And I do not -- I think we talked about this a little yesterday -- I do not -- I think, again, I think the Senate is going to be -- this is -- the tax issues is not going to get solved in -- not likely to get solved today. The Senate is going to be here and there is time to do -- there is time to do the people's business. And I am not going to get into a long discussion about do not ask, do not tell because I think as many of you know, that very shortly Secretary Gates, Admiral Mullen and others are going to discuss the public release of the Pentagon's review. But -- and we will have a statement from the President on what that review has found. But I think, in discussions that the President has had on this issue over the past few days, this is an issue that if we do not solve legislatively is going to get solved in the courts. And solving that issue in the courts is not going to provide the Pentagon with the type of orderly transition that they have said they need. But we have the pathway to do it legislatively, make progress, and I think the President -- obviously the President still wants to do that. So just to put a period on this, the President thinks that funding the government, passing unemployment insurance extensions, do not ask, do not tell repeal, the DREAM Act, tax cuts and START all can be done -- You will have a lot to cover. You said that the President, and in fact, the President said that he acknowledged he had not reached out enough and would do his part. But you just told Jake that the Republicans did not make a similar statement. Let me do this, Chip. No, I do not -- look, I am not -- I have got my hands full being the spokesperson for the President. The President -- I think the President just laid out that in order for us to work together we are going to have to communicate better. Does he believe the Republicans -- it is a two-way street -- does he believe they have not reached out? I did not ask the President that. Again, I'd leave that up to others. The President was, I think, pretty clear about the fact that -- in acknowledging that he needed to and would do better. Well, again, I can only speak for the actions of what the President intends to do and what the President told leaders today.


So his reaching out is not -- reaching out more is not contingent upon their returning the favor? His reaching out is contingent upon the fact that he is the President of the United States and in order to get things done in what will now be a divided government requires working with the other side. I do not -- the President is willing to have a better line of communication with Republicans on Capitol Hill to get something done. I do not -- I am not sure I'd call that bending. I call that trying to work together. I think that is incidentally likely what the American people call it, too. Yes, and I do not want to get too much into semantics here, but you talk to people -- I appreciate the -- yes. I think there is that sign that said, Last chance to not get into semantics. And we might have passed that a few miles ago. We never do that. We never parse words, either. But speaking of parsing words, you said that what Jack and Tim had been tasked with is finding common ground. Would it be accurate to say that they have been tasked with finding a compromise that can pass by the end of the year? And on the tax issue, do you think there was a breakthrough in the meeting? Was this a meeting that constituted a breakthrough? Well, I would say two things. One, there is a -- we have an agreed-upon, appointed process for the continuing of those conversations to happen very quickly. And, again, I will try to get as much information as I can throughout the day and share with you all about the progress and the scheduling for those meetings. I also think that the notion that there was agreement that this is an issue that needed to be dealt with by the end of the year, I think those two things give -- I think they give the President and I hope they give others hope that we can work together. Do you think there is any chance whatsoever that the tax issue will not be resolved by the end of the year? I think there is a extremely strong likelihood that the issue is resolved prior to the tax cuts expiring at the end of this year. And I think there is -- I think there was strong agreement to do that. And I think -- I think there was an acknowledgment on the part of all those involved that we have a window of time to work together on this issue.

Barack Obama Press Briefing by Press Secretary Robert Gibbs


We have got a little more than a month to come to a conclusion on that and we ought to be able to do so. We could be here like New Year's Eve, I take it. Well, I guess we have got 31 days. It sounds like New Year's Eve. I do not anticipate being here on New Year's Eve, but we will see. So, ENTITY, is the next step the OMB director, the Treasury secretary and representatives of the different camps getting together and trying to hammer this out? And, again, I will -- the way they left it in the meeting, there was an agreement that we would have this group of people do this. The Vice President, I think rightly so, pushed to have a meeting as quickly as possible. And like I said, it could happen as early as today. Is the Democratic position on the tax cuts truly unified? I mean, publicly it sounded like maybe the President was ready for compromise, but perhaps some of the leaders on the Hill were not as eager to compromise. Well, again, look, everybody went in with the position that they brought to that meeting. And I think the President enumerated the position, as he said in the statement, that he and his fellow Democrats hold, and that is our priority is to ensure that those that are in the middle class in this country that have, as he said during the meeting, have been hurt throughout the past decade in terms of watching their wages go down even as they were working longer and working harder, that we had to do all that we could to ensure that for that group of people, their taxes did not go up. So I think that -- I think Democrats are very unified in that. Are you freer today to talk about the State Department cables, or are you choosing not to? The law continues to not allow me to speak about classified information, so -- It is unclear whether there is a period in which that becomes operable for me, but -- Can I follow up on that? What is your read of the situation in Korea right now? Are we on the brink of war? Well, I will say I think that there have been a series of meetings throughout the holidays and the weekend here at a deputy and a principals' committee level. As you know, the President spoke with President Lee in South Korea. We dispatched for joint exercises the aircraft carrier George Washington.


And we remain committed to -- as you heard the President say a few days ago and during our trip to Seoul -- remain committed to the common security of our allies in the Republic of Korea. And as I said yesterday, Mike, I think the Chinese have a duty and an obligation to greatly press upon the North Koreans that their belligerent behavior has to come to an end. And I think you will see progress on multilateral discussions around this over the next few days. Does the United States government believe China has done enough so far? I do not know that I am going to get into grading them, Chuck, as much as I am going to say that there is an obligation there, and we expect them to live up to that obligation. Should we let the record show that you did not have praise for what they have done so far but said an obligation -- Well, again, I think that the bottom line is movement and progress with the North Koreans. Not that I am aware of. I mean, I can go back and check with others and see what their impression was. I anticipate that the -- I think the next vote on taxes, if I am not mistaken, and I will double-check on this, is that there will be a vote in the House on making permanent middle-class tax cuts. I anticipate that -- while this group worked itself out a compromise? And the other thing, on START, did -- was there any attempt by -- conversation between, for instance, Reid and McConnell with the President sort of mediating and saying, okay, if he takes something off the plate, if he takes DREAM Act off the plate, and then START or any of those -- The President spent several minutes walking through why he believed that this was most important -- why this was so important to our national security in verifying what is going on with the Russian nuclear arsenal; obviously the reduction in deployed nuclear weapons that we all know is a danger; and our efforts in the world to continue to press on Iran and others like North Korea for the strongest possible sanctions and how all those efforts work multilaterally. Again, I think the President believes and I think -- the President believes that we can -- we have enough time to get this done, while acknowledging that there is going to be a process to this. That process also has included 18 hearings. This has been something that is been discussed for going on seven months.


