Decodedc

So, here’s a question. When is it too early to assess a president’s legacy? How about two years before his term ends? Not for David Haskell, an editor at New York magazine, who polled 53 historians and asked them how they thought we’d remember President Obama 20 years from now. On this week’s DecodeDC podcast, we talk with Haskell about his piece and what he learned. When asked what the president's legacy might be, the overwhelming response, according to those Haskell spoke with: Obama’s status as the first African-American president will be the defining aspect of his legacy. Yet they didn’t always agree on how race would affect the way we will remember Obama. Some pointed to the effect his race had on the opposition. These historians said what contemporary pundits won’t: that the rise of the Tea Party had something to do with Obama’s race. “Seeing a black family in the White House reminds us that this isn’t a white nation,” wrote historian Annette Gordon Reed. That simple fact, said the historians Haskell in