Barack Hussein Obama was elected the 44th president of the United States and the first African-American to hold the office and in eight short years have made a huge impact in more ways than expected despite obstruction and us not doing our job helping him get the tools needed to do more making his presidency the success it became anyway.
· Barack Obama made an impact on America and especially Black America despite Diddy, Jesse Jackson and other saying Obama did do a thing for Black folks. However, the facts say different and he could have done more had we done our job.
More on that later, first to prove my argument, let’s go back to both campaigns. The campaigns for president and reelection. I watched video of every speech in which many of them I watched live. Even in some of the speeches he made as president, Obama never promised a damn thing solely.
Every Obama “guarantee” came with work we had to take care of. With every claim, he used the phrase, “we”, “together we,” or “with your help, I”. He never made a promise unless he was guaranteed to keep it without our help which was very rare. In fact, those were working to fix the economy and providing good healthcare which still required help but he said he’d try to make these things happen.
However, the argument is, what has Obama done for Black Folks? I will go into the specifics later but for now I need to explain how we failed Obama and how we torpedoed his chance for real change; but he still managed to get things done.
Yes, I said we torpedoed his chances as well as our chances for change. I’m not going to put it out there whether he’d solve all of our problems but first, he worked harder than any other president to do what he did despite obstruction; and second, you all never gave him a chance to put his feet to the fire.
It started with obstruction. The morning after he won the election, Republicans in Congress and throughout the media wished not only bad luck on his campaign, the guaranteed he would fail in his presidency.
· See if you noticed how Obama had the power to do things in the beginning is because the Democrats had the White House, and were the majority in both the House and the Senate. With that time, he revitalized the Auto Industry which were one of the industries that suffered the most.
· If you want to talk about “What have you done for black folks?” that’s the one of the biggest early things. Someone black I know have a brother, a sister, a mother, a father, a cousin, a girlfriend, an aunt, an uncle, a best friend or someone who work at an auto plant and tell me that’s not true so I can call you a liar.
There was the cash for clunker program and other little money building programs like that that put money in your pocket.
Then came the biggest thing of all which was healthcare. It took all of the powers of the House and the Senate. He used every favor and every bit of leverage to get Democrats and a few Republicans on board.
· Despite all of the obstruction, Health Care Reform was passed on March 23, 2010. How did that help Black Folks? Well a lot of us who couldn’t afford to go to the doctor even with a good job and went to the Emergency Room can now go to the doctor for minor things and leave the Emergency Room for the emergencies.
In 2010, Obama’s Supermajority ended when lost the House but continued to hold control of the Senate. This is the point we started failing Obama because we forgot an important Civics Lesson.
A president’s superpowers come from the Congress: The House & Senate. A president needs both in order to be successful. How do you think Trump seemed to be able to do whatever he wanted in the first two years of his presidency? He had a Supermajority until at least we turned out to at least have him lose the House.
Obama introduced many bills like crime bills and budget bills in the House just to die in the Senate. Fortunately, the bailout of the banks and the auto industry with the first stimulus was the first step in jump starting the economy. That led to economic growth as to why once the jobs numbers started going down, they didn’t stop even beyond his presidency. Checking it is just as simple as tracking the numbers.
Over the years, he introduced jobs bills, economic bills and others to get rejected. We also forget that he is PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. Not just black folks. So, when other groups get priority especially in the eyes of the media, we shouldn’t be upset.
We still had wars to fight and promises to keep in other countries. Obama turned us into the most trusted country in the world and he was one of the most respected leaders in the world. Many of you allowed the Republicans and the media surrounding the Republican party to see him as weak.
Then August 2014 happened. Eric Garner, Mike Brown and other murders caused by the police started getting media attention. Then the protests in Ferguson happened. Many of you screamed, “Where is Obama?” Well, he had the Justice Department investigate but the Republican controlled House stopped a lot of things he wanted to do.
He managed to do an executive order for body cameras and even I said that wasn’t enough. I screamed as others screamed that all of the rioting and marching means nothing if we don’t vote in November. All of this happened on the heels of the midterms. THIS WOULD HAVE GIVEN OBAMA A CHANCE TO REALISTICALLY DO SOMETHING.
He even said, we should give him the Congress he needs to do what he needs to do. Again, that didn’t happen and things started getting worse. Eventually, Obama’s time was over and while he goes down in history as one of the most successful presidencies and scandal free, Diddy, Jesse Jackson and others still say he did NOTHING FOR BLACK FOLKS.
Bottom line is yes, he did. You just haven’t been paying attention. Also, while not glamorous enough to get media attention, they were very strong deeds for sure.