On January 20th, 2017, President Barack Obama exited the White House for the final time as the President of the United States of America. President Obama’s eight years as the leader of the free world is a period of time that history will not soon forget. As America turns the final page on the Obama Presidency to an uncertain and uncomfortable future it is worth looking back on the successes and failures of the 44th President and what his legacy will be.
When Barack Obama took office in January of 2009 the country appeared to be teetering on the brink of economic collapse. The “Great Recession,” as it is now known, had devastated the financial and housing sectors, and countless Americans had seen their savings all but wiped out. The situation certainly wasn’t as bad as it were during the summer months of 2007, when it seemed that the entire global financial system was about to implode, but the situation was still serious. This was to be the first major test of his Presidency.
Less than a month into his first term Obama signed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, better known as the stimulus. The act, though certainly flawed, did help to stop the bleeding and put America on the road to recovery. Massive middle and lower class tax cuts helped give people some more spending money, increased unemployment benefits helped create economic security as people looked for more jobs, and business and consumer spending quickly rebounded. The year after the act took place the economy was getting back on track. The stimulus actually did better than originally projected. It may not have been perfect but it certainly cushioned the impact of the recession.
When Obama took office the economy was shrinking at a rate of more than four percent, but is now growing at a rate of over three percent. The unemployment rate is less than half of what it was in 2009. U.S. employers have added more than 11 million jobs, and median household income actually increased in 2015 after decades of relative stagnation. Say what you will about the policy specifics but President Obama is certainly leaving the economy in better shape than he found it.
During his tenure as President the United States sought to reduce its dependence on foreign oil and invest in clean energy technologies of the future, something that he has been incredibly successful in. The US is now generating almost 30 times more energy from solar energy than we were in 2008, and the cost of solar panels has dropped almost in half, making solar energy more viable for more Americans. We have cut our dependence on foreign oil by more than 50% and domestic production of renewable energy has more than doubled.
Even for doubters of climate change this is an important milestone. Clean, renewable energy is on the bleeding edge of technological advancement, and the US the potential to lead the world in that field. Investment in these fields creates secure, long term, high paying jobs that cannot be outsourced to our competitors. The more energy that we produce at home as opposed to importing from abroad the more secure and profitable we will be as a country.
Throughout much of the second half of President Obama’s term criminal justice reform was one of the most important, bipartisan issues to face the federal government, and on that issue the President led the way. His Justice Department took significant and concrete steps to improve a justice system that unfairly targets people of color, people of little means, and those accused of relatively low impact drug offenses. The importance of this issue is apparent to all, especially when you consider that the United States prison population has increased exponentially more than our population as a whole, and that we make up 5% of the world’s population but lock up 25% of the world’s prisoners.
President Obama oversaw the enactment of the Fair Sentencing Act, and the Smart on Crime initiative, both of which provide meaningful reform to criminal justice and sentencing reform. His administration specifically worked to reduce the likelihood of repeat offenders, reduce the cost to the taxpayers of keeping people in prison, reducing mandatory minimums for low level drug offenses, and making the issue of criminal justice reform a political priority. Additionally the President has commuted thousands of sentences for low level drug offenders, and pardoned dozens more. These are tangible, practical actions that will hopefully reverberate for generations to come. Criminal justice reform is the next major civil rights battle that this country faces, and President Obama’s Justice Department took some crucial first steps in that fight.
President Obama and Vice President Joe Biden have been at the forefront of the national conversation on the prevalence of campus sexual assault, and violence against women more broadly. They spearheaded the “It’s On Us” campaign to stop sexual assault on college and university campus across the country, in addition to making it clear that they would not visit or support college campuses that do not take a stand on this issue. They sent guidelines to every single institution of higher education that receives federal funding, laying a framework for dealing with this problem, and created a task force designed to combat the issue. It is hard to pinpoint specific accomplishments here, but the very fact that the Obama White House made campus sexual assault an issue helped to bring much needed focus and funding to this problem that affects far too many college-age women and men.
Of course the core domestic accomplishment of President Obama’s eight years was also one of his first, the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, more commonly known as “Obamacare.” Though the future of this landmark piece of legislation is at risk, even if Obamacare is technically “repealed” it will still have a profound impact on healthcare policy in the US for years to come.
The goal of the ACA was to make healthcare more affordable for all Americans. It lowered the costs of emergency room visits and chronic illnesses, two of the most expensive healthcare costs, subsidized medications, mandated that insurers cover those with preexisting conditions, and allowed young people to stay on their parents insurance plans for a longer period of time.
Since the passage of Obamacare private insurance spending per enrollee has fallen by 5%, the uninsured rate has fallen by 7.1%, and over 20 million more Americans have access to healthcare than before.
The significance of this law cannot be overstated. Make no mistake, Obamacare literally saved lives. The preexisting conditions mandate in particular guaranteed that those with devastating preexisting conditions could not be denied healthcare options by their insurers. Stories of staunch Republicans who thanked the President for saving their lives went viral, showing the real human impact of the President’s signature domestic achievement. Though its future may be uncertain the impact it has had on the lives of millions of Americans cannot be overstated.