Was there consensus on extending unemployment benefits in the room, or was it more of an urging? Let me -- that is not clear in my notes, but I will double-check with others. I think the President was very clear that -- and this was also clear from both Larry and Tim in speaking in the meeting -- that unemployment benefits are given to those that have lost their jobs. That is money that is, almost dollar for dollar, put back into the economy. And, look, the President brought up the fact that we are seeing the beginning of the expiration of unemployment benefits and that even as we have these discussions about extending tax cuts for those who make $250,000, those who make a million, those who make $10 million a year, we certainly in no way can afford to look past the fact that there are those that have been hurt extensively in losing a job and need to continue to have those benefits. Was that argument met with any sort of Republican agreement on this, or did -- Not that I recall in my notes, to be honest with you. I mean, has the President said, look, if he does not get this, we are going to yank this off the table? I do not -- Chuck, I do not recall any bright lines in it, Chuck. I think the President simply laid out, as Tim and Larry did, the importance of ensuring that this be and must -- that this must be part of the solution. We cannot -- again, we are going back and forth here on the permanence of tax cuts for those that make a lot of money. Was there an okay -- were you guys agreeing on any way of paying for it, saying, look, if you guys -- because Republican stance has been, find a way to do this, find a way to pay for it. Did you guys offer up, here is a way to pay for it -- No, the President mentioned that this is normally and has historically been considered, rightly so, a measure of extraordinary importance and extraordinary times and should be considered the same now. One, the President said in his statement that on the tax cut negotiations he hoped to get some answers back over the next couple of days. So does that mean that he is hoping that there is an agreement within the next couple of days? Well, I think we can -- look, if you could get an agreement today, that'd be great.


I think what the President is saying is we want to continue to see forward progress on this. Again, the agreement to come out of this meeting with those that would sit down, again, as soon as later today, I think give the President some hope. And as soon as I have updates on that schedule, we will let you know. I mean, but is he setting up an expectation that he is hoping to have a deal within a matter of a few days? I think the President is setting up the expectation that we will all get in the same room and continue to make progress on this over the next few days. Both of those came up, yes. And was it a matter of people just going around the room and stating their previously stated positions? No, I think that -- again, the meeting started out with the President opening up, and then I think each of the eight members and senators spoke about what they saw as important in the short term and in the medium term. I'd say the tax issue took up by far the majority of time. Again, the President asked both Tim and Larry to give an update on where they thought we were economically. Again, I should note that my timing and my percentages here does not include the 35 minutes in the private dining room without staff. So those two issues came up -- did the President bring this up, or did others? The President started on the issue agenda after everybody had had a chance to say something, walking through and talking about taxes. And that is when he offered to have Secretary Geithner and OMB Director Lew sit down with Democrats and Republicans. And besides the offer of the Camp David gathering, do you know anything else? Can you tell us anything else that was discussed during the 35-minute closed portion? I do not have a readout from that, and I do not know that the President would give that to me to read out. ENTITY, did anybody raise the nature of the campaign rhetoric that came up before the election? Do you mean Slurpees? Well, I was not going to mention that by name, but as long as you brought it up. No, I mean, look, I think there was an acknowledgment, honestly, Mark, by everybody that an election had come and gone, and that after elections there is a time in which both parties are responsible for governing the country.


The President mentioned and I think others mentioned that -- the acknowledgment that not soon after one election passes, you enter the political season again, but that he believed -- the President certainly believes that there is a time in which we can seek common ground, that we can work together and that we can make progress on these issues; that there'll be plenty of time for -- there will be plenty of time for a political campaign in 2012. And I would -- I think the President's line in his statement that -- acknowledged and agreed to by those in the room -- that it is time to put our focus on their jobs, the jobs of the American people, not on the jobs of the elected officials that sit in that room. Let me get some on that. I missed that because I was in the meeting. But let me take that question. I want to shift over to the debt commission. I think they were having lunch with the Vice President, if I am not mistaken. Paul Ryan is saying that the debt commission is having trouble getting a vote and that they are going ask for a delay until Friday. Can you fill us in on that? Do you know anything? Roger, I would -- I do not -- I would point you to the commission and their staff to answer that question. I do not know definitively the answer to that. Another question, Senator Schumer has suggested as a possible compromise in the tax cuts of raising it from $250,000 up to $1 million. What does the President think of that? Does that have shades of a compromise? I do not , quite frankly, see that it has -- I do not see that it has moved any Republican, and I think the President has restated the case today for a $250,000 threshold for those filing together. Has the President put any limitations on concessions that Geithner and Lew can make in these negotiations, or is he willing to accept anything that they agree on? Well, they are negotiating for him, so I do not -- So how closely will he watch these negotiations, then? I mean, will he keep tabs on the back-and-forth? Yes, I anticipate that the President will on occasion ask his Treasury Secretary what are the byproducts of said negotiations.


Yes, I mean, obviously this is -- I mean, again, the majority of the roughly hour and 25 minutes that was spent with staff in the Roosevelt Room was done on taxes, and as Laura mentioned, that part of the statement where the President hopes to see some progress in the next few days. I think Senator Reid said to Secretary Geithner and to Director Lew, you just tell us what time and we will have our people there. Why did not the President do a better job in the last two years of reaching out to Republicans? When he is been asked that question in the past he is rejected the premise. Well, I think that the President -- without looking too much backward -- I think the President understands that we are in a period of, as I said earlier, we are going to enter into a period of divided government, that in order for a piece of legislation to make its way through the House and the Senate to get to his desk it is going to go through a body that is controlled by one party and then go to a body controlled by a different party. So if -- that is going to require better communication; that is going to require more communication; it is going to require a better relationship in understanding on both sides what is important. And I think the President is acknowledging that and willing to do his part in changing that. Was there a particular reason he decided to move the meeting from a larger gathering to a smaller one? Was there something particular that happened in the larger session that made him decide that something could be accomplished -- No, I think the President just wanted to give everyone an opportunity to speak as -- I mean, people were speaking pretty freely, but if people wanted to do so without note-takers and such, that they'd feel free to do that. Did the President mention to Senator McConnell his statement about his first priority being to deny him a second term? And moving to a different subject, do you -- I mean, I -- as I said to Mark, I think there was an acknowledgment that there will be time for a political campaign, but that now is a time for those responsible for governing the country to get about doing so. Did the President discuss his priority for whether Senator McConnell is reelected? Not that I recall that, either.


