Why History Will Be Very Kind to Obama

[NoNukes]

Ten and a half years ago, at the Democratic convention in Boston, Barack Hussein Obama was introduced to America as a youthful, magnetic man who had burst suddenly and somewhat mysteriously onto the scene. This characterization — superficially appealing yet weightless, more symbolic than substantive — followed him throughout his presidential campaign, when Hillary Clinton cast him as an inspirational speechmaker like Martin Luther King Jr., as opposed to a viable contender for president, and John McCain’s campaign scathingly labeled him a “celebrity,” attractive but vacuous.

The lived reality of Obama’s presidency has unfolded as almost the precise opposite of this trope. He has amassed a record of policy accomplishment far deeper than even many of his supporters give him credit for. He has also survived a dismal, and frequently terrifying, 72 months when at every moment, to go by the day-to-day media, a crisis has threatened to rock his presidency to its core. The episodes have been all-consuming: the BP oil spill, swine flu, the Christmas underwear bomber, the IRS scandal, the healthcare.org launch, the border crisis, Benghazi. Depending on how you count, upwards of 19 events have been described as “Obama’s Katrina.”

Obama’s response to these crises—or, you could say, his method of leadership — has been surprisingly consistent. He has a legendarily, almost fanatically placid temperament. He has now spent eight years, counting from the start of his first presidential campaign, keeping his head while others were losing theirs, and avoiding rhetorical overreach at the risk of underreach. A few months ago, the crisis was the Ebola outbreak, and Obama faced a familiar criticism: He had botched the putatively crucial “performative” aspects of his job. “Six years in,” BusinessWeek reported, “it’s clear that Obama’s presidency is largely about adhering to intellectual rigor — regardless of the public’s emotional needs.”

By year’s end, the death count of those who contracted Ebola in the United States was zero, and the panic appears as unlikely to define Obama’s presidency as most of the other crises that have come and gone. But there have been other times when Obama’s uninterest in engaging in the more public aspects of his job — communicating his reasoning and vision, soothing our anxieties with lofty rhetoric, infusing his administration with the sense of purpose that electrified his supporters during the 2008 campaign — has clearly harmed him. “If there’s one thing that I regret this year,” he admitted in 2010, “it is that we were so busy just getting stuff done and dealing with the immediate crises that were in front of us that I think we lost some of that sense of speaking directly to the American people about what their core values are.”

The president’s infuriating serenity, his inclination to play Spock even when the country wants a Captain Kirk, makes him an unusual kind of leader. But it is obvious why Obama behaves this way: He is very confident in his idea of how history works and how, once the dust settles, he will be judged. For Obama, the long run has been a source of comfort from the outset. He has quoted King’s dictum about the arc of the moral universe eventually bending toward justice, and he has said that “at the end of the day, we’re part of a long-running story. We just try to get our paragraph right.” To his critics, Obama is unable to attend to the theatrical duties of his office because he lacks a bedrock emotional connection with America. It seems more likely that he is simply unwilling to: that he is conducting his presidency on the assumption that his place in historical memory will be defined by a tabulation of his successes minus his failures. And that tomorrow’s historians will be more rational and forgiving than today’s political commentators.

It is my view that history will be very generous with Barack Obama, who has compiled a broad record of accomplishment through three-quarters of his presidency. But if it isn’t, it will be for a highly ironic reason: Our historical memory tends to romance, too. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s fatherly reassurance, a youthful Kennedy tossing footballs on the White House lawn, Reagan on horseback — the craving for emotional sustenance and satisfying drama runs deep. Though the parade of Obama’s Katrinas will all be (and mostly already have been) consigned to the forgotten afterlife of cable-news ephemera, it is not yet certain whether this president can bind his achievements into any heroic narrative.

Much More: Why History Will Be Very Kind to Obama -- NYMag

President Obama is playing chess - while his critics play checkers.

Obama's whole story is the American dream. A guy comes out of nowhere, an underdog, and becomes President. Everyone of any political persuasion would be cheering, if he were White.

He's really the ultimate example of affirmative action.

Yes, affirmative action helped someone go on and become a good President. You are finally getting it.

 

[Freewill]

Of course they will, he's black. I can see the first line of the bio: Barack Obama, the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review, was born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii.

^Didn't see much of a success story there. Just a bitter idiot trying not to suck.
Sorry. If you want to paint him as a bad president you had better point out his bad qualities.

All politicians have them, yet you simply point out that he is black..........not smart.

We have been hashing over his faults for 6 freakin' years why continue? Might as well joke about it.

If for no other reason the country is divided like no time before and that is ALL him. Not because he is black, because a whole lot of people cheer for a whole lot of accomplished blacks but because of the things he has said and done. But that will be forgotten in a few years.

