Not Really That Into Obama

Ok so let me start by saying that I think being the president is one of the hardest jobs in the world. No one is perfect and out of the past people or even out of all the presidents in history he did a historically good job. The problem is the bar was really really low. President Obama was the first black panther. He was going to change everything for black people. I will never forget the episode of the Boondocks where they made fun of just how extra the black community was being about President Obama. I get it and I understand as much as it is possible for me to understand the importance of this moment. A black man was going to be president, I mean wow. We have come such a long long way and to think that a black man could reach the highest office in the land it really meant something. My issue is it meant a lot but he didn’t really follow through on a lot of those promises. I mean that is not to say that he didn’t do anything. I have health insurance right now because of him. The Obama care that Republicans love to hate on has given myself and serval people that I know a chance to have quality health care. He also made some good adjustments in the criminal justice system specifically the ridiculousness of how far out of whack the sentencing was for crack appose to cocaine.
So I am not going to sit here and act like he didn’t do anything for me or for my family. He definitely did some things but I feel like he didn’t do enough. To me, he was constantly hedging. He would say something that was important and impactful to the black community and then he would walk it back.  He tried to work together with the Republicans and they basically gave him the middle finger. In response to this rather than throw it right back, he just kept beating that dead horse. Obama just never really panned out for the black community. In fact, I feel like he forgot the very black community that rallied behind him to make history. He was our candidate but everyone’s president. I get it. He is everyone’s president and he should not only think of the black community but man it seemed like he almost never thought about us. I remember between the end of his first term and the start of his second all the black people that I would talk to would tell me that he had to be careful and work together in his first term but now that he has been re-elected and he doesn’t have to worry about running again he can really get in there and make it happen. Well, he got reelected but he never made it happen. At least not for the black community. He made a lot of amazing things happen for other communities but when it came to the black community the most we got was the “yes we can” slogan. Our schools remained poor and highly segregated. Black business did not grow and police brutality did not decrease but possibly increased. (Thoughts not fact) In fact, there was not much difference in the lives of many black Americans before Obama, during Obama and after. Say what you want about Trump but he is in there and he is fighting for the people that got him into office. It just happens that a chunk of those people are horrible and want horrible things but that’s what you would expect a person to do. If you got into the office off the backs of smurfs you better get in there and make sure the lives of the smurf community is substantially better. I feel like Obama got caught up in being that dude. I mean he is a rockstar and he deserves to be. He is a very smart and caring role model for both black and brown men all over the world. His wife is probably the greatest national treasure we have had in years despite the horrible things said about her. I don’t know. I hear people talk about how amazing Obama is and I just think to myself, he’s alright. He speeches never really moved me. He policy moved me even less. I’d love to have a beer with him and learn from him but as far as a president I’m good. We need someone that’s going to get in there and not motivate us to be happy and be our best selves. You need to get things done and for me, with respect to the black community, Obama was just ok.

BG