On a different subject, President Medvedev in Moscow gave his State of the Union equivalent address today and said that there might be a new arms race if there was not a cooperation agreement on missile defense; expressed some frustration that things had not gone as far as he wanted in Lisbon. What is your reaction to that? Well, I think that -- I mean, look, I think the President mentioned in the meeting with the leaders just a little bit ago that we had actually made great progress on missile defense. We had -- what was -- what had been a contentious issue just several years ago now is part of an agreement with NATO with the cooperation of Russia, and that that made -- look, we had made -- and I think there is been an acknowledgment that we have made -- both parties have had a priority on protecting our friends and allies in Europe, and obviously the United States. And our agreements in Lisbon make concrete years of effort into a missile defense apparatus that provides greater protection for Europe and for the United States, and that he was pleased with that progress, and that that was not -- nothing in that, nothing in START constrained our ability to do that. That was clear, even as you had the head of NATO pushing and advocating for ratification of START; was also working through getting NATO on board for missile defense. I will say, taking this a step back, the President reiterated to those in the Roosevelt Room the genuine importance of -- and why it made so much sense for our security and in working with Russia and Medvedev, why it made so much sense for us to get this done and get this done now; that this was not something that the President was doing for political purposes or that the opposition was based on politics, but that this just made good sense and made common sense for our security and for our relationships around the world. Do you have any response to the information the Wall Street Journal reported about the Russians moving tactical weapons, nuclear weapons, closer to NATO countries in recent months? Let me just get something from NSC on that. I mean, obviously that is -- tactical is not something that is -- those are different from launchers and deployed missiles in START. North Korea warned today that the continuing military exercise by the U.S. and South Korea in Yellow Sea could lead to all-out war any time. So how effective does the administration believe the military exercise could deter North Korea's --


Well, their -- I guess I would disagree largely with the statement that exercises that are going on now or have -- that are similar to exercises that have gone on in the past are -- will lead us to where they said in that statement. I think the exercises demonstrate our strong desire for common security with our allies in the Republic of Korea. And also could you -- sorry, could you give us some detail about the coming meeting between the U.S., Japan and South Korea next week in D.C.? Let me get that from State and NSC. Did the President secure from the Republicans any commitments on the two-year pay freeze for rank-and-file government employees? And did he urge them to do the same for their own congressional staff? I know that -- I do not -- it just was not something that they talked about. I mean, again, legislative branch appropriations govern the salaries of those working -- I have not asked him, Ann. But, again, that is something that members of Congress -- based on their appropriations -- have the power to do. Several members mentioned, on both sides, that -- spending and the deficit obviously was something that was talked about quite a bit, and that we are going to have to make a series of decisions that might not be popular in individual districts, particularly around the Washington area, but that are hard decisions that ultimately have to be made if we are going to make progress on our deficits and our debt. And the -- several applauded the President for making that decision. I will be honest in saying that some believed that non-uniform military and others they thought should have been covered in what the President announced yesterday. But I think what -- the President believes that, as you heard yesterday, that we all have a responsibility to do our part. And now that the embargo has been lifted on the military review on do not ask, do not tell, what kind of value does the President put on the kind of poll, the survey done of American military personnel -- about 28 percent of them responded. They basically said they saw no problems, foresaw no problems getting rid of the policy. Does the President put a lot of weight in that?


Well, I think the President -- the President wanted to and the Pentagon conducted a study of the attitudes of those serving in our armed forces bravely each day and asked directly their attitudes on ending what the President believes is a divisive policy in do not ask, do not tell. And, again, we will have a statement on this shortly, but the President has been clear that this is a policy that should end, needs to end. And I think that the survey demonstrates that those that serve in the military believe it can be done in a way that does not disrupt unit cohesion and that -- Right, no, no -- and I think the overwhelming majority said that they thought it would -- could be done with little to no disruption. And I think the President certainly shares that. Again, I think you will hear from Secretary Gates -- well, you are hearing from Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen -- and the President's strong belief that doing this through a legislative process provides for a transition that -- an orderly transition that the military has sought and that the President believes is the right way to go about doing it. ENTITY, I am curious about that private part of the meeting today. Does he -- has he done that before, where he sends all the staff out of the room? I mean, look, I do not -- I will say this. It is not unusual writ large in meetings. I do not know that it -- I'd have to go back and check notes and see whether that is happened before in -- I do not recall that it is happened before in the bipartisan meetings. The ones that were had in Cabinet Room, as best I can remember, were always what was set forth in the room and not -- and they did not generally repair to somewhere else. You made note a minute ago that note-takers were out of the room for that. Was that private part of the meeting specifically to interrupt the spin cycle that the President talked about happening? Well, I think it just -- I think it provides people with a candid -- they can be even more candid than they could be in a room full of people. And that is why the President would -- sought to do it. And, again, I think the President believed that both parts of the meeting were productive. And someone in that meeting -- in that part of the meeting, brought up the spin cycle.


He said it was one of my friends or my friends. Do you know who brought that up and what was said about it? I do not know the answer to that. President Obama acknowledged that he needed to improve his communication. Is some of that going to include some more informal talks, or off-the-agenda discussions between him and Republican leaders like Secretary -- Senator McConnell and Boehner? Yes, I think that -- look, they have had -- he is had occasion to talk with Senator McConnell and Speaker-to-be Boehner during some of this time period. I anticipate that those are conversations that you will see more of. I do not think that -- well, I know that what the President discussed and what the President means in terms of improving that outreach and that communication is not simply reserved for meetings that happen here or meetings that happen at Camp David. I think you will see just an increase in all types of that communication. The President talks a lot about what might happen in January if this process is pushed back in terms of re-educating new members about the treaty and what is in it. Did he bring that up in the meeting with Republican leaders?  No, I do not remember that coming up. Obviously they are -- again, it is been -- I think there is a pretty long record of hearings, formal written questions back and forth out of those hearings on where -- on different aspects of the treaty, and I know that members of our national security team continue to brief members on it, and I think anybody that has questions can get those answered. ENTITY, on a historic story -- stick with what you have right now -- on that side of Pennsylvania Avenue, the House is getting ready to pass Cobell, Black Farmers and the water rights issue. What does the White House have to say about this, after 15 years it is finally going to happen? Well, I think based on hard work both on Capitol Hill and in the administration that we are about to or on the cusp of seeing a much deserved settlement for these two important cases. It is, as you mentioned, April, justice that is overdue and has been a priority, again, of the administration and those on Capitol Hill to see something done by the end of the year. I think it demonstrates that we can find common ground on issues that are important to both sides of the political aisle. And I think it gives people hope for what we can do.


It is been raised the anti-fraud issue, the anti-fraud language that is in the bill. Some Dems on the Hill feel that it could be a tool for intimidation against the farmers. What say you? I would have to ask -- I guess I would point you to USDA on what their reaction is to that. Why is there a difference in the stringency for judgments when it comes to women and Cobell versus the Pigford II climate -- the Pigford II people had to go -- go through a much more arduous process to get -- April, I do not -- again, I'd point you to USDA on the specifics of that settlement. Will there be a signing ceremony, since this is one of the largest civil rights payouts -- Let us get it to the President's desk and then we will go from there. I want to follow up on a question from yesterday's briefing that you might have read out, but I do not think I got a readout on it. It was about the meeting between the President and the service chiefs yesterday. And the question was, what did they talk about? And did the President specifically ask them to stop opposing the repeal of do not ask, do not tell or to get onboard? Let me -- the President asked -- I was not in the meeting, as I said yesterday, because of being out here. The President wanted to have a private conversation with the Joint Chiefs and asked that that conversation be private, and I am not going to violate the President's wishes on that. Obviously the -- I am told that the -- do not ask, do not tell, obviously, was the entire topic of the meeting. Okay, but so the reason we have not heard more is because we are not going to hear more? What is the White House view at this moment on what is happening in Haiti with the presidential election and the cholera epidemic? Let me get some guidance from these guys on Haiti. Since Secretary Clinton's strong message yesterday regarding the WikiLeaks, has the President felt compelled to call any of his -- any of the leaders -- for example, Prime Minister Cameron or anyone else? The President, to my knowledge, has not made -- not made any calls on this. Again, I think this continues to be handled at the State Department at the foreign minister level. And I would say -- I would reiterate largely what we said yesterday.


