American troops struggled to bring order and freedom to a land that had experienced neither, while guerrilla warriors and Muslim extremists stood in the way. Much of the American public, the chancelleries of Europe, and the Congress -- especially the "anti-imperialist" Democrats -- clamored for the U.S. to transfer sovereignty and end its occupation, both objectives the U.S. met, although not without difficulty. Indeed, the divide .... between unique -- his opponents would have said "megalomaniacal" -- way of conducting foreign policy fell neatly along party lines.
On the domestic front, a booming economy began to erase memories of an earlier recession while many Americans considered whether, amid technological advances and expanding international commerce, things would ever be the same. Debates over how to protect U.S. jobs while empowering American consumers festered in Congressional
deliberations over trade and tariff policy. .... the integrity of corporate America came into question as combinations and trusts increasingly began to dominate industry.
Partisanship seemed ... shrill ..... thundering that the Democrats "seem at a loss, both as to what it is that they really believe, and as to how firmly they shall assert their belief in anything," while .... sentiment among Democrats, accused the Republican leadership of "a shameless exhibition of a willingness to make compromise with dignity."
Sound Familiar? Actually it is Roosevelt's 1904 election being described in this excellent analysis in FrontpageMag.com (another excellent resource for analysing current events.) I edited out references to the times to make the comparision more dramatic!