Legacy of ashes: Obama’s fading accomplishments

http://www.unionleader.com/editorial/Legacy-of-ashes-Obamas-fading-accomplishments-05142018

Early in the Obama presidency, National Review’s Jim Geraghty observed that all of Barack Obama’s promises come with an expiration date.

By that, Geraghty meant that Obama tended to have strongly held convictions, up until the moment they became politically inconvenient.

It turns out that President Obama’s few accomplishments are just as ephemeral.

Lacking Senate votes to ratify a treaty with Iran, Obama instead made a personal promise to honor the Iran deal. Last week, President Trump reversed that decision.

Obama long claimed he lacked authority to provide amnesty to illegal immigrants brought to the U.S. as children. Then he did it anyway. The so-called Dreamers remain in political limbo, relying on the federal government to continue to ignore the law.

Obama signed the U.S. up for a climate change plan that won’t do anything to slow climate change. Trump took us out of it.

Blocked by Congress, Obama passed his Clean Power Plan by executive order and net neutrality through the FCC. What he did with “a phone and a pen,” Trump is undoing.

Obama’s signature health care law remains in place, but Congress repealed the individual mandate at its core. The damage it did to our health care system remains.

Barack Obama built his castles out of sand. He should not be surprised that they are being washed away by the next tide.

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