Our foreign policy is far stronger than one website. To follow up on Laura's question about timing, Senator McConnell said in his news conference that the Senate might be able to take up START if they could quickly clear the decks of tax cuts and stop-gap spending, or an extension of omnibus spending bill. So is part of the understanding in the room, behind the President's comments about wanting answers quickly, is that you'd get a quick deal on tax cuts in order to leave time for a START debate in the Senate? I think the President understands the desire to have a discussion on START and believes that that can be accomplished. ensuring our economic strength in creating jobs and protecting the American people. He does not have the luxury of deciding only to do one of those things. And I do not believe that the President thinks that the Senate can only do one of those things, either. And I think we can make progress. The Russians, when they discuss the issue, they keep sounding as if they -- they keep saying they want real partnership and they keep sounding as if they do not believe the U.S. is ready for a real partnership. After Lisbon, do you have a feeling that both sides understand what each one means by real partnership ? And is the U.S. ready for such a partnership on missile defense? Again, I think it is clear that the administration through its phased adaptive plan set forth a missile defense apparatus and program that we believe more greatly protects our security. And we pursued and got NATO to sign off on the pursuit of that. I think writ large in our relationship with Russia we have made -- and the President mentioned this today -- we have made tremendous progress. We are working together on issues that two years ago separated us. I think that only because of the strong and real partnership we have were we able to see the type of sanctions that are having a real bite and a real impact in Iran. And that relationship is important to this country and to this President. President Medvedev actually referred to a strike capability. He said that if this partnership does not materialize, then within that 10-year period that he described Russia will have to take a hard decision on the strike capability, that it will have to deploy. Was it the way that the Russians framed this issue in Lisbon, and do you have any idea what strike capabilities they are talking about? I would point you to your comrades in Russia. On the way in I saw President Carter headed into the Oval Office.


I wanted to just talk today, if I could, about more of your personal feelings through a very tough time in your Presidency, and you know, this is kind of a demarcation point. How do you feel about it? Well, naturally it was not the happiest of times, and sometimes I'd get annoyed at the interference with what I thought was getting on with the things that should be done. But, Hugh, I have to tell you, I never felt too upset, because I knew I'd told the truth and that the truth would have to come out-and did. But how did you keep smiling, because a lot of people would not believe you still? A lot of people question, you know, whether the-or at least think that you have not told everything, according to the polls. And what used to make me smile a little bit was the fact that I was the first one to tell them about such things as that there was extra money and so forth. And good Lord, I appointed the first commission, and it came in long before this one started with a lot of the information that was new to me and that I had to hear for the first time. How did you keep your optimism? It was pretty sustained throughout that period. Well, as I say, I just had faith in the truth. How tough was it, though, to see those close to you affected by this-Mrs. Reagan or children or old colleagues? Well, I think that those that were close around me kind of took their cue from me. But I did hear from a great many friends who expressed, again, their faith and trust, and that was very pleasant. I kept reading these stories about sometimes you got sore, here and there, at what people said. Yes, sometimes, and sometimes I got a little angry before all of this in finding out when I learned of things that I had not been told. You had every faith you were going to come out in the end? A number of people have said that the thing that bothers you-friends have told me that-were these polls that said the people thought that you were holding back. Now, can you recover that? Do you fully expect to restore the credibility? Naturally no one's going to be overjoyed at seeing a poll that finds that people thought you were not telling the truth.

Interview With Hugh Sidey of Time Magazine


But then one other poll asked an added question, and that was a question of the people who said that they thought I was not telling the truth. They asked them, well, you know, what did they think about that? And the overwhelming majority of them thought, well, of course, there are always going to be things that a President should not tell. And it threw a whole different aspect then on that first question and the answers to it. Did you end this period at all-or how did you feel about the group of men that were involved in this that had been on your staff? How do you end this period now with your feelings about North and Poindexter and McFarlane? Well, I heard them out. I can understand why they did what they did and what their motives were, and certainly they were not bad motives. I am the one who went on the air and told the people that and told the press that in the press room, and that I had appointed a commission to find out what there was to know about this. Do you pinpoint something you should not have done or should have done that you did not do? Well, you see, in a covert operation like that-and the covert operation was a response by us to an appeal from this other group of individuals who wanted to discuss better relations with our country. And it had to be covert for their safety, because contrary to what some of the people have said, I was not doing business with the Khomeini. In fact, quite the contrary; these were people that were anticipating another government to follow him. And if you will remember, at that particular time, almost every day there were reports of his failing health and that his days were very numbered and so forth. And they wanted to talk about a better relation than we have with the present government. How'd you get through those days when the hearings started, ENTITY? Did you read the papers as normal? Did you follow it closely in the papers? Actually, I did not change my pattern or my schedule much at all. Occasionally, I might have a few minutes and step into the next room and turn on the TV just to see who was on and so forth. And I did not have to depend on the press. Our legal counsel kept me informed with a summary. So, you had internal information- Did you give up any reading at all?  But you watched a little of it. Did you talk it over with Mrs. Reagan?


We used to she kept an eye on it? Well, she probably did not watch any more than I did. But you felt current throughout the time? Is this sort of thing inevitable in this office at some time or another in the Presidency? has an investigation by the Congress of What is your broad view of it? Well, Hugh, actually, all that I remember is, you know, for a half a century now, with only an exception of a few years, the Congress, both Houses, have been of one party. And I think if you check back, every President of the opposite party has been investigated for something or other. But I do not recall any investigations of the Presidents when the Presidents and the Legislature were of the same party. Well, what you are suggesting, if I am correct, is that there is a lot of politics in this. The Presidential election have much to do with it? Well, I am not going to comment on that. You are going to stay out of that, I see. Maybe I should not have said what I just said. Well, now, did you keep a diary throughout this time? Do you have some private thoughts? Well, I have kept a diary from the first day here. And actually, Hugh, the reason for that was one thing I learned after the 8 years as Governor-that the schedules are such and the succession of things and the meetings-that getting out of that 8-year experience as Governor, I suddenly realized that memory-well, there were things that I could remember, but I could not tell you whether they were in the first or the second term. And then I realized there were a lot of things that I just could not, if I had to, recall, and it was a very busy 8 years there. And so, when faced with this job, Nancy and I both said this time You are going to keep that record, huh? let us keep a record so that that will not happen. Through this particular stressful period, then, you have kept pretty good notes on- As a matter of fact, I made some of those diary notes available to the investigators. Yes, I knew that. Somebody told me you also kept your regular meetings with Edmund Morris . He is working on the book. I see, you know that.


