Obama: Moderate Republican?

The orchestrated infomercials that are the Republican and Democratic national conventions are getting set to saturate the news channels while most Americans would rather watch football or "reality" shows.   When I saw the endorsement of President Obama by Florida's former GOP governor Charlie Crist, it struck me how fitting this was. Tea Party first-termers ruling the US House and many statehouses since the 2010 sweep don't know the meaning of the word "compromise."  Now "moderate" has become as much of a dirty word as "liberal" to many right wingers.   Has this intractable stance advanced the agenda of the traditional Republican Party? 

While Mitt Romney pledges North American energy independence by 2020, the Obama administration already has us on that course with an all-of-the-above approach that includes more oil drilling and natural gas exploration. Obamacare is Romneycare, and many Republicans were originally out front on individual mandates. The GOP can trace health care reform efforts back to Nixon.   With the ultra-rich Romney paying 13% in taxes are we really stifling job creation taxes are lower than they've been in decades?  By recent past GOP standards, I’d say no.   Are "Obama's EPA" and other government agencies really strangling us with regulation compared to previous administrations?  No again.   In Afghanistan, the troop surge could have been a page out of the Bush/Cheney playbook. Obama constantly gets pelted with the "socialist" label, yet evidence of that is scant. If we were on such a sharply left-leaning trend, why are some hardline liberals less enthusiastic about him now than in 2008?   On social issues, President Obama did not exactly lead the charge to accept gay marriage any more than Abe Lincoln started out as a fiery abolitionist, but both knew when the time had come. It took the absolutely outrageous claims of the extreme right and a shift in public attitudes for Obama to "evolve" in favor of it. The radical right wing agenda is driving younger generations, minorities and more women away from the mainstream.  Now with pre-election movies slamming his role as commander-in-chief and conspiracy theorists claiming the government is buying up all the bullets to put down its own citizens, President Obama has an even greater opportunity to be the adult in the room.