Emotional Obama bids farewell to presidency
In his final speech to the nation as president, Barack Obama Tuesday delivered a heartfelt and stinging slap not to President-elect Donald Trump, but to the policies and plans that carried the GOP developer to his surprise victory in November.
In a speech from his hometown of Chicago, Obama warned that many of the programs Trump has proposed — and endorsed by newly emboldened Republican leaders in the House and Senate — pose a threat to the ties that have bound this country together for more than two centuries.
“Democracy does not require uniformity,” Obama told the crowd of more than 18,000 cheering supporters. But the founders “knew that democracy does require a basic sense of solidarity — the idea that for all our outward differences, we are all in this together; that we rise or fall as one.”
The assault on Trump was an oblique one, purposely steering away from anything resembling a personal attack, but quietly slamming the dramatic changes the businessman says are needed “to make America great again.”
But “we remain the wealthiest, most powerful and most respected nation on the Earth,” Obama said, but only “if our politics reflect the decency of our people.”
The president had a narrow line to walk.
Since George Washington, the nation’s first president, gave his farewell address in 1796, there’s been an almost pro forma aspect to the speeches, said Barbara O’Connor, former professor of political communications at Sacramento State University.
“You thank the people for all their efforts, mention what you might have done differently and then claim credit for what went right when you were in office,” she said. “And you have to be an optimist.”
That doesn’t have to take long. In 2001, Bill Clinton touched those bases in a snappy eight minutes. Eight years ago, George W. Bush was done in 13 minutes.
But Trump raced to victory with a promise to immediately undo just about everything Obama accomplished during his years as president, unraveling the legacy that’s a source of pride to both Obama and the voters who twice elected him. Turning that around took Obama 51 minutes.
The man who will become president Jan. 20 was off-limits to Obama, though the crowd would have been delighted to see the president take the same harsh, no-holdsbarred attitude toward Trump that the businessman did to Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton — and Obama — in raucous rallies throughout the fall campaign.
The one time Obama mentioned Trump, the president had to silence the jeering crowd with a “No, no, no,” arguing that the peaceful transfer of power to a new president is a “hallmark of our democracy.”
But if Trump got a free pass, his policies didn’t.
Countries like Russia or China “can’t match our influence around the world,” Obama said, “unless we give up what we stand for and turn ourselves into just another big country that bullies smaller neighbors,” a muted reference to Trump’s promise to build a wall on the southern border “and have Mexico pay for it.”
Then there’s Trump’s call for a ban on much Muslim immigration or even a registry of Muslims in the country.
While the country “must remain vigilant against external aggression, we must guard against a weakening of the values that make us what we are,” the president warned. “That’s why I reject discrimination against Muslim Americans, who are just as patriotic as we are.”
Obama also took on social media and television for their role in what he called the growing tendency “to retreat into our own bubbles ... surrounded by people who look like us and share the same political outlook and never challenge our assumptions.”
That’s a threat to democracy, he added, because if people aren’t willing to accept new information “and concede that your opponent is making a fair point,” politics doesn’t work.
But Obama had to do more than just defend his legacy. He also had to look to the future and give Democrats, wallowing in a self-indulgent sea of despair at the prospect of four years or more of President Trump, a reason to look to the future, said David McCuan, a political science professor at Sonoma State University.
“Democrats since the election have been in one long therapy session, talking about what’s wrong with the Democratic Party,” he said. “Now he has to give them hope to move forward.”
Much of the night featured Obama as cheerleader, talking about the things that went right with him as president and pointing toward the prospect of a better future, even if it might not come in the next four years.
It’s the young people who are that future, he said, looking well beyond the next election and quietly contrasting the typically more-liberal youth with many of those not-so-young voters who cast ballot in November.
“This generation coming up — unselfish, altruistic, creative, patriotic — I’ve seen you in every corner of the country,” Obama said. “You believe in a fair, just, inclusive America; you know that constant change has been America’s hallmark, something not to fear, but to embrace.”
The president also mentioned the obvious: “You’ll soon outnumber any of us.”
Obama built his speech on contrasts with Trump’s proposed policies, whether climate change, gay rights, the Iran nuclear agreement or Obamacare. But ideas, more than particular plans, mark the real difference the president tried to show.
In his acceptance speech at the GOP convention in July, Trump painted a dark, despairing picture of an America in decline, facing chaos in the streets and economic disaster.
“Nobody knows the system better than me,” he said, “which is why I alone can fix it.”
Obama had a different take, one he hopes Democrats and others will carry with them after he leaves office.
“I am asking you to believe,” he said. “Not about my ability to bring about change — but in yours.”
Before he wrapped up his speech with a call for Americans to “hold fast to that faith written into our founding documents,” he took a few moments to express his gratitude and pride in first lady Michelle Obama and daughters Malia, who was with him in Chicago, and Sasha, who stayed behind in Washington because she had a test in the morning. As the crowd applauded them, the president wiped a tear from his eye.