What will be seen as Obama's biggest failing in posterity?
       |           

Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
Did you miss your activation email?
March 28, 2024, 11:44:55 AM
News: Election Simulator 2.0 Released. Senate/Gubernatorial maps, proportional electoral votes, and more - Read more

  Talk Elections
  General Politics
  Individual Politics (Moderator: The Dowager Mod)
  What will be seen as Obama's biggest failing in posterity?
« previous next »
Pages: [1]
Poll
Question: ?
#1
Being unable to get his chosen successor in office
 
#2
Collapse of the Democratic Party at a state level
 
#3
Inability to reach catharsis in regards to the public's demand for punishment of Wall Street
 
#4
Rising disillusionment with political system
 
#5
Sluggish post-crash growth
 
#6
Continued racial tension
 
#7
Inability to pass key trade deals with Pacific countries and EU
 
#8
Inability to ride with rising economic inequality
 
#9
Failure to pass a healthcare reform with lasting, strong public support
 
#10
Failure to pass immigration reform
 
#11
Failure to pass gun control
 
#12
Failure to pass comprehensive climate change legislation
 
#13
Collapse of Sunni Awakening, and subsequent rise of ISIS, fall of Mosul
 
#14
Being moribund in Syria
 
#15
Unable to deal with a more aggressive Russia
 
#16
Failure to follow through on Libyan mission
 
#17
Inability to install successor to Scalia
 
#18
Other
 
Show Pie Chart
Partisan results

Total Voters: 42

Calculate results by number of options selected
Author Topic: What will be seen as Obama's biggest failing in posterity?  (Read 434 times)
🦀🎂🦀🎂
CrabCake
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 19,192
Kiribati


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« on: November 25, 2016, 07:34:04 AM »

?

I like the guy, and still think his presidency has been better than most, but by god there's been missteps.
Logged
DavidB.
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 13,612
Israel


Political Matrix
E: 0.58, S: 4.26


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #1 on: November 25, 2016, 08:18:54 AM »

Increasingly being out of touch with Middle America, contributing to the election of Donald Trump. It's too easy to blame it all on Hillary's campaign, and while there has always been an insane amount of conservative nonsense against Obama, things like e.g. lighting up the White House with the colors of the rainbow flag while half the country opposed gay marriage seemed vindictive and was a bad look (and I'm saying this as someone who totally supported Obergefell).

Many of the above things I cannot hold against Obama because he did everything to make it a success (e.g. Obamacare: not perfect, but an important step forward) but I think his foreign policy has been a disaster, particularly in the Middle East, and the long-term impact will be profound. The Iran deal will turn out to be a big mistake and Obama himself admitted that if Iran will ever develop nuclear weapons, they will have his name on it: I fully expect this to happen.

Voted for the first option, the three foreign policy options (Sunni awakening/ISIS, Syria, Russia) and "other", namely the Iran deal.
Logged
Maxwell
mah519
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 28,459
Germany


Political Matrix
E: -6.45, S: -6.96

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #2 on: November 25, 2016, 01:52:16 PM »

Some of the foreign policy mistakes are things I think that are "obvious" with hindsight but weren't feasible at the time (i.e. Iraq), but others like Syria and Libya were ones that you could've foreseen being a problem.

I dislike that Biden had to push him out of the closet on gay marriage.

I think a lot of the problem with the Obama administration, truthfully, was the literal knee jerk "no" from the GOP caucus. They made absolutely no effort to give him any room, and that along with conservative Democrats who were damn close to being GOPers, forced him to hedge to the right on healthcare, giving us a plan that is slightly better than what would otherwise be existing, but still is not close to fixing the problems we have with healthcare. Obamacare was a fine first step but should've been acknowledged as such, rather than being promoted as the "healthcare fix", which is why any negative news on it is so damning.

On the other hand - I think a stronger anti-Wall Street package could've been passed, and other policies with more potential traction could've been passed in the time it took to get through Obamacare.
Logged
Storebought
YaBB God
*****
Posts: 4,326
Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #3 on: November 25, 2016, 02:06:26 PM »

His domestic policy failures all stemmed from a piece: not realizing that the GOP opposition to him was atavistic, and could never be minimized with negotiations and glad-handing. They were, and are, an enemy power resident in the US, and Obama should have used militant means of carrying through his reforms over their objections.
Logged
Cashew
Sr. Member
****
Posts: 2,559
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #4 on: November 25, 2016, 03:05:54 PM »

Other. He wasted the first two years trying to bask in a post partisan glow. Even as late as 2012 he was still desperately trying to be seen as some new era president, angering his base with attempts at a "grand bargain", the only thing that saved him from that disastrous mistake was tea party extremism.

There was also his immigration flip flop, where he passed the buck to congress saying he had no authority, only to pass an executive order once it becomes clear that republicans will not behave the way he expected them too.

