Why Obama can't bring the change he promises.

Obama promises that he can change the tone in Washington, and derides "the partisan politics of the past" (ie the nineties and Hillary Clinton).  But he can't change the tone because the problem is with Republicans not Democrats.  A non-partisan Democratic President will be as hapless against partisan Republicans as the Democratic congress is often accused of being now. Republicans are willing to block progressive legislation.  

Unless Obama has a Congress with 60 Democratic Senators or more, and that is unlikely even with the favorable circumstances we will see in the fall, Republicans will continue to block whatever progressive legislation comes along.

Digby described it this way:

The truth is that Republicans out of power believe in total obstruction. They are perfectly happy to block all progressive legislation because they know they will suffer no consequences for it from the mild mannered Democrats and the bipartisan zombies.

I agree with Markos Moulitsas who said the problem Democrats have lately in Washington is "valuing compromise over confrontation."  (link) Markos's schtick has been to rail against the DLC centrists which he associates with the Clintons.  But he has failed to appropriately apply that same venom to centrist triangulator Barack Obama. (Obamaism = Clintonism)

That point about partisanship, incidentially, bears much resemblance to a central point of Paul Krugman's book The Conscience of a Liberal (link):

To be a progressive, then, means to be a partisan—at least for now.

It is true that Krugman has also railed against the incrementalism of the nineties.  But when it comes to choosing between Obama and Clinton, he chooses Hillary. Why is that? Perhaps a key insight is that Senator Obama denigrates previous fights for progressive values, as discussed by Barney Frank here.  If he has no respect for those fights, but is himself destined to have to deal with obstructionist Republicans, then is he the leader we really need to fight for progressive values?

We need a fighter not a compromiser.  Obama promises to lead by ending partisanship.  But since he won't have a filibuster proof senate and he can't wave a magic wand and make Republican partisans disappear, it doesn't take a genius to see why he can't do what he promises.