Did you expect when you became President, having seen, of course, what happened to Lyndon Johnson and Nixon and Truman and all of them, as you mentioned before, did you expect that anything like this would happen, that there would be an episode in your Presidency? Were you prepared for that possibility, I guess is what I am saying. Well, Hugh, I think after the 8 years as Governor, also, you know that there is always a target painted on the Chief Executive's door. No, the big surprise, however, was exactly what we said. First of all, my reaction when our covert operation was exposed by that leak in Beirut and our press immediately went up with it, my reaction there-it was just one of-and I voiced it to the press at every opportunity, and then it was echoed by David Jacobsen, the hostage that came home at about the same time-and that was, please, you can get some people killed by talking about this and asking about it. And I had in mind the people we were dealing with as well as our own hostages, because when Jacobsen came out, the word we had was that there were going to be a couple more in just a few days. And that was all that was on my mind. Well, then when-as I say, Ed Meese was the one who saw that one paper that indicated that there was somehow more money and in a Swiss bank account this was just the biggest surprise in the world, because we had not set out to trade hostages for-or arms for hostages, even though I always feel a great responsibility to do everything possible to get back the hostages, except ransom. And I knew that the arms we sold were priced at $12 million, and we got our $12 million. That had come back before the exposure and all. And it was just such a surprise that first-well, the very next morning-he agreed with me that we had to make this known. And we called in the joint leadership of the Congress, both Houses and both parties, and told them. And then I went immediately into the press room and then, as you know, a short time later, went on the air. One of the points in this whole thing, ENTITY, was the failure or the fact that you did not just summon Oliver North and say, you know, lay this all out for me.


Well, whether our thinking was right or wrong at that point-and we were all agreed here that with this now exposed and my not having been told that they just had to leave the National Security Council, they could not continue. So, I thought of that before I thought any questions or anything, and I think they both felt the same way. And it got swept up in all the litigation or the process there. But finally, how do you think history will deal with this, looking down the road? Do you think it is going to fade away in the minds of people the next few years or Well, it is my hope that, once everything is settled and known, history will deal with it as the big investigation that finally discovered the President was telling the truth from the very beginning. And will you still be in office when that is established, do you think? Is it getting tougher, in your judgment-now you have been here 7 years-tougher to run this place in this city? You invented the term inside the beltway, which implies a certain environment that does not reflect national sentiment. Well, I do not know whether it is any different than it is been for anyone else. I do know that for years back there has been a kind of friction between the executive branch and the Legislature and an attempt to erode the powers of the President, and. I do not really know, because I came here with minus some powers that previously Presidents had had. Naturally, seeing it from the Executive Office side, I believe what is being attempted is a mistake. I think there are some things that just cannot be run by a committee of 535 people. And when you stop to think back over history, we have been in my lifetime-well, in the lifetime of the nation, I should say-five declared wars. But history will reveal that Presidents have sent military forces of the United States into action 125 times, and without it being a declared war, and on the assumption of the executive branch that it was essential for the security of the United States to do that. Your feeling then is that in all the actions you took, to the extent you knew anyway, was perfectly legal. Going back to that one question, you do not see then any evil men involved in this on our side? I am talking about your NSC, White House-nobody that you would point to as a culprit or somebody.-


Well, this would get me into trying to comment on all that took place in these hearings and all, and I cannot say that, not having seen them any more than that and getting summaries of them of the day that-I just do not think that I should risk making such an assertion.- of all of the people that have been mentioned in the hearings. It is getting a rather lengthy roster, I guess. Who was the most help throughout this period for you in terms of morale and guidance? Because, you know, it had to be somewhat of a burden added on to the normal job. Well, you mean outside of my wife. But, no, from the very beginning, not only the people here in the White House and some outside but also friends and supporters that have gone out of their way from the very beginning to express their confidence in me-and it was very heartwarming. Now, how does your wife buck you up? get you through those days? she knew I'd told the truth, too. Well, you answered that. A lot of comment, ENTITY, that you seem older and look older-how do you feel? I read the Wall Street Journal this morning. I suppose you did, too-a long piece about it. No, I have not read the Journal this morning. Well, it had that piece in column eight saying, you know, the President seemed to be losing steam and this, you know. It was one of those ambiguous pieces, to be true. But anyway, a lot of comment on the feeling that you are slowing down in these last months, not only because of the burden, but just because you are just older. I do not know about any slowing down. Oh, yes. And some doctors seem to be a little surprised that I could have done that. And every night the schedule for the next day and the homework for the next day arrives, and that is my bedtime reading and so forth and- Well, the other part of that theory is that your friends said that you were going to be more combative than normal in these last 18 months. Well, that would have been true even without this other thing. And that has to be, because I think we have accomplished a great many things in these 6 1/2 years.


I think the fact that we are within 2 months of having the longest expansion period in the Nation's history-economic expansion and all but I think there are things that I will regret all my life if we do not get them pinned down. Well, for one thing, the great problem that from the very beginning that has faced us-the deficit-that I had thought at one time we could get balanced. But that was during the campaign, and I had had a group of economists who were working on the plan that we followed. But no one's ever asked me, so I will tell you. Before the election, those economists came to me and told me that the deterioration had now been so much greater than when they made their study that, no, there was no way that we were going to, in a few years, be able to balance the budget. But we put the plan into effect anyway, aimed at whenever it can happen. But now with this deficit spending and our Economic Bill of Rights, as we call it-that is based on some things that are just essential, and that is a balanced budget amendment. When I heard some of the Congressmen talking about their obligation to the people and to do what the people want-the polls show that 80 percent of the people want a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. I see that. The new figures have come out on that, yes. And also what 43 Governors have and what I had as Governor-and that is the right of line-item veto I would like to see those in place and a program in place. Well, the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings program is dedicated to this also-that is aiming at a point down here where the budget will be balanced and from then on have to stay balanced. Having had that in our Constitution-I think about 44 States have that in their State constitutions; we had it in California. And I have to tell you, it is a guarantee when you know that as executive officer you are responsible that, when you come to the end of the budget year, the revenues have to have matched the outgo. And of course, the answer to those people who think that, well, then let us just raise the revenues-well, we have done that a few times, and if you want to look back in history, virtually every tax increase has led to lower revenues when the rates were higher because of the lack of incentive and the search by people to find tax shelters and so forth.