There was so much that could have been done if the filibuster had been nuked as soon as Obama too office, although the blame falls on congressional democrats too, as they suffered from many of the same delusions as him.
Logged
nolesfan2011
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 1,411
United States


Political Matrix
E: -5.68, S: -7.48

WWW Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #5 on: November 25, 2016, 03:19:37 PM »

Enabling a genocide in Syria and allowing Russia to grow in power and support worldwide
Logged
They put it to a vote and they just kept lying
20RP12
Atlas Superstar
*****
Posts: 38,235
United States


Political Matrix
E: -5.29, S: -7.13

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #6 on: November 25, 2016, 04:35:36 PM »

Rise of ISIS, not passing thorough healthcare reform, increasing disillusionment with political system, not doing enough about climate change, and rising racial tensions. I wouldn't blame him personally for the racial tensions or the disillusionment with the political system, but that's how people will remember him. ISIS isn't entirely his fault either, but just how 9/11 was a Bush administration thing, ISIS has to be an Obama administration thing.
Logged
Mr. Reactionary
blackraisin
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 17,784
United States


Political Matrix
E: 5.45, S: -3.35

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #7 on: November 25, 2016, 05:51:47 PM »

the GOP ... were, and are, an enemy power resident in the US, and Obama should have used militant means of carrying through his reforms over their objections.

LOL!
Logged
SUSAN CRUSHBONE
evergreen
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 9,735
Antarctica


WWW Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #8 on: November 25, 2016, 05:56:44 PM »

the rise in polarisation in general. not that that's his fault, of course, but it'll still be considered a big part of his legacy
Logged
Blue3
Starwatcher
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 12,035
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #9 on: November 25, 2016, 07:12:38 PM »
« Edited: November 25, 2016, 07:16:57 PM by Blue3 »

Being unable to get his chosen successor in office
He did all he could

Collapse of the Democratic Party at a state level
Could have done more, but not even mostly his fault, when he campaigned for other Democrats they usually did poorly

Inability to reach catharsis in regards to the public's demand for punishment of Wall Street
He passed financial reform, and it's a good thing he didn't go all populist and tell people to gather their pitchforks and torches

Rising disillusionment with political system  
It was there before him, in fact Obama came to fame by trying to fight it in his 2004 speech
 
Sluggish post-crash growth
Not his fault, and it was pretty good we grew at all and didn't have another depression

Continued racial tension
This is what you get when a country that still has a lot of racists gets a black president

Inability to pass key trade deals with Pacific countries and EU
Not many really care about this

Inability to ride with rising economic inequality
Not sure what this means? Most of his proposals couldn't make it through a GOP Congress

Failure to pass a healthcare reform with lasting, strong public support
Yeah, they failed in the PR of this for the most part

Failure to pass immigration reform
See GOP Congress, but he does have some responsibility for not fully taking advantage of those first 2 years

Failure to pass gun control
See GOP Congress, but he does have some responsibility for not fully taking advantage of those first 2 years

Failure to pass comprehensive climate change legislation  
See GOP Congress, but he does have some responsibility for not fully taking advantage of those first 2 years... and he WAS able to accomplish a lot with executive orders

Collapse of Sunni Awakening, and subsequent rise of ISIS, fall of Mosul
Not really America's fault, and I think ISIS will be a short-term blip anyways

Being moribund in Syria  
Yeah, this was a failing

Unable to deal with a more aggressive Russia
We enacted crippling sanctions against them... he was perfectly "able to deal" with them. But "dealing" anymore with them would mean war.

Failure to follow through on Libyan mission
We were never meant to be even the leader of the humanitarian intervention. Libyans made that mess, they should clean it up. Maybe doing a little more would have prevented Benghazi and that whole fiasco, but really I don't think it was our responsibility. It's not like Iraq, which we broke.

Inability to install successor to Scalia
Did all he could
Logged
Intell
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 6,817
Nepal


Political Matrix
E: -6.71, S: -1.24

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #10 on: November 25, 2016, 07:58:56 PM »

Syria and Libya was shyte.
Logged
Frodo
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 24,509
United States


WWW Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #11 on: November 26, 2016, 10:44:10 AM »

Much of the deterioration of the Democratic Party (at least in the South) was perhaps inevitably a result of the decades-long realignment of the region with the Republican Party.  

Elsewhere, though it could have been avoided had President Obama kept Howard Dean on as DNC chair.  
Logged
Pages: [1]  
« previous next »
Jump to:  


Login with username, password and session length

Terms of Service - DMCA Agent and Policy - Privacy Policy and Cookies

Powered by SMF 1.1.21 | SMF © 2015, Simple Machines

Page created in 0.045 seconds with 13 queries.