The Obama Presidency
2009-2017
Barack Obama
-Born August 4, 1961 Honolulu, Hawaii
-Raised by a mother from Kansas and a father from Kenya, Obama was raised with help from his grandparents in the midwest
-Barack entered Harvard Law School in 1988, he later joined the Chicago law firm Sidley Austin as a summer associate and it was there he met a young lawyer who was assigned as his adviser Michelle Robinson
-In 2004 he ran for the US Senate and later delivered the keynote speech at the Democratic convention
-On February 10, 2007 then Senator Obama announced his run for President and on November 4, 2008 Obama was elected President of the United States
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMMHfC1pH0Q
The Good
-President Obama put billions of dollars into improving access to mental health for services for veterans, service members and military families
-Marriage equality, gay couples now have the same rights as straight couples.
-President Obama convened a National Security Summit and eventually got 16 countries to give up their loose nuclear material
-Obama banned solitary confinement for juveniles in federal prisons
-Ban on Transgender troops was lift and all combat positions were open to women
-Saved the automobile industry
-Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)
-Can’t be denied health insurance because of a pre existing condition, can’t charge women more than men, can’t put a lifetime cap on
- 10 of billions go to pell grants instead of banks for student loans
-For the first time in history the amount of uninsured is in the single digits
-The A.C.A (Obamacare)
-Nominating Sonia Sotomayor, the first Latina on the Supreme Court
-The most diverse cabinet to ever serve in the White House
-The High School graduation rate hit 83.2% the highest ever
-Unemployment rate was 10% when he came in, when he left it was 4.7%
-The longest streak of job growth in U.S. history under the private sector and created 11.3 million jobs compared to George W, Bush’s 1.3 million
-Homelessness by veterans dropped by half
-Normalized relations with Cuba and opened an embassy
The Bad
-Under Obama the military conducted 503 military drone strikes compared to Bush’s 52
-Issued an executive order to shut down Guantanamo Bay and it never happened but has been reduced from 242 to 45
-While Obama ended the war, Al Qaeda is still active, the rise of ISIS, ignoring North Korea, not paying attention to Syria, and the state of Libya after Muammar Gaddafi
-900+ state legislature seats, 27 state legislative chambers, 12 Governorships, 62 House seats, and 11 US Senate seats
-The War on Whistleblowers, Obama has prosecuted more whistle then every single President combine. (Ed Snowden, ex CIA agent John Kiriakou, Stephen Kim, and Sibel Edmonds)
-The trans pacific partnership attempt
-Reinforcement of surveillance
-Tied to wall street
-Black middle class is stagnant, black homeownership is at record lows, and income inequality is still a problem
-An increase of tribalism between both parties
-Not passing an immigration reform bill and being the deporter in chief. Deporting more people than any other president in history.
Questions
What do you guys remember about the Election of Obama ?
Was Obama treated unfair ? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5N-BRrhxh0Y
Was Barack Obama a black face to an American empire or is it unfair to expect one man to undo behaviors of multiple Presidents ? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JXQK3yIIvc&t=9s
Was the election of Trump a backlash of the election of Obama ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyiH3YcvRH0