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Obama’s legacy

I was thinking about what Obama left behind him:

A $9 trillion increase in our national debt, with nothing to show for it.

A healthcare bill which was passed on a strictly partisan basis, which failed in all the ways it was predicted to fail, and which delivered none of its alleged benefits.  We were not able to keep our doctors, most of our premiums tripled, many policies were cancelled outright, and it nearly forced a massive consolidation of health insurance providers, which were blocked by the courts on an anti-trust basis.  The numbers of insured increased a bit, but only because having a policy was made a legal necessity, causing people who may well have had a reason not to be insured, such as excellent health and an adequate bank account, to get health insurance anyway.

A Middle East on fire.  The deal with Iran merely delayed their pursuit of nuclear weapons.  It did not end it.  For this we gave them massive amounts of literal cash, and apparently access to as much as billions, all covertly.

The war in Syria would likely have ended long ago if Obama had not fanned the flames by funding, training and arming what became ISIS, one of the most horrifically violent groups of human beings ever seen.  There is nothing in the worst parts of human history which was foreign to them.

A completely lawless Libya, and a greatly expanded war in Yemen.

A huge regression in race relations, and in respect for law enforcement, all in tandem with a metastasis of violent and radically intolerant hyperpartisanship.

The subversion of multiple Federal agencies, including the FBI, the CIA, the IRS, the ATF, the Department of Justice, and the EPA.  He rewarded and promoted partisans who favored his political goals over integrity, professionalism, the rule of law, and common decency.

A stagnant economy.  He presided over the worst recovery since the Great Depression, despite the Fed pumping $50 billion a month into its member banks for 4-5 years.

This is a short list.

People remember him, who supported him, as a “classy” guy.  But I was thinking this morning about this whole birth certificate issue.  He could have had it released at any time, the original. Public documents can be made public and to argue otherwise is to betray, in my view, imbecility.

There are only two possible conclusions for this decision.  The first, and most likely, is that he had something to hide, most likely that the Communist drug dealer pornographer Frank Marshall Davis was his father.  And if we grant that, it becomes much easier to believe it was his mother who posed for all those nudes with him.  That he was 20-30 years older than her also adds to the fucked-up-ness of it all.

The second was that he was playing politics, that he saw the “Birther” tag as a way of scoring partisan points, and if he made it go away completely that it would cease to be a political asset for him.  This is possible.  But that is the opposite of class.  That is an asshole move.

All in all, it is a blessed MIRACLE we got Trump.  Look at all these goons in the street. Imagine if nobody was fighting back.  Imagine if our President was egging them on.

And I get completely how vast a disaster this was for the radicals.  They spent 3 decades or so building up their apparatus, doing it quietly, disingenuously.  They learned to pretend to be normal people.  They learned to keep their true views private, and their public rhetoric moderate and unobjectionable.  And under Obama they got themselves embedded everywhere in the Federal apparatus.  But they need a leader who supports them.

Trump can’t wave a wand and make these people go away.  It seems most likely he learned early on that vast changes in vast organizations rarely succeed.  Gradualism is the way.  But that he is pursuing his agenda quietly, seriously, and on a daily basis I have no doubt.

It is the knowledge of this dripping which is driving the Left insane.  They can’t stop it.