Obama’s “Accomplishments” Refuted

I wanted to stop talking about Obama. Really, I did. I can’t wait to get to the point where I never have to talk about this guy again. But left-wingers everywhere are fawning praise all over this corrupt, warmongering corporatist as he leaves office, so I have to respond with the facts. Again I will repeat that I am not a conservative, never vote for Republicans, think George W. Bush was one of the worst presidents ever, and disagree with today’s Republicans on most issues. In four or eight years, you can bet I will be writing an article just like this, hell, many of them, refuting Trump’s so-called “accomplishments” too.

The article here that talks about Obama’s “28 great achievements” is a perfect example of this meaningless gushing. Let’s analyze. I link to my sources as always.

1 – Rescued the country from the Great Recession, cutting the unemployment rate from 10% to 4.7% over six years

False.

Under Obama, the government started tracking unemployment differently to make it look artificially lower than it actually is. The unemployment rate doesn’t include:

– People who have given up looking for work because they couldn’t find any.

– Older people who couldn’t find a job so they retired earlier than they planned.

– People who only have shitty part time jobs, who are desperate for a full time job, but can’t get one.

If you account for these other categories, the real unemployment rate is anywhere from 9.7% all the way to 40%.

Obama didn’t cut unemployment at all. Real unemployment may actually be worse.

2 – Signed the Affordable Care Act which provided health insurance to over 20 million uninsured Americans

And raised premiums for everyone, making health insurance more expensive. Of course, this was its intent all along.

3 – Ended the war in Iraq

False.

There are still over 5,000 American troops in Iraq right now. Soldiers and civilians alike are still dying over there.

4 – Ordered for the capture and killing of Osama Bin Laden

This is a good thing. That’s one.

5 – Passed the $787 billion America Recovery and Reinvestment Act to spur economic growth during the Great Recession

False.

The ARRA actually cost somewhere between $1 trillion and $1.7 trillion, money we didn’t have and had to borrow from sources like China, and for that massive amount of debt we got a tiny, 0.2 percent bump in the economy. Obama’s ARRA was one of the biggest wastes of taxpayer money (actually taxpayer debt) in the last 15 years, and yet another nail in the coffin leading to the eventual collapse of the US.

6 – Supported the LGBT community’s fight for marriage equality

Government should have nothing to do with marriage. Including the government in now even more marriages will just create worse divorces down the road.

As I said at the time, gay people never needed to worry about the horror of divorce, but now they will.

7 – Commuted the sentences of nearly 1200 drug offenders to reverse “unjust and outdated prison sentences”

This is a good thing. That’s two.

8 – Saved the U.S. auto industry

False.

To quote Poltifact: No one can say what would have happened without massive government intervention. There is no question that General Motors and Chrysler are profitable today. But so is Ford, a company that received no financial aid at all. And, Barack Obama cannot claim full credit for this outcome. According to several experts, he needs to share it with his predecessor, President George W. Bush.

What would have happened if Obama had stayed out of it is what always happens in the free market: dumbass executives would have been fired, new more competent executives would have been hired, some auto companies or divisions would have gone out of business, and new competitors would have entered the market. Just look at Ford.

9 – Helped put the U.S. ontrack for energy independence by 2020

False.

I would bet you $5,000 of my own money that the United States will not be energy independent by January 1st, 2020, which is less than three years from now.

How easily people buy into the government’s marketing slogans and bullshit. Stupid.

10 – Began the drawdown of troops in Afghanistan

Obama surged the troops in Afghanistan, so why does he get some kind of credit for being a great guy by drawing them back down? If Obama was drawing down troops who some prior president put in Afghanistan, then okay, but that’s not what happened.

Don’t forget that we are, right now, bombing seven different countries under the peace-loving Barak Obama.

11 – Signed the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals allowing as many as 5 million people living in the U.S. illegally to avoid deportation and receive work permits

More hundreds of millions of dollars that will be spent that we don’t have and can’t afford. It is policies precisely like this that will end up bankrupting the US.

12 –Signed the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act to re-regulate the financial sector

This issue is somewhat complicated, but the bottom line is these are corporatist policies that actually enrich much of Wall Street, not restrict its power. This is why so many progressives are angry at congress (and Obama) for passing these policies.

13 – Dropped the veteran homeless rate by 50 percent

This is a good thing. That’s three.

14 – Reversed Bush-era torture policies

This is a good thing. That’s four.

