Was Barack Obama's election the greatest historical event in your lifetime?

donegal__road · 04-07-2014 10:02AM

In my lifetime so far,

The end of the Berlin Wall.

The end of the Cold War.

The Good Friday Agreement.

The end of Apartheid in South Africa, and the release of Nelson Mandela.

The birth of the Internet.

All of the above rank much higher in terms of greatness than the election of Obama.... imho.

Nerdlingr · 04-07-2014 10:10AM

osarusan wrote: »

In no particular order: Berlin Wall, 9/11, Mary Robinson election (Iris focus on that one obviously), end of communism in Russia, Rwandan massacres, Bosnian War (Srebrenica in particular), more I can't recall right now.

But thanks to television, the Chilean Miners' rescue is something I'll remember as clearly as anything mentioned so far.

Good list. I'd add to that Mandela being released, Lockerbie and Boxing day Tsunami.

For some reason the Oklahoma bombing always stood out for me as well.

Clearlier · 04-07-2014 10:11AM

Ash.J.Williams wrote: »

I think he's a plant. It's as if they looked for the whitest black president they could find, someone who wouldn't cause any trouble. That chap has been groomed since college...imagine a real black man was president, somebody who would fight for rights ....can't have that!

If Obama had achieved his goals then he would have been a significant president but he hasn't. He has made a lot of moves in the right direction but often not gone far enough. For sure he has been thwarted by a quite remarkable Republican party but a great president would have found a way around that. Actually Bush is a far more significant president. The ramifications of his decisions are going to be felt for decades.

That said the question was about an historical event and there's no doubt that the decision by the American electorate to choose a man with black skin to be their president is a significant historical event. The berlin wall was bigger though and so was 9/11 but the most significant event in my lifetime has been the creation of the world wide web. Nothing else has had anything like its impact.

snaphook · 04-07-2014 10:12AM

Collapse of the Berlin Wall > Barack.

Ash.J.Williams · 04-07-2014 10:12AM

I was actually thinking about the zeebrugge ferry disaster last night. That was pretty big. (did you know uboats sank 3000 ships in 1917).
Also stardust and a train crash in kildare and one in buttevant.

Pawwed Rig · 04-07-2014 10:14AM

snaphook wrote: »

Collapse of the Berlin Wall > Barack.

Exactly! The Soviet Union imploding and millions of people gaining independence. Unification of Germany, Nelson Mandela, 9/11.

Barack was significant but would not be in the top 20 in my lifetime.

Legs.Eleven · 04-07-2014 10:15AM

Michael D. Higgins being elected as president of Ireland was mine.

Ash.J.Williams · 04-07-2014 10:16AM

Clearlier wrote: »

If Obama had achieved his goals then he would have been a significant president but he hasn't. He has made a lot of moves in the right direction but often not gone far enough. For sure he has been thwarted by a quite remarkable Republican party but a great president would have found a way around that. Actually Bush is a far more significant president. The ramifications of his decisions are going to be felt for decades.

That said the question was about an historical event and there's no doubt that the decision by the American electorate to choose a man with black skin to be their president is a significant historical event. The berlin wall was bigger though and so was 9/11 but the most significant event in my lifetime has been the creation of the world wide web. Nothing else has had anything like its impact.

it's hard to achieve your goals when you are powerless. The US president is a stooge.

take everything · 04-07-2014 10:19AM

ThomasFlynn wrote: »

Remember that iconic moment back in november 2008 when Barack Obama got elected? The first African American president ever to hold office?

There's a good chance Obama will go down as American greatest ever president by the time he leaves office in 2016, not that I agree with that, but just the sense of how popular he is within the world and the media that many can't help but call him that probably I suspect.

Would you regard Obama's election the most historic event you've witnessed in yourlife time? For those old enough, was it greater than the fall of the Berlin wall or man on the moon?

2/10
Needs more subtlety.

