History 'Will Be Very Generous' To Obama

[Maedhros]

3. In the big picture, Obama will be primarily remembered as the President

that legitimized the extraordinary behavior of the Bush Administration.

At the end of Bush's second term, Americans were disgusted with the Bush/Cheney Administration. There were four major, controversial ideas put forth by Bush and Cheney:

1. Preemptive wars of aggression, against countries that did not pose a threat to the United States, are acceptable as tools in the geopolitical game.

2. The natural state of affairs for the United States is that of perpetual war, and that war is everywhere and against anyone we designate as supporting "terrorism."

3. Torture is no longer a war crime.

4. Dick Cheney's "Imperial Presidency," an institution that answers to no other branch of government when affairs of "national security" are at stake.

There was a time that these ideas were viewed with shock and alarm by Americans. Now they elicit a shrug.

History will view the Obama Presidency as the one that failed to curtail the Bush Era abuses, but instead embraced them. When a controversial idea in America is championed by both political parties, that idea becomes ordinary and dropped from the debate. Going forward, future Presidents will also embrace these ideas and come up with some new ones of their own.