15 – Began the process of normalizing relations with Cuba

This is a good thing. That’s five.

16 – Increased Department of Veteran Affairs funding

Increased funding doesn’t solve problems in government. 99% of the time it just wastes more money. The Department of Veteran Affairs, like almost all government agencies, requires massive reform, not more money.

17 – Signed the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure Act

As with Dodd-Frank; this is a corporatist policy that won’t stop banks from making billions. The banks own Obama and congress, not the other way around.

18 – Boosted fuel efficiency standards for cars

Fuel efficiently standards should be set by private companies and their customer base, not by the incompetent and corrupt federal government. Restrictions on business to maintain air quality are good, but only when they are done on a local / regional basis. San Diego has every right to enact air quality laws for San Diego, but not for Miami.

19 – Improved school nutrition with the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act

Forcing taxpayers to provide millions of rich and middle class kids free breakfast and lunch, even when their families can easily afford it, is insane in the extreme.

If you want to give very poor children free school lunches, then that’s something we could talk about, but that’s not the crazy Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act, which beta male Obama did to keep his wife from yelling at him.

20 – Repealed the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy

Please explain to me how this makes the military more effective.

21 – Signed the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, making it a federal crime to assault anyone based on sexual or gender identification

In a free country, you cannot modify the punishment of a criminal based on what he was thinking when he committed the crime. Only the actions of the criminal should be considered.

22 – Helped negotiate the landmark Iran Nuclear Deal

Handing a dictatorship millions of dollars for promises to not make a bomb in the future didn’t work when Bill Clinton tried it with North Korea, and it won’t work with Iran either. Just watch.

23 – He signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act to combat pay discrimination against women

Insanity. There is no gender wage gap, nor should government force private companies to pay any gender anything. Gender should have nothing to do with how much the government thinks you should get paid.

24 – Nominated Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, making her the first Hispanic ever to serve as a justice

Please explain to me why the race of a Supreme Court justice is something we should be excited about. Shouldn’t these people be appointed based on ability, regardless of race?

25 – Supported veterans through a $78 billion tuition assistance GI bill

That’s a grey area, but I’ll be nice and give you that one. That’s six good things so far.

26 – Won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples”

Jesus. I know this is difficult for left-wingers to accept, but Barack Obama is one of the most bloodthirsty, warmongering presidents in American history. We’re bombing people in seven different countries right now, including thousands of civilians.

27 – Launched My Brother’s Keeper, a White House initiative designed to help young minorities achieve their full potential

More welfare, millions more dollars spent on what will be yet another bloated welfare program, something Obama did to cash in on the Trayvon Martin shooting.

28 – Expanded embryonic stem cell research leading to groundbreaking work in areas including spinal injury treatment and cancer

This should be done by the free market. It almost always ends up in as a boondoggle whenever government gets involved, particularly the federal government.

So out of 28 of Obama’s “great achievements,” five are lies, four are meaningless, 13 are actually bad things, and just six are good (some of them barely good).

As usual, people are fundamentally irrational and tend to judge leaders based on likeability rather than what they actually accomplish. As I’ve said before, when you take your emotions out of it and look at the facts, Barack Obama will go down in history as one of America’s worst presidents.

(If it’s any consolation, Trump probably will too.)

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15 Comments
  • CrabRangoon
    Posted at 12:21 pm, 12th January 2017

    He was just here in Chicago for his big farewell. People here think he walks on water honestly. The emotions I’ve seen about him are pretty amusing. He’s a politician like any other yet they seem to think he’s a Messiah that fixed all our problems. They legitimately see him as the greatest president of all time-way better than those darn racist old white founding fathers. Cult of personality goes a long way in this “feels” culture we live in now I guess.

    Sadly I feel the Obama’s are not going away anytime soon. I bet she runs for something down the road-seems like a power hungry dominant just like Hillary. The progressives would piss themselves with joy for the first black female president, regardless of her qualifications.

  • Kurt
    Posted at 04:05 pm, 12th January 2017

    While I disagree on some of your points, I think the main story here is that the list of 28 items just isn’t terribly impressive to start with, even if they were all as true as stated.

  • Caleb Jones
    Posted at 05:24 pm, 12th January 2017

    Sadly I feel the Obama’s are not going away anytime soon. I bet she runs for something down the road-seems like a power hungry dominant just like Hillary. The progressives would piss themselves with joy for the first black female president, regardless of her qualifications.

