Answer:
true
Explanation:
began writing this column (originally in the form of a blog) in 2009, at the very beginning of Barack Obama’s presidency. His election filled me with both hope and trepidation: I admired his eloquence and visible intelligence, and I shared some of his foreign-policy instincts, but my early columns also expressed misgivings about his overly ambitious foreign-policy agenda.
Now, in his final week in office, it’s only natural to take a look back and offer an assessment. And when it comes to foreign policy, I regret to say my verdict is not particularly favorable.
Let’s start with the positive side of the ledger. Here one must begin by recalling the dire circumstances when Obama took office. The world economy was in the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, and the United States was teetering on the brink of a complete economic meltdown. Unemployment was soaring, and millions of Americans were losing their homes to foreclosures. The United States was mired in two unwinnable wars, Osama bin Laden was still at large, and America’s image in many parts of the world was at historic lows.
What has happened since? Here at home, the U.S. economy recovered faster than any of the other major industrial democracies, we’re now at full employment, and the deficits that resulted from the 2009 bailouts and stimulus package have shrunk dramatically. Wall Street was at near-record levels even before the recent post-election surge. More than 20 million Americans who lacked health care coverage now have it (for the moment), and we have seen important progress on civil rights for gay Americans and some other minorities. Moreover, Obama managed these important economic and social achievements in the face of extraordinary opposition from the Republican Party, which seemed more interested in thwarting Obama than in doing anything to help the American people.
In foreign policy, the Obama administration successfully negotiated a deal that halted Iran’s progress toward a nuclear weapon. He fulfilled the George W. Bush administration’s plan to get U.S. troops out of Iraq and significantly reduced the U.S. role in Afghanistan. Bin Laden was found and eliminated on his watch. The Paris agreement was an important step forward on climate change, and the pivot to Asia began a much-needed reorientation of America’s strategic focus. Ending the spiteful and counterproductive ostracism of Cuba was equally overdue and will do more for the Cuban people than our lame-brained embargo ever did.
In both foreign and domestic policy, therefore, this administration notched some genuine wins. And throughout his presidency, Obama conducted himself with the same dignity, humor, grace, intelligence, forbearance, respect for American values and traditions, and above all class that were on display in his farewell speech. Contrast that with the tone of Donald Trump’s first post-election press conference, held the day after Obama’s speech, which was bombastic, deceptive, abusive, defiant, contemptuous of traditional norms — and entirely consistent with Trump’s campaign and business career. (If you think Jan. 20 isn’t a watershed moment for political leadership, think again.) No matter how petty or two-faced his opponents were, Obama rarely paid them back in kind. One suspects Americans will appreciate these qualities even more as Trump’s egomaniacal circus act wears thin and his plutocratic policies leave his working-class supporters out in the cold.
Yet Obama’s presidency is in other respects a tragedy — and especially when it comes to foreign policy. It is a tragedy because Obama had the opportunity to refashion America’s role in the world, and at times he seemed to want to do just that. The crisis of 2008-2009 was the ideal moment to abandon the failed strategy of liberal hegemony that the United States had been pursuing since the end of the Cold War, but in the end Obama never broke with that familiar but failed approach. The result was a legacy of foreign-policy missteps that helped propel Donald Trump into the White House