The rest of what went on with the economy and such, I don't believe him educated enough in that area and mostly he did what advisers told him should be done.

I just think he will bet a pass by the liberal leaning press and historians because of being black. It is them taking care of the black man like they like to do.

Maybe his bio will start out like this: "I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy," Biden said. "I mean, that's a storybook, man."

Now tell me there isn't latent racism in the DNC.

 

[Freewill]

Ten and a half years ago, at the Democratic convention in Boston, Barack Hussein Obama was introduced to America as a youthful, magnetic man who had burst suddenly and somewhat mysteriously onto the scene. This characterization — superficially appealing yet weightless, more symbolic than substantive — followed him throughout his presidential campaign, when Hillary Clinton cast him as an inspirational speechmaker like Martin Luther King Jr., as opposed to a viable contender for president, and John McCain’s campaign scathingly labeled him a “celebrity,” attractive but vacuous.

The lived reality of Obama’s presidency has unfolded as almost the precise opposite of this trope. He has amassed a record of policy accomplishment far deeper than even many of his supporters give him credit for. He has also survived a dismal, and frequently terrifying, 72 months when at every moment, to go by the day-to-day media, a crisis has threatened to rock his presidency to its core. The episodes have been all-consuming: the BP oil spill, swine flu, the Christmas underwear bomber, the IRS scandal, the healthcare.org launch, the border crisis, Benghazi. Depending on how you count, upwards of 19 events have been described as “Obama’s Katrina.”

Obama’s response to these crises—or, you could say, his method of leadership — has been surprisingly consistent. He has a legendarily, almost fanatically placid temperament. He has now spent eight years, counting from the start of his first presidential campaign, keeping his head while others were losing theirs, and avoiding rhetorical overreach at the risk of underreach. A few months ago, the crisis was the Ebola outbreak, and Obama faced a familiar criticism: He had botched the putatively crucial “performative” aspects of his job. “Six years in,” BusinessWeek reported, “it’s clear that Obama’s presidency is largely about adhering to intellectual rigor — regardless of the public’s emotional needs.”

By year’s end, the death count of those who contracted Ebola in the United States was zero, and the panic appears as unlikely to define Obama’s presidency as most of the other crises that have come and gone. But there have been other times when Obama’s uninterest in engaging in the more public aspects of his job — communicating his reasoning and vision, soothing our anxieties with lofty rhetoric, infusing his administration with the sense of purpose that electrified his supporters during the 2008 campaign — has clearly harmed him. “If there’s one thing that I regret this year,” he admitted in 2010, “it is that we were so busy just getting stuff done and dealing with the immediate crises that were in front of us that I think we lost some of that sense of speaking directly to the American people about what their core values are.”

The president’s infuriating serenity, his inclination to play Spock even when the country wants a Captain Kirk, makes him an unusual kind of leader. But it is obvious why Obama behaves this way: He is very confident in his idea of how history works and how, once the dust settles, he will be judged. For Obama, the long run has been a source of comfort from the outset. He has quoted King’s dictum about the arc of the moral universe eventually bending toward justice, and he has said that “at the end of the day, we’re part of a long-running story. We just try to get our paragraph right.” To his critics, Obama is unable to attend to the theatrical duties of his office because he lacks a bedrock emotional connection with America. It seems more likely that he is simply unwilling to: that he is conducting his presidency on the assumption that his place in historical memory will be defined by a tabulation of his successes minus his failures. And that tomorrow’s historians will be more rational and forgiving than today’s political commentators.

It is my view that history will be very generous with Barack Obama, who has compiled a broad record of accomplishment through three-quarters of his presidency. But if it isn’t, it will be for a highly ironic reason: Our historical memory tends to romance, too. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s fatherly reassurance, a youthful Kennedy tossing footballs on the White House lawn, Reagan on horseback — the craving for emotional sustenance and satisfying drama runs deep. Though the parade of Obama’s Katrinas will all be (and mostly already have been) consigned to the forgotten afterlife of cable-news ephemera, it is not yet certain whether this president can bind his achievements into any heroic narrative.

Much More: Why History Will Be Very Kind to Obama -- NYMag

President Obama is playing chess - while his critics play checkers.

Obama's whole story is the American dream. A guy comes out of nowhere, an underdog, and becomes President. Everyone of any political persuasion would be cheering, if he were White.

I think everyone can say that is impressive, but that alone does not mean he is a good president or bad.

 

[nodoginnafight]

History WILL be very kind to Obama imho.

Considering Truman called the lack of a national healthcare plan a national disgrace, Obama will be credited with accomplishing something that democrats have worked for for 60 years.