    Holy shit. I never thought of that. I think you’re right.

    Oh boy.

    While I disagree on some of your points, I think the main story here is that the list of 28 items just isn’t terribly impressive to start with, even if they were all as true as stated.

    Good point.

  • Paul Murray
    Posted at 06:06 am, 13th January 2017

    21 – “In a free country, you cannot modify the punishment of a criminal based on what he was thinking when he committed the crime.”

    That is not and has never been true. Motive has always been a factor in judging the severity of a criminal act. To the extent that a criminal motive must be present for a crime to have been committed at all. This is why accidentally killing someone is not punished the same as doing it deliberately.

    This is not saying that handing minority pressure groups a loaded gun to point at everyone else is a great idea – it’s a shitty idea. But your reasoning here doesn’t hold up.

    28 – “This should be done by the free market. It almost always ends up in as a boondoggle whenever government gets involved, particularly the federal government.”

    The free market does not do basic research. Never really has. All of your bits of amazing free-market techno gagetry and medicine are based on research financed by government. The boondoggle here is not that the government does this stuff, it’s that it grants patents to private companies to profit off research paid for by tax dollars.

  • Caleb Jones
    Posted at 12:31 pm, 13th January 2017

    That is not and has never been true. Motive has always been a factor in judging the severity of a criminal act. To the extent that a criminal motive must be present for a crime to have been committed at all. This is why accidentally killing someone is not punished the same as doing it deliberately.

    You’re talking about determining guilt. I’m talking about modifying the punishment. Two different things.

    Yes, you need to establish motive as a factor in determining guilt. But once someone is found guilty, and it’s clear that person did it on purpose, what he was thinking should not be a factor anymore. The punishments in a free country should be based on actions, not thoughts.

    This is why I’m not only against hate crimes but things like “first degree murder” vs. “second degree murder,” etc. Murder is murder; what the perpetrator was thinking before or during the act should be completely irrelevant to the punishment of the crime.

    The free market does not do basic research. Never really has. All of your bits of amazing free-market techno gagetry and medicine are based on research financed by government.

    Haha! Really? I wasn’t aware that government invented the integrated circuit, the VCR, iPod, the iPhone… Hell, we should hand over ALL technological R&D to government then! Great idea!

  • Max
    Posted at 05:39 pm, 13th January 2017

    But should Obama get credit for everything good and bashed for everything bad that happened during his presidency? He played a big part in warning the relationships with Cuba so if you are in favour of that (I am) then you can give him credit. But killing Osama was for the most part the result of american intelligence officers continuing what they started with Bush and it would have most likely happened with a republican president in power or any president with enough sense not to get in their way. If I was going to give credit I would say:
    1. 70% intelligence officers for finding him.
    2. 25% the seals for risking their necks to kill him.
    2. 4% to Obama for not cutting their funding or get in their way.
    4. 1% for Bush for the same reasons than Obama.

    Cuba on the other hand, would have probably not happened without Obama or somebody similar so he gets credit for that IMHO.

  • Caleb Jones
    Posted at 06:06 pm, 13th January 2017

    But should Obama get credit for everything good and bashed for everything bad that happened during his presidency? He played a big part in warning the relationships with Cuba so if you are in favour of that (I am) then you can give him credit. But killing Osama was for the most part the result of american intelligence officers continuing what they started with Bush

    Correct. That’s true with any president. I suppose we could go back through the above list and assign percentages. Not that I care, but your point is accurate.

    I still give Obama WAY more credit on the Osama thing than Bush, since Bush flat-out didn’t give a shit about Osama once he invaded Iraq (which is was he was dying to do all along). There’s video of him saying he “doesn’t really think about him (Osama) anymore.”

  • Pyro Nagus
    Posted at 09:58 am, 15th January 2017

    Reader hailing from the forementioned dictatorship here. I’m not too sure on that prediction. While the Iranian side may not show it, they are actually very desperate ducks. While the powers at be need to keep fueling tensions in the middle east to keep the target off their backs and war away from themselves (Along with a whole slew of other reasons I’m probably not seeing), lifting the sanctions will be a much needed relief for the collapsing economy (not that it will fix it). Even if one’s an evil warmonger (they are), they needs to weigh their options. Healthy relationships with world’s economy gives them far better advantages.

    However, they MIGHT play their part provided the American side does as well. While Trump can’t simply call it off, he doesn’t seem too keen on the deal either.

