, Columnist
Obama Stayed Out of the Swamp, and That Hurt Him
His purist approach to making policy was squeaky clean. It also weakened him and his party.
Above politics.
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I’m not ashamed to say it: I cried when Barack Obama was inaugurated. OK, yes, I supported him. But a startling number of Republicans I know who didn't vote for him nonetheless felt their eyes dewing up as our nation’s first black president took the oath of office.
Of course, some people took things further. He was given a Nobel Peace Prize, hailed as the reincarnation of Lincoln or FDR, or as a “lightworker.” Even Obama himself occasionally got into the act, as with his speech accepting the Democratic nomination. People really expected a new and better sort of politics to attend his administration. And as he leaves us, it seems worth assessing how that went.