And since our tax cuts have gone into effect, the revenues now are bigger. And to those liberal-minded individuals who always want to aim at the top earners and say, Make them pay the heaviest load -they do pay the heaviest load. And the truth of the matter is, the top earners today are paying a higher percentage of the total tax than they were before, even though their rates have been reduced. Now, that means that there is the proof that those people who are in brackets where they look for tax shelters and so forth, or did not earn extra money because it was not worth it, now with a lower tax rate, the incentive is there for them to produce more, and as a result, they do pay a higher tax even though it is at a lower rate. as a kid, as a sportscaster, as a movie actor, as a Governor and a President. Well, I have to tell you something, I have been blessed; I have enjoyed every one of them. I am still very proud of seven summers as a lifeguard. Yes, I had a log with 77 notches in it for the-pulled out. And yet I had always-going through school, high school and college-I'd always, in addition to athletics, I'd always been involved in the dramatic clubs and that sort of thing and the class plays. And when, out of the blue, literally, came an opportunity to switch from sports announcing to acting-and I loved that. And all I can tell you is I fought like a tiger against ever running for office. I thought that was for someone else, that I would do what I had done for other candidates, like my speeches for Barry Goldwater, that I would campaign for others. And when I was beset in 1965 by this group that insisted that I had to seek the governorship against the incumbent Governor then because the party was divided and all, I fought like a tiger not to. But then, I have to tell you, we'd only been there a few months and one night we looked at each other, sitting in the living room in Sacramento, and said this makes everything else we have ever done look as dull as dishwater. So, you went the distance? Now, what are you going to do when you get out? And I anticipate that; I look forward to that.


ENTITY, why cannot you seek seclusion, and play hermit for a fortnight? It would reinvigorate you. two or three weeks would do me no good. I cannot fly from my thoughts my solicitude for this great country follows me wherever I go. I do not think it is personal vanity or ambition, though I am not free from these infirmities, but I cannot but feel that the weal or woe of this great nation will be decided in November. There is no program offered by any wing of the Democratic party but that must result in the permanent destruction of the Union. But, ENTITY, General McClellan is in favor of crushing out this rebellion by force. Sir, the slightest knowledge of arithmetic will prove to any man that the rebel armies cannot be destroyed by Democratic strategy. It would sacrifice all the white men of the North to do it. There are now in the service of the United States nearly one hundred and fifty thousand able-bodied colored men, most of them under arms, defending and acquiring Union territory. The Democratic strategy demands that these forces be disbanded, and that the masters be conciliated by restoring them to slavery. The black men who now assist Union prisoners to escape are to be converted into our enemies, in the vain hope of gaining the good-will of their masters. We shall have to fight two nations instead of one. You cannot conciliate the South if you guarantee to them ultimate success; and the experience of the present war proves their success is inevitable if you fling the compulsory labor of millions of black men into their side of the scale. Will you give our enemies such military advantages as insure success, and then depend on coaxing, flattery, and concession to get them back into the Union? Abandon all the posts now garrisoned by black men, take one hundred and fifty thousand men from our side and put them in the battle-field or corn-field against us, and we would be compelled to abandon the war in three weeks. We have to hold territory in inclement and sickly places; where are the Democrats to do this? It was a free fight, and the field was open to the war Democrats to put down this rebellion by fighting against both master and slave, long before the present policy was inaugurated. There have been men base enough to propose to me to return to slavery the black warriors of Port Hudson and Olustee, and thus win the respect of the masters they fought.

Interview with John T. Mills


ENTITY, I was watching you on CBS This Morning, and you were very funny. I think I heard you say that you also had a manicure in California. But I also could hear a lot of excuses when you talked about the Travel Office problem, the haircut, the economy, the jobs stimulus program. I did say that. I mean, the haircut thing was a boner, but I am just saying I did ask whether I would inconvenience anybody and was told I would not . Now that I have said this, I challenge you to tell the American people that I think that we have a right to run an office with three people instead of seven at taxpayers' expense, the primary job of which is to arrange travel for people who travel with me. And I challenge you to tell the American people that we saved 25 percent on the very first flight that we put out for competitive bid. I take responsibility for any mistakes made in The White House, and mistakes were made in the way that was handled, absolutely. But the goal was to save taxpayer money and to save the press money. And the press complained to me about how much the plane rides cost. I am just trying to fix it. I still think we can achieve the goal and correct the mistakes. We did make a mistake. Obviously, on the stimulus thing-no one asked me about that-if we would have followed the right strategy somehow we would have won, and we did not . But if you try to do a lot of things, you are going to make some mistakes. I am going to admit my mistakes. All I want to do is to have the kind of relationship, with you and others, that will present me as I am to the American people and not as some sort of clay figure that is , all pulled out of shape. I am going to make a lot of-you get out and go to bat every day, you are going to make mistakes. Babe Ruth struck out twice as many times as he hit home runs. But I am going to make a few hits too, if I keep going to bat. ENTITY, we will accept that challenge. And ENTITY joins the CBS Evening News next Tuesday night; we hope you will be watching. She will accept that challenge and meet what you said. I am excited about it.

Interview With Connie Chung and Dan Rather of CBS News


ENTITY, if we could be one one-hundredth as great as you and Hillary Rodham Clinton have been together in The White House, we'd take it right now and walk away winners. As you know, ENTITY, I pride myself on trying to ask the tough questions. So I am not going to apologize in advance for this question, but I do want to put you on tough question alert. You have been through 2 hours of questioning this morning with two of the most insightful questioners on television, Hary Smith and Paula Zahn. ENTITY came at you there with a substantive question. When you are able to take a deep breath, when you are able to watch television, besides news and sports, what do you like to watch? What do you watch on television? I did watch the NBA playoff game last night while I was calling Congress, asking them to help me in our playoff. I like to watch old movies. After news and sports, my favorite thing to watch are old movies. Could you name two or three that you particularly like? Yes, I saw The Maltese Falcon again on television the other night. My two favorite movies of all time are Casablanca and High Noon. It is a movie about courage in the face of fear and the guy doing what he thought was right in spite of the fact that it could cost him everything. I surf the channels. A lot of times when I come in late at night, I punch that button frenetically just to sort of see what is on. And I like Washington because there are a lot of cable stations here. And I get frustrated, particularly on the weekends if I have a little time, when there is not a single good movie on. But I do like to bump through the channels. ENTITY, we all recognize that you have a kind of high noon today with the vote in the House of Representatives. And with that in mind, let us go to our first questioner from among our affiliates, ENTITY from Cleveland. We appreciate it so very much. ENTITY, could you please give us more details on the agreement that you and the House leadership and the conservatives worked out early this morning on your economic package that will be going to a vote in the House sometime later today? And specifically, sir, does it include an increase in spending cuts or a lesser increase in taxes or both? The short answer to your question, or second question, is no.


