The Democrats controlled all 3 branches for less than a year, and they chose to pursue healthcare reform. After that Republican leaders admitted in public that their #1 priority was preventing Democrats from passing any further substantial legislation whatsoever in a bid to make them look ineffectual.

If you want to criticize Democrats, they did choose to expand Medicaid and Medicare without a more comprehensive long-term financing plan. OTOH, unlike the GOP tax reform, these expansions were at least nominally revenue neutral thanks to some targeted tax increases, the insurance mandate, etc. Democrats may spend but they _tax_ and spend, which is better than spending or (as Republicans do) cut taxes and spend.

Republicans could come to the table and attempt to compromise with Democrats. Democrats would want to expand benefits. Republicans would like to cut them, at the very least, if not eliminate benefits or privatize the entire program. But compromise theoretically could be fairly easy. But Republicans are committed to a nihilistic "starve the beast" strategy. That's the crux of the problem. Republican ideology has become so extreme that compromise is literally anathema. It's no coincidence that old-school Republicans have been bowing out left-and-right.

I see similar trends happening on the left with an insistence on single-payer healthcare, but it's early and not even remotely comparable to where Republican politics is at.

The president doesn't write legislation though, that comes from Congress.