Barack Obama campaigned for the U.S. presidency on a platform of change. As he prepares to leave office, the country he led for eight years is undeniably different. Profound social, demographic and technological changes have swept across the United States during Obama’s tenure, as have important shifts in government policy and public opinion.
Obama has also fundamentally changed Americans’ ideas about the redistributive state. Whereas, under Clinton and Bush, the argument centered on whether federal subsidies eroded the work ethic, created dependency, and led to a permanent underclass, now the discussion is quite transformed beyond the safety net.
When it comes to the nation’s religious identity, the biggest trend during Obama’s presidency is the rise of those who claim no religion at all. Those who self-identify as atheists or agnostics, as well as those who say their religion is “nothing in particular,” now make up nearly a quarter of the U.S. adult population, up from 16% in 2007.
Obama: Transforming America | RealClearPolitics “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” — Barack Obama, October 30, 2008 “We are going to have to change our conversation;... Polls Election 2014 Election 2016 Video Changing Lanes Writers Cartoons Links Events More Newsletters Photos Twitter Policy
Major acts and legislationResponding to the Great Recession. American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. ... Wall Street reform. Credit CARD Act of 2009. ... Taxation and spending. Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010. ... 2013 debt ceiling crisis and government shutdown.
The Obama Administration stated that its general agenda was to "revive the economy, provide affordable and accessible health care to all, strengthen our public education and social security systems, define a clear path to energy independence and tackle climate change, end the War in Iraq responsibly and finish our ...
The theme for President Obama's speech was "Rescue, Rebuild, Restore – a New Foundation for Prosperity". Among the topics that Obama covered in his speech were proposals for job creation and federal deficit reduction.
College years He then transferred to Columbia University in New York City, where he majored in political science with a speciality in international relations and in English literature. Obama lived off campus in a modest rented apartment at 142 West 109th Street.
"Change We Need." and "Change." – 2008 U.S. presidential campaign slogan of Barack Obama during the general election.
60 years (August 4, 1961)Barack Obama / Age
Jon Favreau (speechwriter)Jon FavreauPresidentBarack ObamaPreceded byMarc ThiessenSucceeded byCody KeenanPersonal details11 more rows
What were some positive results of TARP? Check all of the boxes that apply. Banks and automobile industries survived. Lending was able to increase.
The youngest person to assume the presidency was Theodore Roosevelt, who, at the age of 42, succeeded to the office after the assassination of William McKinley. The youngest to become president by election was John F. Kennedy, who was inaugurated at age 43.
2012 United States presidential electionNomineeBarack ObamaMitt RomneyPartyDemocraticRepublicanHome stateIllinoisMassachusettsRunning mateJoe BidenPaul RyanElectoral vote3322064 more rows
Smartphones and social media. If demographic changes are slow, technological changes can be swift. In the new millennium, major technology revolutions have occurred in broadband connectivity, social media use and mobile adoption. All three of them continued, and in some cases accelerated, during Obama’s presidency.
Barack Obama campaigned for the U.S. presidency on a platform of change. As he prepares to leave office, the country he led for eight years is undeniably different. Profound social, demographic and technological changes have swept across the United States during Obama’s tenure, as have important shifts in government policy and public opinion.
PEW RESEARCH CENTER. The U.S. economy is in much better shape now than it was in the aftermath of the Great Recession, which cost millions of Americans their homes and jobs and led Obama to push through a roughly $800 billion stimulus package as one of his first orders of business.
will not have a single racial or ethnic majority group, according to Pew Research Center projections.
The U.S. retained its popularity in Africa and parts of Latin America during Obama’s second term. But the U.S. wasn’t seen favorably everywhere . Russian views of the U.S. veered sharply negative in 2014 while the image of the U.S. remained dour in key Muslim countries.
Obama’s presidency is only a chapter in a story that began long before his arrival and will continue long after his departure. Even so, the U.S. of today differs in some significant ways from the U.S. of 2008.
Hodges, a majority of Americans said for the first time that they favored same-sex marriage. As the Obama era draws to a close, Pew Research Center looks back on these and other important social, demographic and political shifts that have occurred at home and abroad during the tenure of the 44th president.
Obama has set the precedent of a president creating, ignoring, or defying laws as he sees fit to forward a progressive agenda. Scandal. Bill Clinton gave us plenty of scandals; but, as in the case of the Nixon administration, the media galvanized public attention to the danger of a sometimes lawless administration.
His signature energy achievement is to change the terms of the debate: The chief energy issues for the Obama administration are not national security, not energy independence, not greater competitiveness for American business, not savings for the American consumer, and not jobs.
These payouts were judged not just on whether they hurt or helped people, but also, in the Greek and Roman sense, of increasing the number of recipients so as to change political realities. Taxes and debt.
In his farewell address, Obama said that widespread disillusionment with the political system can "weaken the ties" that bind the nation. And indeed, marking one of the most significant shifts in public opinion over the past eight years, Americans are losing faith in all aspects of their government, from its political leaders, to long-standing institutions, to many of the agencies that provide public services.
Former President Obama will occupy a place in history as the nation's first African-American president. But while his election would seem to signal that American society has overcome its past history of racial discrimination and tension, Americans' views of race relations in fact became far less harmonious during Obama's tenure in office.
Obama has set the precedent of a president creating, ignoring, or defying laws as he sees fit to forward a progressive agenda. Scandal. Bill Clinton gave us plenty of scandals; but, as in the case of the Nixon administration, the media galvanized public attention to the danger of a sometimes lawless administration.
