this post was submitted on 10 Oct 2025
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Hey, I get it. Obama wasn't a bad President on the scale of US Presidents, but there are a lot of left wing people who have genuine grievances with him.
I could see anyone who is an advocate for or Middle Eastern themselves be pretty damned pissed at him, considering he dropped twenty-six thousand bombs on seven countries. This was AFTER he won the Nobel Peace Prize.
I was right smack in the middle of the Finance Industry back in the 2008 Crash and paid very close attention to what he did to "rescue the Economy" in the aftermath of it.
Let's just say that the complete total crash from well above most of Europe to near zero of Social Mobility in America and the acceleration of the growth in inequality (especially between people whose income comes from Work vs people whose income comes from Asset Ownership) and subsequent problems with impoverishment of the Working Class which fed the growth of the vote in Far Right Populists like Trump, are all down to which kind of people Obama choose to Rescue and which ones he chose to pay for it.
He didn't just cause grievances for left wing people, he fucked up the US with his choices at a pivotal moment, pretty much plowing, fertilizing and seeding the field were Trumpism grew.
His influence is way more massive than it seem to many, mainly because of the moment in History when he became president made his choices have far reaching effects that structurally pivoted the US Economy which in turn cascaded into changes to the US Politics and Society.
However, as he's a veritable songbird with the gift of the gab (plus Liberals pushed for decade the whole Racist idea that his race made him inherently a better person) a lot of people formed opinions on him based on his race and his speeches rather than on his actions.
You make a lot of great points. It does make me wonder if I to cut Obama a lot of slack because of the color of his skin. I certainly bought the hope rhetoric before I began to see a pattern of the status quo.
I still remember how much hay was made from him being "The first Afro-American President": the Democrats sold the hell out of him being Black as a good thing (not least to get more votes for him from Black Communities) whilst the Republicans sold the hell out of him being Black as a bad thing.
His race kept getting dug up (and, as you see here, still is) and IMHO it together with his truly exceptional gift of the gab obscured the actual character of the man as shown by his actions which were often pretty negative and had widespread negative consequences some of which still resonate today.
In many ways he's a symbol of American politics highly divisive and mainly performative approach to discrimination, IMHO.
Besides being famous for drone striking and murder in the Middle East, Obama's most impactful policy on America was bailing out Wall Street with American taxpayer dollars and surpressing protests against it.
Many corrupt billionaires could have lost their assets in 2008 but Obama is the reason the elite cabal is still alive and kicking. And they were even able to buy the dip.