As President Obama winds down his final term, his defenders are in a goal line stand defending his accomplishments to an increasingly critical audience. Obama failed to fundamentally transform the nation, resuscitate the economy, improve American standing abroad, slow the rise of the oceans, heal the planet, or even establish a convincing moral justification for trying. What’s left? One old standby, less in use now than a couple of years ago, is Obama’s ability to hand over to his successor a supposedly scandal-free administration. The other, more newly minted, is Obama’s supposedly similar ability to hand over a crisis-free America. If these claims are illegitimate, then Obama’s meaningful legacy will be reduced to his glibness and complexion. – READ MORE