His final domestic accomplishment, and one of his most important, was his decision to come out in support of LGBT rights and the right of gay and lesbian couples to marry. It is easy to forget how big a deal this was at the time, having the President of the United States come out for gay rights. During his time as President he overturned Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, allowing gay and lesbian members of our armed forces to serve openly, as well as allowing their partners to receive benefits. The historic Obergefell v. Hodges Supreme Court case came down on the side of the President, that state bans on gay marriage are unconstitutional. Beyond that he has been an advocate for the LGBT community and a staunch opponent of those who would discriminate against their fellow Americans simply because of who they love. Decades from now people may look back and wonder why this was ever an issue, why we ever thought it was ok for the government to discriminate against you because of who you love, but it is important to remember that the Obama White House helped this fight enormously.
The Presidency is one half domestic and one half foreign, and while many of President Obama’s more visible accomplishments were in the domestic sphere that does not in any way lessen his administration’s accomplishments abroad.
One important milestone is terrorism. Since 2001 the United States has been engaged in the War on Terror, fighting terrorism on multiple fronts all over the world. President Obama inherited this fight from his predecessor and did not hesitate to use the full might of the US military to destroy those who would attack the United States or her allies. He ordered a massive troop surge in Afghanistan, widely acknowledged as a major turning point in the war in that country, allowing the US to finally secure and stabilize most of the country that we invaded in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.
He was responsible for the assassination of Osama bin Laden, the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks and the leader of al Qaeda. The assassination of bin Laden had been a top US priority since the day the towers fell and President Obama and his national security team finally oversaw retribution for the 3,000 Americans who perished on that day. Of course the credit for this mission goes to the military and intelligence personnel who carried it out, but President Obama’s oversight and direction, in addition to his risky decision to carry out a ground assault as opposed to an airstrike, cannot be overlooked.
President Obama also oversaw the controversial Iran nuclear deal, which granted Iran sanctions relief in exchange for strict monitoring and oversight of its nuclear program. This was one of the most complicated foreign policy maneuvers his administration undertook, involving months of negotiation between dozens of countries. The deal is still controversial but top military, intelligence, and science figures have lobbied against its repeal, stating that the deal does in fact make it significantly harder for Iran to achieve nuclear weapons capability, and that without the deal Iran becomes a much more complicated and dangerous threat. It still remains to be seen what the long term effects of this plan will be, but experts hope that it will eventually lead to normalized relations between Iran and the western world.
President Obama’s recent move to normalize relations with Cuba was praised by experts on both sides of the isle, finally doing away with one of the last relics of the Cold War. This move opens Cuba up for US business interests and investment, while finally allowing travel by US citizens. Liberalization of trade with Cuba will hopefully give US hotel, travel, automobile, and telecom industries a much-appreciated boost, while also serving to smooth over relationships with other Latin and South American countries.
Finally it is important to note that the Obama Presidency has not always been a successful one, and several high profile failures and missed opportunities will likely stand out for years to come. President Obama’s attempt to broker pear between the Israelis and the Palestinians went absolutely nowhere, and US relations with Israel have deteriorated, even as the US provides Israel with massive aid packages, both military and otherwise. Similarly US relations with Russia have reached a point not seen since the Cold War, culminating with Russia interfering in the 2016 Presidential Election.
Even though the US has not seen any attacks by any foreign extremist group on US soil, a testament to US intelligence and law enforcement services, it has been vulnerable to several so-called “Lone Wolf” attacks. The President also failed to close the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, though he has managed to decrease the number of prisoners.
His administration failed to achieve immigration reform, with the bipartisan “pathway to citizenship” failing in Congress, leaving our system still flawed and in desperate need of repair. Obama’s decision to withdraw US troops fro Iraq appears, in hindsight, to have been a miscalculation, allowing for the advancement of ISIL in the power vacuum left behind. He also failed to enforce his “red line” on the use of chemical weapons by President al Assad in Syria, declining to intervene to oust the ruthless dictator. Similarly his administration’s failure to act more decisively on the refugee crisis and failure to do anything to prevent the wholesale slaughter of countless civilians, including women and children, in the Syrian city of Aleppo will likely stand as one of the greatest travesties of the past decade. Finally his administration did not manage to make meaningful progress on the plague of gun violence in the United States. He was blocked at every turn, even prevented from passing such common sense laws as universal background checks and no fly no buy requirements.
Some of these failures are the result of unprecedented Republican obstructionism, some are the result of political tradeoffs, and some fall on the President himself.
In the end though the legacy of President Barack Obama will be all of these things, and none of them. Regardless of anything I mentioned above President Obama will always be remembered as one of the most important leaders in the history of the Republic.
Anthony “Van” Jones of CNN put it best: “The power… of President Obama, as president, has always been less than his power as precedent. It's the precedent that he set that you could dream that big.”
President Obama was a man who shattered conventions, whose story inspired a nation. He may have occasionally fallen short, may have disappointed, but the dream was always there. That a man of African descent could rise from almost nothing to be come the President of the United States should serve for all of us an affirmation that yes, the American Dream is still alive.
Generations from now when people look back on the years of President Barack Obama they will see an icon, the promise of America embodied. A man who strove to better himself and his country, who tried to the best that he could for his country. He led with quiet strength, unbridled determination, and a fierce love of country.
So, for the final time:
Thank you, Mr. President.
You will be missed.
