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Then there was his very revealing response to a 2009 question about American exceptionalism: “I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.” As too often with Obama, the quicksilver tongue formed a yes that swiftly, smoothly morphed into a no.

Still, one could always make excuses. That Churchill bust was loaned to Bush. Israeli PM Netanyahu is himself prickly. Ukraine was corrupt and it’s very risky to act decisively in an area so close to Russia’s heartland. It was high time America had a less arrogant president.

It was even argued that despite short-run upheavals, there would be significant long-term benefits to Obama’s overdue reduction in American overreach. The U.S. would get a much-needed respite while encouraging its allies to step up in the world. Unfortunately Obama shrugged as the withdrawal turned into a rout while its Western allies, long accustomed to a free ride, seemed unable to find their convictions, weapons or wallets. Indeed, both Britain and France voted for Security Council Resolution 2334 on which Obama’s representative abstained, a loathsome document essentially denying any Jewish connection to key sites in “East Jerusalem” including the Temple Mount, although British PM Theresa May went after John Kerry for his pompous post-vote speech piling on to Israel.

Whatever one thinks of British foreign policy, Obama’s snaky stab at Israel makes it very hard not to put the least favourable interpretation on much that went before, including his infamous nuclear deal with Iran. It vindicates those critics who called him anti-American or simply un-American, sharing his father’s anti-colonial mentality in which the United States was just one more arrogant white nation oppressing non-whites like himself. As Britain’s Daniel Hannan has pointed out, when Obama went to West Africa and spoke of the slave trade, he made no mention of the Royal Navy’s role in stamping it out.