crowd a wave at an election night celebration in Chicago.
Children climbed trees outside the White House in Washington as people celebrated President Obama's victory at the polls.
A South Korean woman carried a cardboard cutout of Republican Mitt Romney at an election night party in Seoul. South Koreans watched the race closely.
President Barack Obama rode a wave of broad support from minorities, women and moderates to win re-election.
Emotion washed over an Obama supporter as the newly reeleted president deivered his victory speech in Chicago.
President Barack Obama embraced first lady Michelle Obama and daughters Sasha and Malia moments before he delivered a rousing victory speech.
Obama supporters beamed and cheered as he delivered an inspiring and inclusive victory speech.
Victorious, President Barack Obama was joined onstage by first lady Michelle Obama and daughters Sasha and Malia.
Young Obama supporters watched the president stride onto the stage to deliver his victory speech.
President Barack Obama clapped onstage in Chicago as the crowd cheered his reelection.
President Barack Obama walked onstage with first lady Michelle Obama and daughters Sasha and Malia to deliver his victory speech.
People gathered in Times Square in New York City and celebrated four more years in office for President Barack Obama.
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney conceded and hugged his running mate, U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan, of Wisconsin.
People celebrated in front of the White House in Washington after Barack Obama won a second term as president.
Mitt Romney slowly walked offstage in Boston after conceding the election to President Barack Obama.
Republican candidate Mitt Romney hung his head and smiled as he strode onto the stage to give his concession speech.
Mitt Romney waved to a crowd of supporters before conceding the presidency.
Romney supporters sought comfort in each other as his chances for the presidency faded.
An Obama supporter clutched a flag and a smart phone at an election night rally in Chicago.
Obama supporters attentively watched televised election results at an election night event in Chicago.
A supporter checks his smart phone while he waits for Republican Mitt Romney to give his concession speech in Boston, Massachusetts.
President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama embraced Vice President Joe Biden and Dr. Jill Biden moments after the election was called in their favor.
Keesha Patterson, left, proposed to Rowan Ha during a rally at Obama headquarters in Chicago. The women live in Maryland, where voters approved same-sex marriage.
Ajay Narayan cheered in Las Vegas, Nevada, as the election was called for President Obama.
Obama supporters celebrated the president's projected victory at a watch party at McCormick Place in Chicago, Illinois.
A huge screen gave Obama supporters in Chicago plenty to cheer about: The president won a second term.
President Barack Obama's supporters were exuberant as the news got better and better on election night.
A dejected supporter of Republican candidate Mitt Romney slumped on the floor in Boston, Massachusetts.
President Obama's young supporters in Chicago cheered and waved flags.
The Empire State Building in New York City was lit in Democratic blue after President Obama won the hotly contested election.
A Romney supporter teared up as the presidency seemed to slip out of grasp.
Obama supporters in Chicago, his hometown, shared their joy at the president's projected victory.
Obama supporters raised their hands in victory at an election night watch party in Chicago.
Romney supporters in Boston were tearful and subdued as the numbers told a story they didn't want to hear.
A Romney supporter's bowed head and slumped shoulders revealed that it wasn't going to be the Republicans' night.
Big boards in Tampa reported results at an event sponsored by the Republican Party of Florida. 
Party-goers wearing 'Stars and Stripes' clothing awaited results at an election night party at the U.S. Embassy in London.
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney was photographed aboard his campaign plane Tuesday in Boston, Massachusetts.
Voter Sheresa Walker used a flashlight for poll worker Lloyd Edwards in a tent set up as a polling place in Queens, New York. The area is still reeling from Superstorm Sandy.
Shadows were cast on a wall next to a television advertising "Election Night 2012" inside the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center, where Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney was scheduled to speak Tuesday evening.
A volunteer prepared ballots at a polling station in San Francisco, California.
Justin Stucki, Leah Quirk, and Kenady Pettingill, left to right, urged drivers to vote for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney in Spanish Springs, Nevada.
A sign directed voters to the gymnasium at Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. School in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney spoke with journalists during the last flight of his presidential campaign.
Raena Lamont, 3, wore a Captain America costume at a polling center Tuesday in Staten Island, New York.
A voter cast his ballot Tuesday in Mansfield, Texas.
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney took a break from last-minute campaigning to greet workers in Richmond Heights, Ohio.
A voter's bicycle leaned against a wall at a lifeguard station, home to a polling place in Hermosa Beach, California.
Voters walked past a plethora of campaign signs after casting their ballots at Immanuel Lutheran Church in Kansas City, Missouri.
Jesse James, whose home was damaged by Superstorm Sandy, prepared to vote in a makeshift tent set up as a polling place in Rockaway Park, a neighborhood in Queens, New York.
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney waved to supporters at Pittsburgh International Airport in Coraopolis, Pennsylvania.
Workers prepared for President Barack Obama's election night rally at McCormick Place in Chicago, Illinois.
A street scene was reflected in the window of a gift shop near the White House in Washington, DC.
Mike Wegart, 30, stood in line to vote at the Venice Beach lifeguard station in Los Angeles.
Obama supporter Tonya Lewis rallied for votes outside a polling station in Tampa, Florida.
Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan left a campaign plane in Cleveland, Ohio.
President Obama greeted supporters outside a campaign office in Chicago.
A jogger on The Strand in the Los Angeles area community of Hermosa Beach passed a directional sign to a polling place at sunrise.
The stage was set for Obama's election night event in Chicago.
James Tate, 45, held a sign in support of the Republican ticket in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
A nun waited in line to cast her vote in Janesville, Wisconsin.
Children's books about politics lined a wall where citizens waited to cast their vote in Janesville, Wisconsin.
Volunteer David Bowser peeked outside the Pinellas County Democratic Party headquarters in St. Petersburg, Florida.
Election inspector Jim Nodorft prepared to hang the U.S. flag outside the Smelser Town Hall as polls opened at 7 a.m. in Georgetown, Wisconsin.
People headed to a polling station at Washington's Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library on Tuesday.
The sunrise was visible through a bus window on Election Day in Chicago.
Voters entered Washington Mill Elementary School in Alexandria, Virginia, to cast their ballots Tuesday.
Rain did no deter voters from waiting in line in St. Petersburg, Florida. The Sunshine State -- with its 29 electoral votes -- was a key player in determining the next president.
A young girl peered out from under a voting booth as her mother cast a ballot at the Bishop Leo O'Neil Youth Center in Manchester, New Hampshire.
William Carpenter, an assistant fire chief, put up an election rules sign at the entrance of a firehouse polling station Tuesday in Port Royal, Virginia.
Poll worker David Smith used a tape measure to mark a boundary at a Bowling Green, Ohio, school to keep local politicians 100 feet away from where voters cast ballots.
Precinct official Bill Partlow inspected a voting machine before polls open Tuesday in Pineville, North Carolina.
Voters in Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, waited shortly after midnight to cast the first Election Day ballots of the U.S. presidential race. For the first time in the village's history, there was a tie.
|