Why is Obama so unpopular?

[hopper]

"Bipartisan enough for whom?" I guess would be the question. The main focus of Obama and the Congressional Democratic leadership regarding the passage of the ACA was always getting their members on board.  There was some outreach to Republicans, but they were always going to be a harder sell on it than the Democrats and so less effort was spent in that direction.  The resulting partisan divide on the bill didn't help with its perceived legitimacy, but that was far less important than the fact that they didn't come up with a bill that they could adequately defend and explain before the public. If they had managed to sway public opinion, they might well have earned a few Republican votes. As it was, they made the deals they felt were necessary to pass it, took a few shortcuts on process, and prayed that it would turn out good for them in the end.

That's another load of bull. Immigration reform is popular even among Republicans voters but the congressional leadership will never even allow a vote on it.
The repeal of Don't Ask, Don't tell was popular but the Republicans bitterly opposed it.

McConnell said it plainly, for anyone willing to listen: their goal wasn't to help governing or legislating. It was to make Obama an one-term president.  

If you look at Politifact yes McConnell said he wanted Obama to be one-termer but McConnell also said he wanted to meet Obama halfway on legislation.

Do you think the opposition party really wants the presidents party to be a 2 term presidency? No. I'm sure Tip O' Neil wanted Ronald Reagan to be a one-termer as did Newt Gingrich probably wanted Bill Clinton to be a one-termer.

Immigration Reform-That's a issue that will always split Congressional Republicans until its passed. There is a deep split in the party on that subject.

I think Republicans voted what they thought on "Don't Ask Don't Tell".

[hopper]

Clinton and Gingrich's relationship was worse than Obama and Boehner. The reason Gingrich was more "productive" is because the GOP controlled the Senate as well, so bills actually made it to the President's desk and he happened to sign a few. No compromise was really ever reached in the 90s.

Well Obama and Boehner do like each other personally but they have no working relationship. Gingrich and Clinton had no personal relationship or very little of one but they worked together for the good for the country.

[hopper]

I don't know, the political environment in 2009 was so toxic that no government action was getting public support. It wasn't just ACA. Even the stimulus bill was derided. And it wasn't just Republicans- turn on NPR at the time and all you could hear was that monotone radio voice droning on about this or that minor shortcoming of the stimulus, the surging deficit, the latest job losses, etc. The public mood at the time was universally negative, and for the first half of the year Obama just seemed to float above it all, like some sort of angel or visage separated by clouds from the storm beneath. In 1933 at least Franklin Roosevelt had the public behind him. When he said in his inaugural that he might have to ask for "broad executive powers" to address the crisis, people cheered. There was a rally-around-the leader effect, as you see in many crises.

But in 2009 it was not there, quite the opposite. When people needed to come together the most, we were coming apart. When people ought to have supported expansionary, Keynesian policies the most, deficit hysteria and gold bugism was at its peak. I still remember how sales of books like The 5000 year leap, atlas shrugged and so on, suddenly appeared on the bookshelves that winter, driven by sales. Years later many liberals faulted the stimulus for not having been larger. I almost replied, you weren't there to defend the one we did get, so how could you expect the public to acquiesce for more? Even now, I look back and think it somewhat of a miracle that we got out of that period the way we did, without worse repercussions. Of course, I know for some radicals it was a disappointment, because a much deeper collapse would have broken the system and forced the government to do what Obama did not, which was to break up the banks and really enact a new, New Deal.

This is not to say health care reform would have been popular in "normal" times; we have 1993-1994 as an example. It may be that just as only Nixon could go to China, only a Republican can pass health care reform. That, or a crisis that brings people together like Britain in the 1940s, and not America in the late 2000s.

Obama had rock star power in the first half of 2009. I think by the end of 2009 his rock star power died out with the passage of ACA through the US House and US Senate the 1st time around in both bodies of congress.