Thank you for the very interesting and informative responses, I thoroughly enjoyed reading them and learned a lot from them!
I tend to agree that Obama seemed like a well-meaning guy and did not generally go overboard when it came to making blanket condemnations of political opponents. However, he was eventually not that successful in helping relegate the subject of race in political discourses to the backstage. Quite a few white people voted for Donald Trump because they felt a sense of alienation with the political establishment (personified by Obama) and had the suspicion that their interests were no longer considered intellectually valid, so Trump's meteoric rise could in part be attributable to the Obama administration's inability to heal the deep divisions within the United States. However, Obama has shown decorum by refusing to jump on the bandwagon and be overly critical of Trump (once the latter assumed power in January 2017), maybe for the sake of national unity.
As an Eastern European, I am personally disappointed that the Euromaidan resulted in death and destruction as well as talks of a Third World War. I firmly believe that Viktor Yanukovych would have lost the next Ukrainian elections anyway, so it's sad that there was no repeat of the Orange Revolution that had a peaceful conclusion for all the parties involved. It's difficult to judge to what extent Obama's administration was guilty of fanning the flames of discontent in Ukraine, but I would be quite disappointed if it turned out that Obama or members of his staff had contributed to radicalizing the protesters.
The negatives of the US intervention in Libya also seem to have outweighed the positives, though (as pointed out by the other posters) Obama was not that keen on it in the beginning, so he can probably be let off the hook, at least in part.
On the plus side, I guess that Obama deserves a lot of credit for the Cuban thaw (in addition to the Iranian one). However, it’s notable that his popularity in Israel, a very important ally of the United States, was quite low in comparison to most other US presidents. I am saying this in the context of the fears expressed by some analysts that Trump will damage the relations between the US and friendly countries such as Germany. By the same token, many Jewish people’s lack of trust in Obama may have been a cause for concern for quite a few US citizens in the period between 2009 and 2017.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/barely-a-f ... oll-shows/http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.798015In essence, I am not sure what grade to give Obama… I guess I see him as an average US president.
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"Be aware of your inner ideology!"