After all, it was four years this week that Barack Obama became the 44th president, bringing hopes not just that he would stem the economic bleeding and end two seemingly endless wars -- but that he would undo the broader expansion of power and secrecy that took place during the Bush-Cheney years. President Obama has proved -- for reasons that are in many cases not his doing -- to be a remarkably polarizing figure, still seen after four years as a savior by some, while to his enemies he is somewhere on the spectrum between a socialist and the Antichrist. The reality is that while he's a necessary counterweight to the radical extremism of ther Tea Party and has soke praiseworthy accomplishments on issues from health care to gays in the military, he's also expanded the power of the presidency at the expense of the public, just like every other modern chief executive before him. Sometimes alarmingly so.