ShagNastii · 04-07-2014 10:32AM

Any excuse.

renegademaster · 04-07-2014 10:36AM

https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.alternet.org/world/egypts-numbers-game&sa=U&ei=BHW2U-q6LuSe7AaDnICoCg&ved=0CB8QFjAH&usg=AFQjCNH4Mw8MiH4-LNGUOl6OdAd32WPreg

The debate over the legitimacy of Egypt's new, military-installed government has become a popularity battle, with some of the most vocal supporters of the coup claiming that the June 30 protests against President Mohammed Morsi represented the largest demonstrations in human history, a real-life Cecil B. DeMille production, with crowd sizes ranging anywhere between 14 to 33 million people - over one-third of the entire population of Egypt.

conorhal · 04-07-2014 11:30AM

In my lifetime, I'd say that the to most geopolitically and personally effecting (I broke down and cried when each happened) events were the fall of the Berlin wall in '89 and 9/11. Both had a massive impact on the shape of the world we live in today.

mikeym · 04-07-2014 11:56AM

ThomasFlynn wrote: »

Remember that iconic moment back in november 2008 when Barack Obama got elected? The first African American president ever to hold office?

There's a good chance Obama will go down as American greatest ever president by the time he leaves office in 2016, not that I agree with that, but just the sense of how popular he is within the world and the media that many can't help but call him that probably I suspect.

Would you regard Obama's election the most historic event you've witnessed in yourlife time? For those old enough, was it greater than the fall of the Berlin wall or man on the moon?

Hes very unpopular in many parts in the States.

who_me · 04-07-2014 12:15PM

So many important (good and bad) events have happened in the last 41 years

Fall of the Eastern block
"Arab Spring"
The Indian ocean earthquake & tsunami
Japanese earthquake, tsunami and nuclear station threat
Haiti earthquake
9/11
Release of Mandela / end of apartheid
The space shuttles first flight & Challenger disaster
Introduction of the internet & web (probably the one that will have the greatest impact on humanity).

elefant · 04-07-2014 02:28PM

The release of the Nokia 3510i.

Colour screen on a phone? Rocked my world.

Amirani · 04-07-2014 03:30PM

I agree with Optimalprimerib, the Madeline McCann disappearance just about shades it for me.

Killer Wench · 04-07-2014 05:13PM

tritium wrote: »

Not even close!

The fall of the wall is probably tops for me. Other big ones include 9/11, Iraq war 1&2, advent of the AIDS virus, the wikileaks and Snowden stories (which have yet to find their full historical place)

As for greatest American president ever? No chance. His administration looks like it will be remembered for achieving very little either domestically or globally in spite of the cheer leaders who swoon whenever he opens his mouth.

Yeah, that Affordable Care Act means jack crap.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1 · 04-07-2014 05:31PM

There have been so many to pick one from. World war two ending, man in space, men on the moon, nuclear bombs/energy, the end of the communist block, the Cuban missile crisis, the advent of computing, the end of appartite in south Africa, civil rights in the USA... Mr Obama is probably small fry in the overall scheme of things.

catallus · 04-07-2014 05:33PM

Isn't Barack Obama currently rated as one of the worst Presidents of the USA by Americans themselves? Not that those polls hold much water anyway.

Maximus Alexander · 04-07-2014 05:36PM

ThomasFlynn wrote: »

Was Barack Obama's election the greatest historical event in your lifetime?

Nope, that honour is reserved for the first time that I got to cup a young lady's soft, swelling, bare bosom in the palm of my hand.

efb · 04-07-2014 05:37PM

iPhone being announced on my birthday

Overheal · 04-07-2014 05:37PM

ThomasFlynn wrote: »

Well I was thinking that, but the unemployment rate dropped in the US yesturday to 6.1%.

Of course with all the media hype of the "great recession" we're living through currently, if he lowers the US unemployment rate significantly to less than 5% by the time he leaves office, he certainly will be compared to FDR on economic terms.

Although the unemployment rate is largely meant to be falling because people have given up looking for work, if you give up looking for work you don't get counted as unemployed.

That number is probably not telling the whole picture, no. Going by the numbers this is still one of the worst economic periods in US history.

I for one am in my mid 20s and going back to college through all this, so I don't show up on unemployment statistics, either.

I think you're out of your damn mind if you think Obama will go down as one of the greatest Presidents. His election was a great election, maybe, but his terms have been terrible. FDR, Clinton, Reagan, Eisenhower, stand out as great presidents.

Sam Kade · 04-07-2014 05:49PM

jacksie66 wrote: »

Sinking of the Titanic for me.

Fair play to you for being computer literate at 102+

DEFTLEFTHAND · 04-07-2014 06:21PM

catallus wrote: »

Isn't Barack Obama currently rated as one of the worst Presidents of the USA by Americans themselves? Not that those polls hold much water anyway.

