( CNN ) -- I 'm reading a terribly sad book these days . It 's a book that I thought would uplift me during the doldrums of second-year medical school , and renew in me a sense of hope . It 's called `` The Audacity to Win , '' and it 's a memoir of Barack Obama 's 2008 presidential campaign . When I 'm finished with my patient write-ups at night and get into bed , the book returns me to a time when politics inspired millions and speeches could take your breath away . The election turned out to be a landslide , and news anchors paused to reflect on the historic nature of the hour . My classmates cried with joy , and my parents saved every newspaper they could find . A young team of visionaries was headed for the White House , and the nation was ready for change . During Obama 's transition to office in 2008 , he had an 82 % approval rating . There was something in the air . And then I close the book . Cutting to the present is a rude awakening , like snapping out of a dream . It 's hard to remember those days of optimism -- they seem a distant memory , a sad reminder of opportunities gone by . Change indeed happened , in the years since I cast my first ballot . It was simply nothing I could have imagined . I credit Obama with great and varied accomplishments , from the passage of the Affordable Care Act to our military exit from Iraq , the end of `` do n't ask do n't tell , '' to the killing of Osama bin Laden . Moreover , I believe that partisan obstructionism has upended too many efforts to push our nation forward : immigration reform , a public option for health care , and closing the base at Guantanamo Bay , among others . But , after the countless times in which I have found myself defending the Obama administration to colleagues and peers , I 've reached a limit to the explanations that I can provide . I 've reached a point of political despair . Republican obstructionism can not explain allowing the bugging of foreign leaders , nor having drones strike innocent children overseas . It can not explain having the National Security Agency collect data on the private lives of Americans , nor prosecuting whistle-blowers who reveal government wrongdoing . It can not account for assassinating Anwar al-Awlaki , an American citizen , without a trial , nor shirking public funding and spending limits during presidential campaigns . It can not justify the findings of a report that says the White House 's efforts to silence the media are the `` most aggressive ... since the Nixon Administration '' . And , most recently , it can not excuse the failure to design a simple website more than three years since the Affordable Care Act was signed into law . I do n't know if this is what I should have expected . If , at 18 years old , I was supposed to figure out that governance may contradict the political campaigns that precede it . Obviously , elective office is n't a predictable course , as the opposing political party and random events , such as the Newtown massacre , will shape our public conversation . Yet , of all of the examples that I have listed above , they largely seem to be of the administration 's own choosing . That is what troubles me most of all . I voted for Obama again in 2012 , but not because I was excited by his candidacy . Mitt Romney presented a confusing and unrefined alternative who could not seem to lock down his policies or his positions . I felt that a second term for Obama , free from the pressures of future elections , would fulfill the hope that we had heard of for so long . Still , as Obama 's approval rating sank below 45 % this week , returning to 2008 through that book has become that much harder . It makes me yearn for the many promises that disappeared . This week I was reading the portion of the book describing how Obama suffered a huge loss to Clinton in the Pennsylvania primary . At a post-mortem campaign meeting , he told his staff that they needed to get back on track and stay true to the purpose of their cause. `` ' I want us to get our mojo back , ' he said . 'We 've got to remember who we are . ' `` It 's five years later , Mr. President , and I could n't agree with you more . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Nathaniel Morris .
Obama : I voted for President Obama twice , sharing hope in possibility of change . He says Obama has had worthy efforts thwarted by Obamacare obstructionism . Morris : Obstructionism ca n't excuse Obamacare website woes , drone attacks . Nathaniel Morris : Obama 's second-year campaign memoir is a sad reminder of what might have been .