Considering Bush faltered for most of 7 years trying to bring the 911 mastermind to justice, Obama will be credited for accomplishing it

If the stock market and unemployment gains of the last five years don't completely reverse between now and 2017 - he will be credited for slowly turning the economy around.

 

[Delta4Embassy]

It's interesting to compare how we are as a political society vs just a generation or two ago. Can you imagine the anti-Presidential vitriol during the McCarthy era, or during WWII? You'd be thrown in prison or forced to go into hiding for what we hear on the news just about every night.

 

[nodoginnafight]

It's interesting to compare how we are as a political society vs just a generation or two ago. Can you imagine the anti-Presidential vitriol during the McCarthy era, or during WWII? You'd be thrown in prison or forced to go into hiding for what we hear on the news just about every night.

Well ... from a historical perspective our politics in the U.S. have been extremely ..... partisan and volatile. But yeah, it seems we hit a period of relative calm between WWII and the Clinton administration.

 

[OKTexas]

History does not make judgement's based partisan ideology and talking points it's likely history will see Obama for what he has been to date an average President time will tell.

Unless he does something to really piss off the left he will be written up as the best thing since sliced bread, leftist academic elites will write it.

Are you stating that the Left Wing has a domination in actual information and history writing?

Actual information, no, but it's the left wing academics that usually write the history books. After all the threads posted on this board about skewed facts in new history books, I thought you would have realized that by now.

 

[regent]

History does not make judgement's based partisan ideology and talking points it's likely history will see Obama for what he has been to date an average President time will tell.

Unless he does something to really piss off the left he will be written up as the best thing since sliced bread, leftist academic elites will write it.

Are you stating that the Left Wing has a domination in actual information and history writing?

Actual information, no, but it's the left wing academics that usually write the history books. After all the threads posted on this board about skewed facts in new history books, I thought you would have realized that by now.

At times the historians are asked if they consider themselves liberal or conservative. But the real question might be does intensive study of American history make one liberal? Is that one reason conservatives are always in a battle to reduce or eliminate higher education?

 

[OKTexas]

History does not make judgement's based partisan ideology and talking points it's likely history will see Obama for what he has been to date an average President time will tell.

Unless he does something to really piss off the left he will be written up as the best thing since sliced bread, leftist academic elites will write it.

Are you stating that the Left Wing has a domination in actual information and history writing?

Actual information, no, but it's the left wing academics that usually write the history books. After all the threads posted on this board about skewed facts in new history books, I thought you would have realized that by now.

At times the historians are asked if they consider themselves liberal or conservative. But the real question might be does intensive study of American history make one liberal? Is that one reason conservatives are always in a battle to reduce or eliminate higher education?

The accurate portrayal of events is the job of the historian not to put a leftist spin on everything, kind of like you did with your last sentence.

 

[NLT]

Ten and a half years ago, at the Democratic convention in Boston, Barack Hussein Obama was introduced to America as a youthful, magnetic man who had burst suddenly and somewhat mysteriously onto the scene. This characterization — superficially appealing yet weightless, more symbolic than substantive — followed him throughout his presidential campaign, when Hillary Clinton cast him as an inspirational speechmaker like Martin Luther King Jr., as opposed to a viable contender for president, and John McCain’s campaign scathingly labeled him a “celebrity,” attractive but vacuous.

The lived reality of Obama’s presidency has unfolded as almost the precise opposite of this trope. He has amassed a record of policy accomplishment far deeper than even many of his supporters give him credit for. He has also survived a dismal, and frequently terrifying, 72 months when at every moment, to go by the day-to-day media, a crisis has threatened to rock his presidency to its core. The episodes have been all-consuming: the BP oil spill, swine flu, the Christmas underwear bomber, the IRS scandal, the healthcare.org launch, the border crisis, Benghazi. Depending on how you count, upwards of 19 events have been described as “Obama’s Katrina.”

Obama’s response to these crises—or, you could say, his method of leadership — has been surprisingly consistent. He has a legendarily, almost fanatically placid temperament. He has now spent eight years, counting from the start of his first presidential campaign, keeping his head while others were losing theirs, and avoiding rhetorical overreach at the risk of underreach. A few months ago, the crisis was the Ebola outbreak, and Obama faced a familiar criticism: He had botched the putatively crucial “performative” aspects of his job. “Six years in,” BusinessWeek reported, “it’s clear that Obama’s presidency is largely about adhering to intellectual rigor — regardless of the public’s emotional needs.”

