ANDREW FERGUSON: The Final Hagiography of the Obama Team.

When I think back over the Obama administration, I have the enduring impression of articulate, well-credentialed people talking, talking, talking. The stars of The Final Year are among the most skilled Obama talkers. When Kerry releases little bubbles of gas like “We have to be realistic about the challenges we face” he is taking a cue from the master, the president, who can say “It’s ultimately where politics, government, diplomacy has [sic] to be rooted—in that belief in a common humanity” and say it slowly, thoughtfully enough to almost persuade you he’s saying something substantial. “Bearing witness is both an instinct and a responsibility,” says Samantha Power, without clarification. Obama’s foreign policy, says Rhodes, is “engagement-focused.”

The manipulation of high-toned, empty tropes was both a cause and a consequence of Obama’s foreign policy. The most touching sequence in The Final Year concerns the “ceasefire” that Kerry negotiated with the Russians and Syrians in September 2016. The movie portrays Kerry as a clueless and oddly endearing popinjay who lurches from photo-op to photo-op, shaking hands with one international grifter after another, getting his pocket picked all the while. He spends dozens of hours “brokering” the ceasefire with those friendly Russians. Then he is astonished and crestfallen when it falls apart, after Russian and Syrian aircraft bomb a U.N. humanitarian convoy headed for Aleppo, killing more than 20 aid workers and destroying food supplies meant for 75,000 starving people.

“It’s so frustrating,” Kerry tells the camera. “Because we had an agreement that could have worked! But some people didn’t want to cooperate.”

It’s almost as though the Russians were our number one geopolitical foe all along.