But the agreement that was worked out late last night is an enforcement mechanism to make sure that what happened to the '90 budget agreement does not happen this time. That is, this is a mechanism to guarantee that if there is a 5-year deficit reduction target, we meet the targets every year. Because under previous budgets, you could adopt a 5-year budget, but it is hard for CBS or your affiliate or the businesses of anybody represented in this audience today to do 5-year budgets. So this says, after every year, if we miss that deficit reduction target, the President is bound to come in and offer a plan to correct it, and the Congress must vote on it. They do not have to take his ideas, but if they do not do that, they must do something else. This will give the American people the assurance that each year we are going to meet these targets. Now, let me say one other thing. Most everybody believes that to whatever extent we can, we should have more cuts and less taxes. But when you get to the specifics-if you look at, for example, Senator Boren's plan, which reduces taxes on the wealthy and imposes more burdens on working people and elderly people just above the poverty line, you see how hard the details are. The Congress will have three more chances to vote to reduce spending. All the appropriation bills are also going through the Congress now, as soon as this is voted on. We are going to have a health care program which will produce savings in the health care area for Congress, the entitlements. And Vice President Gore is going to present a program to reform the way the Federal Government works in September that will give a third chance to cut spending this year. We are going to keep doing things that will reduce unnecessary spending in the Federal Government whatever happens on this bill today. Thank you, ENTITY, and we have another questioner who will identify himself and his station and town. My name is ENTITY from Missoula, Montana. First of all, on behalf of all the CBS affiliates, I want to thank you, and for free broadcasters all over America, for your support of free broadcasting, and also want to say thank you for participating in this town meeting this morning. We were proud to have you on our network. The subject is the Northwest and development and use of the natural resources in the Northwest. The debates have been going on for many, many years. You yourself have been involved in hearings.


When is it time to make a decision and let the folks go down the road? We are going to recommend a resolution to the problems that we found in the timber summit that was held a few months ago, very shortly. We are going to make our recommendation. The Northwest now has a lot of difficult natural resource issues. For example, if you cut all the old-growth forests, you can keep people working for a while, and then you will not have any left at all. You will have lost a lot of not only the biological species there, but there will be more water pollution and the salmon fishermen will be hurt. A lot of these things are very, very complicated. We are going to try to resolve them the best we can and make a recommendation that will preserve as much of the old-growth forests as we can, recognize the importance of maintaining responsible logging practices, and keep the salmon fishers going, and doing as much of those things as we can to balance the economy and the environment. I understand a little about this because I live in a State that is over half timberland with a lot of national forest land. Probably no one will be happy with the recommendations that our administration will make. But we are going to do our best to be fair and to look at the long view. We have to think about people making a living not just now but also 5 years from now and 10 years from now and how to preserve those essential parts of our environment that are an important part of the character of the Pacific Northwest. We have, I think, time-we want to keep our commitment to you, because we do appreciate very much your doing this. And ENTITY from KHOU-TV in Houston has a question. We have heard a lot of comments regarding yet another broadcast campaign reform; 50 percent of lowest unit rate and three commercials are just a couple of the things we have heard. I wonder if you might enlighten us on that, please. Well, the whole issue of free campaign time from the broadcast networks arose, frankly, as a result of the opposition that some folks have in any public funding of campaigns. I presented a campaign finance reform law to the Congress which lowers the cost of campaigns, lowers the cost of political action committees, and gives people who are candidates for office communications vouchers so they can have access to the airwaves, so the challengers as well as the incumbents, and without regard to party, can have access to the airwaves.


ENTITY, I wondered if you had a chance to see our replica of Columbus' ship, the Santa Maria. Not yet, I have not , but I expect that that commemoration next year is going to be fantastic, knowing the spirit of this place. Well, I am not sure I have had a formal invitation. I will have to check with the schedulers. I am going to be participating in many events, because this is American. So I hope I get a chance to come here. We are right now planning a special program on ENTITY aimed at teenagers. I know you were in Europe when Magic Johnson made his announcement. I wondered if there was anything more you wanted to say about him or that you would say to teenagers. Well, simply that Magic is coming onto the National ENTITY Commission. And I believe from what I have heard him say that he will be, because of his fame, he will be a marvelous advocate for education, helping teenagers understand how to avoid getting ENTITY. You cannot do it in every instance, but ENTITY is one disease where behavior has a lot to do, a lot to do, with whether you get it or not, shooting dope or promiscuous sex. Those are areas where we need more education to the teenagers. And I think that that commission and I think that that individual can be extraordinarily helpful, saying here is what I have learned, here is what I believe. In the meantime, we are going forward with a vigorous and large funding in research. And we have got some great research that is hopeful research going on at NIH, National Institutes of Health, in Washington. Headlines all across the country today are talking about ENTITY Reviews Plans for Saddam's Ouster and Move Would Counter Democratic Critics , like Mario Cuomo, who says you waged the war well enough but lost the objective in that you did not get Saddam Hussein. You remember the U.N. resolutions. It was to kick Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait and teach the aggressor a lesson. And that was a lesson that he got loud and clear. So we have got to be careful about redefining objectives for the American people. But if your question is would I like to see him out of there and would we like to help in some way or another, the answer is, yes. But I did see that story.

Interview With Doug Adair of WCMH - TV in Columbus, Ohio


We never comment on anything that we are doing of a clandestine or covert nature and never should, because people's lives -- if they were doing this, and I am not confirming or denying anything -- could be put in danger by this. But I'd like to see him out. I will tell you what there is -- this is the first time I have said this -- there is some interesting information coming out of Iraq of increasing dissent. People are tired of this man. They are tired of seeing food and medicines go in only to have them ripped off and be sent to the Republican Guard or to the people in Tikrit. And so I think we are watching a situation with growing dissent, growing discouragement about this brutal dictator, regret at being isolated by the world community. And who knows what the dynamics inside Iraq will eventually be when that move that I mentioned now just becomes paramount, when everybody feels that way? Is it difficult having been such a hero of the Gulf war and to see the popularity polls reflecting that and then to see the popularity rating come down with the economy? Do people expect too much of ENTITY that way? No, I think ENTITY has to -- I think people, when they are frustrated on an economic sense, they will blame Congress, they will blame ENTITY, they will blame the Governor. They will blame anybody. And so I can understand it. I would like to say, without being rancorous about it, that if Congress has passed some of the economic growth package that I put forward in the State of the Union and the programs that I have put forward since then, I think we'd be much further along in terms of a boisterous recovery, a robust recovery. But, look, I do not think the American people want blame. I am going to try to constrain myself a little. I will go to some political events, and I will hammer away at the Democrats as they are doing on me right now. But more important is, what can we do to help people? And I am going to continue to fight for the programs that I think will help the American people. And we can take care of the politics later on. And you cannot live or die by polls. I did not live euphorically at 86 percent, nor am I wringing my hands now.


