Trump has failed to do 'basic stuff' correctly while 'violating' principles of American democracy, says Obama in fresh attack

but falls flat on action

IMO there is certainly a fair amount of truth in that. It was not however, solely of his own volition. After his first two years the legislature literally jammed up damn near every issue of consequence, regaurdless of merits, that was tied to his office.

Even in the first 2 years however, he lead with a much more pragmatic approach centered more on compromise than ideals. Sure his office got the ACA pushed through (better than what we had, but by no means a comprehensive or good solution to the nations healthcare dilema), but it seemed that doing so sapped pretty much all the political energy from voters on the left while simultaneously having the exact opposite effect for voters on the right.

Outside the legislative side of his presidency, IIRC he did issue more executive actions than any of his predessors. Which, even if you agree with any , or even all, of them - it is hard to argue that it paved a dangerous trend. Of course, while conservatives were losing their shit about this during his presidency, those hypocritical assholes are now using it as justification for trumps doing the same god damn thing. Only more of it.

Im no expert, but it seems that perhaps if obama had stuck to the ideals that earned him the office in the first place instead of compromising with the democratic party establishment he may, or may not, have gotten any more done in terms of legislative issues, but maybe we wouldnt have seen the level of disinfranchment with voters on the left that we did. Although he wasnt a political outsider in the sense that trump was, relative to the status quo obama was still pretty much an outsider coming into his tenure, but seemed to be just another cog in the machine by the time he left.

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