His signature energy achievement is to change the terms of the debate: The chief energy issues for the Obama administration are not national security, not energy independence, not greater competitiveness for American business, not savings for the American consumer, and not jobs.
These payouts were judged not just on whether they hurt or helped people, but also, in the Greek and Roman sense, of increasing the number of recipients so as to change political realities. Taxes and debt.
Abandoning the story of a fall from primordial innocence does not mean abandoning dreams of human emancipation – that is, of a society where no one can turn their rights in property into a means of enslaving others, and where no one can be told their lives and needs don’t matter. To the contrary.
According to Flannery and Marcus, the next major step on the road to inequality came when certain clansmen of unusual talent or renown – expert healers, warriors, and other over-achievers – were granted the right to transmit status to their descendants, regardless of the latter’s talents or abilities.
New classes of bureaucrats, priests, and warrior-politicians install themselves in permanent office to keep order and ensure the smooth flow of supplies and public services. Women, having once enjoyed prominent roles in human affairs, are sequestered, or imprisoned in harems. War captives are reduced to slaves.
It isn’t true. Overwhelming evidence from archaeology, anthropology, and kindred disciplines is beginning to give us a fairly clear idea of what the last 40,000 years of human history really looked like, and in almost no way does it resemble the conventional narrative.
The story we have been telling ourselves about our origins is wrong, and perpetuates the idea of inevitable social inequality. David Graeber and David Wengrow ask why the myth of ‘agricultural revolution’ remains so persistent, and argue that there is a whole lot more we can learn from our ancestors.
America was aching for something different after eight years of war, economic trouble, and declining international influence. From the start of the campaign, Republican candidates were distancing themselves from the Bush legacy, and political pundits were saying the race was the Democrats to lose.
Virginia and North Carolina voted for Obama. Bositis said, “Virginia and North Carolina have seceded [from the South].”. That’s because of the large numbers of people who’ve moved into those states from elsewhere and the higher level of education in those states, he said.
More Americans have college degrees than in the past, and the country is more diverse. Obama won Hispanics, Asian Americans, African Americans and the most educated Americans, and young voters, who’ve seen so many black presidents on TV they don’t blink at the idea.
Obama introduced his white uncle, a war hero, to the audience during one of his debates against John McCain. I think that might have helped some white voters feel more comfortable with him. And black folks who are giddy now, were once uncomfortable with white people’s comfort.
Getty Images. Barack Obama sealed his racial legacy the moment he sealed victory in the 2008 election - a black man would occupy a White House built by slaves, a history-defying as well as history-making achievement. In 1961, the year of Obama's birth, there existed in the American South a system of racial apartheid that separated ...
America's racial problems have not melted away merely because Obama has spent eight years in the White House. Far from it. Indeed, the insurmountable problem for Obama was that he reached the mountaintop on day one of his presidency.
His famed race speech in the 2008 primary campaign, when his friendship with a fiery black preacher threatened to derail his candidacy, was as much about his white heritage as his black.
In 1961, the year of Obama's birth, there existed in the American South a system of racial apartheid that separated the races from the cradle to the grave. Whites-only water fountains. Whites-only schools. Whites-only graveyards.
Race relations have arguably become more polarised and tenser since 20 January 2009. Though smaller in scale and scope, the demonstrations sparked by police shootings of unarmed black men were reminiscent of the turbulence of the 1960s.
Obama was not the victim of discrimination in the same way as a black kid growing up in Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, or even New York or Illinois. As a result, he may have underestimated the forces that would seek to paralyse his presidency and to impede racial advance more broadly.
Obama and civil rights hero John Lewis lead Selma walk, 50 years on. For veterans of the black struggle, those remarkable images of Obama marking the 50th anniversary of the Selma protest became instantly iconographic, a truly golden jubilee.
When Obama first took office, he wanted to push for more science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) opportunities for students. He hoped that through the Educate to Innovate initiative there would be more college graduates in these fields. By investing in the Innovation Fund and working with the Department of Education and National Science Foundation (NSF), he anticipated an increase of 100,000 more STEM teachers each year.
With the increasing number of college graduates bogged down by student loans, Obama wanted to find a way to help students and parents find schools that would give them the most for their money. To do this, he created College Scorecard with the input from college students and their families.
ESEA also looked for ways to help ESL students, increase students’ college and career readiness, and improve the effectiveness of teachers. 3. Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act. As First Lady, Michelle Obama focused on children’s nutrition. She encouraged schools to serve healthier lunches.
As president, Barack Obama hoped to ensure that college students received the education they desired without accruing large amounts of debt. To do this, he enlarged the amount of federal support that students can receive by increasing the number of Pell Grants awarded, offering the Education Tax Credit, and decreasing student loan interest rates.
As such, here are the top 10 accomplishments that he made in the field of education. 1. Race to the Top. Race to the Top is an initiative that the Obama Administration created to promote education reform at the state level.
In conjunction with her, the Obama Administration passed the Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act. This legislation allocated about $4.5 billion to help schools serve nutritious and healthy lunches. It also doubled the number of fruits and vegetables served and ensured that only whole grains are offered to students. 4.
Elementary and Secondary Education Act Revisions. To improve K-12 student performance tests, the Obama Administration set aside $330 million for revisions to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), which was originally passed in 1965 by President Lyndon B. Johnson.