    I can’t be convinced with a “Look at how Korea turned out”. Iran and korea are in very similar situations but they are very different countries. Could you elaborate? Or is your prediction just a guess?

    Btw, according to many sources, US didn’t “give” millions of dollars to Iran. They returned them.

  • Caleb Jones
    Posted at 10:31 am, 15th January 2017

    I can’t be convinced with a “Look at how Korea turned out”. Iran and korea are in very similar situations but they are very different countries. Could you elaborate? Or is your prediction just a guess?

    It’s just an educated guess on my part and I could be wrong. As always I look at the odds of something happening rather than make outright predictions, and I think the odds are well over 50% that the leaders of Iran, at some point down the road, will thumb their nose at whatever they agreed to in Obama’s deal. (It’s possible they might be so scared of Trump that they’ll do it after he leaves office though.)

    Btw, according to many sources, US didn’t “give” millions of dollars to Iran. They returned them.

    Correct but irrelevant. It’s the same thing for purposes of the comparison.

  • Kurt
    Posted at 10:31 am, 16th January 2017

    “Haha! Really? I wasn’t aware that government invented the integrated circuit, the VCR, iPod, the iPhone… Hell, we should hand over ALL technological R&D to government then! Great idea!”

    Ironically, the basic technology that powers all of those inventions WAS discovered through government funded research. Economic benefits of things like the technology developed during the cold war and space race have been profound and well-documented.

  • JB
    Posted at 01:24 am, 17th January 2017

    I think you Americans should know how much most of Europe (Right-wing nations like Poland not included) has had a massive hard-on with regards to Obama ever since he was elected. I myself was guilty of this, but after opening my eyes regarding political SP, I have noticed that he is just like the rest of the political elite. The way the media has presented him, he is considered part saint, when in fact he’s done a lot to start more wars, shift the world economy even further towards the elites (and financial collapse).
    Where it really cuts the line for me is this re-ignited hate that Obama and the rest of the political forces have found for Russia. I don’t understand the need to start a meaningless feud that we all know hurts everyone, especially since Russia hasn’t changed in many years. Putting on my tin-foil hat, I actually suspect that we have some political forces who are interested in creating some good ol’ Cold War vibes so that fear can once again be a part of peoples everyday lives.
    Good thing that Donald Trump hasn’t jumped on the bandwagon yet, and I really hope that he doesn’t.

  • Caleb Jones
    Posted at 02:08 pm, 17th January 2017

    Ironically, the basic technology that powers all of those inventions WAS discovered through government funded research. Economic benefits of things like the technology developed during the cold war and space race have been profound and well-documented.

    There are always technological advancements via government during prolonged periods of war (cold or otherwise). My hypothetical question stands: If government is so much better at tech than the free market, should we then turn over tech R&D to government (or government funding)? If not, why not?

    I think you Americans should know how much most of Europe (Right-wing nations like Poland not included) has had a massive hard-on with regards to Obama ever since he was elected.

    Correct. That’s because Europe is to the left of the US (though the US is catching up with Europe fast).

    Good thing that Donald Trump hasn’t jumped on the bandwagon yet, and I really hope that he doesn’t.

    He won’t. The evidence (not proof, but evidence) that he has various financial ties to Russia is overwhelming.

  • Pyro Nagus
    Posted at 05:47 am, 18th January 2017

    Ya know, now that I think about it, the odds are way over 50 percent that they will. No matter how you spin it, the leaders of Iran are power hungry just like the US. You can’t change old patterns of behaviour with sanctions, contracts and deals. Somewhere down the line, they’ll find a way to mess up other regions to stay in power (I see this pattern of behaviour in their inner-politics). Maybe with nuclear weapons, maybe not. After all, they’re just means to an end.

  • Teresa
    Posted at 04:34 am, 2nd November 2018

    I wonder what everyone that commented on this, has to say now. That it’s almost 2 years of Trump. Will the author still think that Trump will go down in history as a bad President?

  • Veronica
    Posted at 12:38 am, 24th July 2019

    Everything you don’t agree with you say its false and put your own personal opinion as to how it should if been handled. You are not a President who has a major recession almost a depression deal with. He had to make life or death decisions and look at all sides to deal with the world on his shoulders literally. I would Love to see Trump try get our county out of that hole… with his history of bankrupting his family businesses until they took it over. You don’t know the true in and out of the government only what the news reports to you… and they don’t and can’t report everything.

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