President Obama Was Inaugurated A Decade Ago. What Did His Presidency Mean & How Much Has the Nation Changed?

Here is a historical story that seems somehow relevant yet irrelevant in some respects, and feels like it as just yesterday sometimes, while simultaneously somehow also feeling like it was an impossibly long time ago.

I wanted to do this on the actual anniversary, which took place a couple of days ago. But I got a bit wrapped up with a lot of things - it has been incredibly busy and chaotic and stressful on many levels in my life just recently - and never quite got around with it.

But now, I have a bit more time as I write this tonight, and so I figured this would be a good opportunity to finally address it.

If you have not already figured it out, two days ago marked the 10-year anniversary of the inauguration of President Barack Obama. 

The thing is, the times were a mixed bag. On the one hand, it was a time of hope, when many people thought that Obama would usher in a new era of "hope" and "change" like his campaign slogans had promised following eight long, disastrous years of the George W. Bush presidency, which had ushered in some serious failures, from the greatest domestic security failure in history, to the numerous major corporate scandals that seemed to become a new normal during those years, to the unjustified war in Iraq while already fighting a war in Afghanistan, and both wars seemed to never end, and finally, the near collapse of the economy right at the end of Bush's term. 

That was some track record, eh?

And indeed, Obama was a change which the country needed. When you look at it, he actually did bring in a serious measure of stability during his eight years. The economy first stopped going down the drain, stabilized, rose, and then began to thrive towards the end of his administration. The United States opened relations with Cuba, joined the world community in becoming part of the Paris Climate Accord, and the overall image of the country improved, as the world seemed to find Obama as inspiring as Americans did in 2008, when he was first elected to the White House.

On the other hand, Obama was not the figure of progressive politics and greater racial equality that many had hoped. He continued many of the programs of the Bush White House to maintain that status quo. He deported many immigrants, and continued the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He undeservedly won the Nobel Peace Prize, and then had the dubious distinction of becoming the first Nobel Peace Prize winner to bomb another Nobel Peace Prize winner. He did do some things to help improve the environment, most notably join the Paris Accord. Yet, despite this being a prominent campaign promise in 2008, he hardly did anything in this area through the first four years, and when he did win re-election (which was not guaranteed), he finally did begin to do more, but even this was limited, and paled in comparison to what most other industrialized nations were doing. And when it came to Flint, Michigan, he showed his true colors by delivering a speech, but then pretending to drink the local water, only wetting his lips and basically seeming to minimize the seriousness of the case that the health threat posed by the local contaminated drinking water, which had become a crisis.

So, Obama was not always as inspiring as he seemed to be to many people. Now granted, compared to what we have now, Obama looks like an absolutely decent and enlightened guy, so much so that many people miss the times when he was in office. We were not embarrassed routinely by his conduct, like we are with the current man in the Oval Office. And things were improving, even though many longstanding problems persisted.

He was not the savior that some took him for, but nor was he the devil that so many others - those who would turn to Trump in 2016, in particular - tried to portray him as.

Nor do I believe that people's overly simplistic interpretation of who he was and what he represented were accurate or provided the nation any services. Some viewed him as the new hope, as the man of the hour, as almost brought to us by God Himself. Quickly, we heard him described as "Bamelot," a play on the "Camelot" days of John F. Kennedy and his family, who the country was, and still to some degree remains, a bit obsessed with. I also remember talking to a couple of guys - older white guys - who said that the country could no longer be viewed as racist, and implied that racism was no longer a problem, after Obama was elected to the White House. Admittedly, that was a big step for the country to take, but it seems clear to me, as it should to pretty much anybody, that the nation's problems with racism certainly did not suddenly, magically disappear. The fact that we have someone who seems to believe in, and for many to represent, white supremacy, is telling. After the first black president, and all of the hopes that people invested in him, we now have the most polarizing and backward president, arguably in our history.

So, Obama represented a hope that the country was indeed moving forward. Moving past the bigotry and racial tensions that have always plagued it. And also moving past an elitist rich guy who promoted elitist politics to benefit rich people like him. Unfortunately, we once again seem to have betrayed our addiction to racial tensions, as well as our apparent addiction towards turning to elitist rich brats who promote elitist political views to benefit rich people like them.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. If there is anything lasting from the legacy of the rise of President Obama, it just might be that, especially here in the United States.

Obama was inaugurated 10 years ago today — here's what newspapers looked like the next day Mark Abadi, January 20, 2019:

https://www.businessinsider.com/obama-inauguration-newspaper-front-pages-2019-1?fbclid=IwAR3rsMx5KO54s36ODAMkh6mgfCbQYunzoFu9bPVuiY1s---FflKjfvjl2Cg&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=topbar&utm_term=desktop&referrer=facebook