By year’s end, the death count of those who contracted Ebola in the United States was zero, and the panic appears as unlikely to define Obama’s presidency as most of the other crises that have come and gone. But there have been other times when Obama’s uninterest in engaging in the more public aspects of his job — communicating his reasoning and vision, soothing our anxieties with lofty rhetoric, infusing his administration with the sense of purpose that electrified his supporters during the 2008 campaign — has clearly harmed him. “If there’s one thing that I regret this year,” he admitted in 2010, “it is that we were so busy just getting stuff done and dealing with the immediate crises that were in front of us that I think we lost some of that sense of speaking directly to the American people about what their core values are.”

The president’s infuriating serenity, his inclination to play Spock even when the country wants a Captain Kirk, makes him an unusual kind of leader. But it is obvious why Obama behaves this way: He is very confident in his idea of how history works and how, once the dust settles, he will be judged. For Obama, the long run has been a source of comfort from the outset. He has quoted King’s dictum about the arc of the moral universe eventually bending toward justice, and he has said that “at the end of the day, we’re part of a long-running story. We just try to get our paragraph right.” To his critics, Obama is unable to attend to the theatrical duties of his office because he lacks a bedrock emotional connection with America. It seems more likely that he is simply unwilling to: that he is conducting his presidency on the assumption that his place in historical memory will be defined by a tabulation of his successes minus his failures. And that tomorrow’s historians will be more rational and forgiving than today’s political commentators.

It is my view that history will be very generous with Barack Obama, who has compiled a broad record of accomplishment through three-quarters of his presidency. But if it isn’t, it will be for a highly ironic reason: Our historical memory tends to romance, too. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s fatherly reassurance, a youthful Kennedy tossing footballs on the White House lawn, Reagan on horseback — the craving for emotional sustenance and satisfying drama runs deep. Though the parade of Obama’s Katrinas will all be (and mostly already have been) consigned to the forgotten afterlife of cable-news ephemera, it is not yet certain whether this president can bind his achievements into any heroic narrative.

Much More: Why History Will Be Very Kind to Obama -- NYMag

President Obama is playing chess - while his critics play checkers.

Sperm catcher at work

 

[Lakhota]

Why are white Christian NaziCons always trying to rewrite history? There must be a reason...

 

[regent]

History does not make judgement's based partisan ideology and talking points it's likely history will see Obama for what he has been to date an average President time will tell.

Unless he does something to really piss off the left he will be written up as the best thing since sliced bread, leftist academic elites will write it.

Are you stating that the Left Wing has a domination in actual information and history writing?

Actual information, no, but it's the left wing academics that usually write the history books. After all the threads posted on this board about skewed facts in new history books, I thought you would have realized that by now.

At times the historians are asked if they consider themselves liberal or conservative. But the real question might be does intensive study of American history make one liberal? Is that one reason conservatives are always in a battle to reduce or eliminate higher education?

The accurate portrayal of events is the job of the historian not to put a leftist spin on everything, kind of like you did with your last sentence.

If I were writing as an historian there would be no spin, but I have a feeling that on these boards there is a lot of politics.

 

[Lakhota]

Unless he does something to really piss off the left he will be written up as the best thing since sliced bread, leftist academic elites will write it.

Are you stating that the Left Wing has a domination in actual information and history writing?

Actual information, no, but it's the left wing academics that usually write the history books. After all the threads posted on this board about skewed facts in new history books, I thought you would have realized that by now.

At times the historians are asked if they consider themselves liberal or conservative. But the real question might be does intensive study of American history make one liberal? Is that one reason conservatives are always in a battle to reduce or eliminate higher education?

The accurate portrayal of events is the job of the historian not to put a leftist spin on everything, kind of like you did with your last sentence.

If I were writing as an historian there would be no spin, but I have a feeling that on these boards there is a lot of politics.

What was your first clue?

 

[The2ndAmendment]

History will remember Obama as:

Worse than Bush.

 

[OKTexas]

Unless he does something to really piss off the left he will be written up as the best thing since sliced bread, leftist academic elites will write it.

Are you stating that the Left Wing has a domination in actual information and history writing?

Actual information, no, but it's the left wing academics that usually write the history books. After all the threads posted on this board about skewed facts in new history books, I thought you would have realized that by now.

At times the historians are asked if they consider themselves liberal or conservative. But the real question might be does intensive study of American history make one liberal? Is that one reason conservatives are always in a battle to reduce or eliminate higher education?

The accurate portrayal of events is the job of the historian not to put a leftist spin on everything, kind of like you did with your last sentence.

If I were writing as an historian there would be no spin, but I have a feeling that on these boards there is a lot of politics.

All that says is you're not leftist college professor like most historians.

 

[Old Rocks]

why sure

 

[ninja007]

Why are white Christian NaziCons always trying to rewrite history? There must be a reason...

we get it- you hate white people. But I bet my last dollar 90% of everything you use and own was made by a white person.