APD Yearender: What's left of Obama's legacy

In the White House, a slender black man named Barack Obama is working on a speech to wrap up eight years of work. He is still the President of the United States and his words are splendid as always but no longer carry that much weight as they did before.

On a Fifth Avenue skyscraper, a stout golden-haired white man casts a look down on the reporters huddling out in the cold at the gate of his Trump Tower, and logs on Twitter. Even before his scheduled takeover on Jan. 20, Donald Trump is tweeting havoc in Obama's world.

The outgoing president's mission to salvage his legacy failed along with his fellow democrat Hillary Clinton's shattered dream to return to the White House. Trump is bent on bringing the country onto a different path and little can Obama do to stop him. Soon, Obama's legacy will be at the mercy of his successor.

Obama's mission to salvage his legacy failed along with his fellow democrat Hillary Clinton's shattered dream to return to the White House.

The Obama administration is racing with time to consolidate its achievements. It is in intensive talks with Cuba, hoping to sign 12 accords in a time frame of less than two months, before Trump takes office to put an end to the normalization of bilateral ties.

Signing deals would make it harder for Trump to reverse the diplomat efforts, but it's by no means a safe bet. The United States has signed a nuclear deal with Iran and other world powers. But Trump said he would rip it up.

To literally rip the deal up would be unprecedented, but Trump has the power to implement the deal in a way that is unacceptable for the Iranians. Obama is expected to sign the extension of Iran sanctions bill after the congress passed it by landslide, a move that drew strong protests in Iran. Trump is known for his unpredictability, but he certainly is going to provoke the Iranians even more.

Another signature of Obama's foreign policy legacy, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), is heading straight to the trash bin. The trade pact was meant to be the economic arm of Obama's strategy of rebalancing US resources from Middle East to Asia Pacific. The failure of TPP also meant for the fall of the strategic rebalance.

Another signature of Obama's foreign policy legacy, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), is heading straight to the trash bin. Obama announced US participation in talks to join TPP in 2009.

Obama announced US participation in talks to join TPP in 2009. The move was considered of such importance that observers dubbed it the "pact of NATO in economy". How could a project so important and promising end up in complete failure? Some blamed it on bad politics and populism. They are not wrong, but over the bickering of politics, those swings a great pendulum.

President Obama is the making of an America mire in financial crisis and burdened with two costly wars in Middle East that it cannot win. America was in dire need of retreat and recovery and Obama promised and acted accordingly, winning extensive support and compliment from around the world. First year in office, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize before he could make any real contribution.

Years have passed, and the pendulum of US politics have silently swung away from where Obama stands. A defining moment of the change of tide and of Obama's presidency came on the day when his "red line" was breached.

First year in office, Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize before he could make any real contribution.

Obama had drawn a red line for the Syrian government: the use of chemical weapons against rebels. Yet when that line was allegedly broken in August 2013, he decided not to intervene.

Is he a coward that gave away US supremacy in the Middle East; or a hero that steered his country away from another messy war that it cannot afford? It was a hard choice for Obama, one that earned him the label of being soft.

Few years back, it would be a no-brainer: the American people didn't want another war in the Middle East. The struggle Obama had to go through revealed a change of attitude in his country.

Now the pendulum has swung even farther with Donald Trump being elected as the next president, Republicans controlling both White House and the congress and hawkish generals nominated for key national security posts.

Obama's domestic legacies, like same-sex marriage, face the risk if being shelved or even rolled back.

Same is true for Obama's domestic legacies: Obamacare, same-sex marriage, American Jobs Act. They all face the risk of being shelved or even rolled back.

History may remember Obama as an honest, determined and elegant US president. But the political agenda that moved forward when the time was right, will roll backward as the time is gone.

The pendulum has swung the other way. Now is Trump time.

(APD)