President Bush did not campaign as a hardline far-right conservative. From my viewpoint, he appears to be "handling" the domestic issues and removing any recourse the Dems could throw back at him, signing those bills that need to be passed when the best-hopeful compromise appears to have been reached or when the obvious unconstitutionality of CFR will be found as such by SCOTUS. If Bush hadn't signed CFR we all know that up to this day we'd still be hearing how Pres. Bush and the GOP are "the party of big money and his reluctance to sign the bill proves it and that they don't want any form of campaign finance regulation."
You seem to dislike the Patriot Act, and though I will admit there are parts I'm not real thrilled with myself, post-911 action needed to be taken and had our country waited too long to tighten things up we may have ben attacked again before such an act was passed. I don't believe that would've gone over well with the people if our elected officials were bickering and not accomplishing anything constructive while it happened. All of you folks who think a Democrat is better to vote for are forgetting that the Dems let the Patriot Act zoom right on through Congress because they couldn't quit drooling over the reality that they were getting to take so many of our rights away. Just think what the Patriot Act would look like with the Dems in complete charge of writing it. We'd be living in a more-Orwellian world than our worse nightmares.
Not even a little bit. Bush is a socialist. The Farm Bill is evidence enough but the Education bill is especially telling.