The polls when he's still in office mean nothing, I say he'll rank lower mid table in years to come. He won't be in the same company as chronic alcoholics like Franklin Pierce. :pac:

Frank Lee Midere · 04-07-2014 06:47PM

Killer Wench wrote: »

Yeah, that Affordable Care Act means jack crap.

Apparantly so.

alan partridge aha · 04-07-2014 06:56PM

Most unpopular post war president, however it might go up a bit when he leaves office. BTW he is as much white as black.

kowloon · 04-07-2014 06:58PM

I was at a lecture the day after Obama was elected, the lecturer was a guy who was big into the civil rights movement and he had been up all night watching the results come in. The guy was in tears, it meant a lot to him. It meant a lot to him and many others, but to call it the greatest historical event? Not by a country mile. I'd say the collapse of the USSR would make it onto the shortlist of anyone of the right age.

comongethappy · 04-07-2014 07:04PM

The collapse of communism in Europe is up there, but for me its 9/11.

DM addict · 04-07-2014 07:18PM

creolebelle wrote: »

Are you for real? As an African american I say no. Technically he isn't african american, he is biracial

ThomasFlynn wrote: »

The ironic thing is is that Obama himself identifies himself as African American only, or at least that is what he stated when filling out the 2010 US census. It is his african american heritage (which is only half), which makes him historic, so I decided refer that to him in my OP.

Irish Guitarist wrote: »

I've always thought it was demeaning to his mother to refer to him as 'African American' as if his fathers side of the family is the only one that matters.

UCDVet wrote: »

I don't mean to sound racist - I'm all for an African American president. It's just, I don't see why people think of Obama as African American.

Politically correct labels aside....
White Mom
Black Dad

Does not equal black child.

He's half-black at best. If you want to really argue about it, I even think you get more genetic information from your Mother than from your Father, making him more white than he is black.

If my Dad was Japanese and my Mom was German - I wouldn't expect the world to view me as Japanese. In fact, I'd find it insulting to my German heritage..

Frank Lee Midere wrote: »

I agree but :
It depends on self identification, skin colour and country.

In the us one black parent makes you black.

topper75 wrote: »

Skin colo(u?)r is not an achievement. If they voted in some crackhead from the ghettos of Detroit as Pres, would that make him the greatest ever by virtue of his skin? ...
I don't care if the next guy is purple with pink spots but he better get America back on track.

Ash.J.Williams wrote: »

It's as if they looked for the whitest black president they could find, someone who wouldn't cause any trouble. ...imagine a real black man was president, somebody who would fight for rights ....can't have that!

I'm surprised by the number of posters saying that Obama isn't truly African American/black/etc - and a little confused. For starters, race is a construct. It's not a 'real' thing. Obama identifies as an African American. That's his call. Also, he has one parent who's African, and one who's American: I recall (but can't find) him being asked about his race and giving a similar reply. I'm somewhat bewildered as to why it's being taken as an affront that he doesn't have two black parents.

Also, the whitest black man is clearly Michael Jackson. Just saying.

Back on topic - I don't think it's the most significant event of my lifetime. 9/11 as rightly been cited already. The Fall of the Berlin Wall, although I don't remember it. I do remember the Good Friday agreement, and thinking how mad it was that peace was actually happening.

Frank Lee Midere · 04-07-2014 08:44PM

DM addict wrote: »

I'm surprised by the number of posters saying that Obama isn't truly African American/black/etc - and a little confused. For starters, race is a construct. It's not a 'real' thing. Obama identifies as an African American. That's his call. Also, he has one parent who's African, and one who's American: I recall (but can't find) him being asked about his race and giving a similar reply. I'm somewhat bewildered as to why it's being taken as an affront that he doesn't have two black parents.

Also, the whitest black man is clearly Michael Jackson. Just saying.

Back on topic - I don't think it's the most significant event of my lifetime. 9/11 as rightly been cited already. The Fall of the Berlin Wall, although I don't remember it. I do remember the Good Friday agreement, and thinking how mad it was that peace was actually happening.

You are inventing the affront.

Self identification only goes so far. Otherwise George W Bush would have been the first black president if he declared himself black. Obama is half white.

One of the people you quoted is herself African American and half white and uses the term creole in her title here. It's the abscence of terms like that in American discourses about race which leads people to be described in binary fashion.

It's not his decision alone. He can self identify as black because of his skin colour but not as Japanese.

If Obama were lighter skinned though - say like Rashida Jones - he would have been considered white.

Was Barack Obama's election the greatest historical event in your lifetime?

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