I feel like the US is the opposite of an "agile" government.
Yes. That is intentional by the design of the federal Constitution. A friend of mine, an engineer, was discussing American politics with me and another friend, a mathematics teacher, one day. The mathematics teacher decried the inefficiency of United States government. The engineer replied, "I'm an engineer. The one thing I'm afraid of is EFFICIENT government." Many Americans are strongly in agreement with Henry David Thoreau that "That government is best which governs least."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Disobedience_(Thoreau)#.2...