You try to assure everyone that the economy is doing well enough, and yet 69 percent of the people, according to the Associated Press, say that the economy is not doing well. It is not, and I do not try to assure them it is doing well enough. Please, that is not what I try to do. I try to put things in perspective. When people talk about Herbert Hoover depressions, they simply do not know what they are talking about. When you see interest rates where they are and you see inflation under control, these are good fundamentals. I think ENTITY owes the American people his judgment. And I do not think that we ought to try to talk ourselves, as seems to be happening by some, into worse times. You see, I have this funny feeling that some of the political opponents think that the only way they can propel themselves to victory is to make America think that everything is wrong. I am in Ohio talking about a revolutionary new education program, America 2000. We moved forward on unemployment benefits. That is helping those now who are hurting. So, we have got some programs that can be short run and some much longer run. Interesting in Reader's Digest this month, a little quote that says you were asked one time what was your favorite Presidential speech, the one you admire the most. And you said it was one that Teddy Roosevelt had carried in his pocket that helped to deflect an assassin's bullet. And I wondered, is that something that concerns ENTITY a great deal all the time, the concern about yourself or about your family being in a position like that? We have the best Secret Service and dedicated young men and women that really go the extra mile for protection. So I do not wake up worrying about that kind of threat. On the family side, I worry more about what you put your kids through, what you put your family through by just being in the arena. And what troubles me is it might get a little worse as the political season goes on. There is a certain ugliness, and I'd like to try to avoid that. But that is on the family side what concerns me, not personal security. I honestly do not think about that. Your call for reducing credit card interest rates got part of the blame for the plunge 120 points on the stock market. I do not think so because I have also jawboned the Fed, saying would not it be nice to have lower interest rates.


So why did you choose to visit Mongolia at this time? First of all, I am really looking forward to going. This is going to be an exciting trip for me and Laura. Mongolia has got a certain fascination for me. I grew up in the West of the United States where there is -where we like wide-open spaces. And when you think about Mongolia, you think about a big country with a lot of space. But what is interesting about Mongolia is it is more than geography now, as far as I am concerned. We kind of consider ourselves-and we like the slogan, the third neighbor of Mongolia. And so I have chosen to go there because of the spirit of the people and a leadership that shares our desire to let the-to have a government of and by and for the people. So, ENTITY, let us talk for a moment about America's foreign policy. Democracies change leaders every few years, so in that change often comes a change in a nation's foreign policy. So what steps has your administration taken to ensure that the foreign policy initiatives you have taken will continue to be guiding principles for the U.S. after you leave the White House? First of all, there are certain values that are inherent in our country that any leader will bring to the White House, the value of human rights, human dignity, freedom to worship, freedom of the press, freedom to speak your mind. And so foreign policy will have inherent in it those values. The other thing is, is that once democracy takes hold-it is hard work to make it work, but once it takes hold, it is hard to change it. Because democracy really speaks to the people and says, We listen to you. You can realize your dreams. And so one of the things my administration is doing is working in places where there has not been democracy. I think of the Palestinian Territories or Iraq. We are working in places where there is a new democracy to help strengthen those democracies. We are working with countries that have dedicated themselves to democracy but want the friendship of the United States to help them even further democracy. And so one way you leave behind a foundation that others cannot undo is to give people-help people develop a form of government that just cannot be unwound unless something catastrophic were to take place inside the country. So as part of our new relationship, Mongolia has contributed our peacekeeping troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Interview With Eagle Television of Mongolia


So in the future, if there are any military threats against Mongolia by its neighbors, would the U.S., under your administration, also rise to our defense? And by being friends, I think we can prevent any potential military dispute from arising. But of course we would support our friends. We certainly would-nobody anticipates over the next 3 years of my administration, any force being used against our friend. But my visit should send a signal to the people of Mongolia that you have got a friend in the United States and a friend in George W. Bush. So during your visit to Mongolia, you will be addressing the nation in a wide televised address. So our nation is experiencing a crisis of corruption. So you will be speaking to our leaders and our nation about the dangers that corruption poses to our democracy. Can you give us a preview about it? Well, I am not going to give you a preview of the speech, because then people may not watch it if they get a preview, see. On the other hand, I will say on your TV screens, there should be no corruption in government, that one of the foundations of any government is the ability for the people to trust the government, itself. And a foundation of democracy and a foundation of our foreign policy and a foundation of our Millennium Challenge Account is that there be honest government. The next related question is going to be to Millennium Challenge. So how has the issue of political corruption affected Mongolia's status for the Millennium Challenge Account? Well, we intend to move forward on the Millennium Challenge Account with Mongolia. On the other hand, we will insist that as a condition of the Millennium Challenge checks being written that there be honest government, that there be investment in health and education of the people, that there be a dedication to rule of law and to the marketplace. Okay, the last question is so important for our television. You might be aware that the Eagle Television was the first independent TV station established in Mongolia, with American Christians and Mongolians are working together to advance freedom of speech, press, and conscience in our country. So, first, how do you feel about the role of ordinary American citizens supporting this kind of work for Mongolia's democracy? And the second, what further role do you think the ordinary American citizens can play in helping to address faith and freedom in Mongolia through media?


The big news story of the day today and obviously President Jonathan accepting US aid to help the girls in Nigeria. So what help will we provide? And do you think at this point with three weeks in, is it too late? We are sending in a team made up of our military and law enforcement and other experts, and we are very glad that Nigeria has accepted the help. And as a father of two girls, I cannot imagine what the parents are going through. But this organization, Boko Haram, has been one of the worst regional or local terrorist organizations in the world. We'd long sought to work with Nigeria on dealing with them. And we are going to do everything we can to assist them in recovering these young women. More broadly though we are gonna have to really tackle a pernicious problem inside that county-a an organization that is carried out ruthless attacks and killed thousands of people over the last several years. They are claiming energy efficiency. In light of all the data coming in with this new report, talking about carbon emissions, are you more onboard or are you concerned at this point? Well, the climate assessment plan was done over the course of four years, talking to hundreds of experts across the country, the private sector, not-for profits. Not only is climate change a problem in the future. It is already affecting Americans. It is increasing the likelihood of floods. It is increasing the likelihood of storms and hurricanes. It is having an impact on our agriculture. It is having an impact on our tourism industries. And people's lives are at risk. So, the emphasis on the Climate Action Plan that I have put forward as well as this assessment is there are things we can do about it, but it is only going to happen if the American people and people around the world take the challenge seriously. And, we have already increased our production of solar and wind power. We have already increased fuel efficiency standards on cars, and now we are going to appliances. But we are gonna have to do more. And that should be a bipartisan issue, because always want to make sure that we are passing on an American to our kids and grandkids that is as beautiful as the one that we inherited. And Sir, climate change is the kind of thing a lot of people do not put as a top priority. How do you change that? We cannot attribute any single weather event to climate change. But we know that if temperatures are rising, you are going to see more extreme weather events.

Interview with Megan Glaros of CBS's This Morning


You know, I was thinking about something today that I heard, and I wanted to see if you could confirm it, and if you could, whether you could talk about it. I was told that the night of the inauguration it was a huge, huge party here. You are talking about the second inauguration? First inauguration we had-you know, this is a good example of when you first arrive, you do not know what you are supposed to do. So there are all these state balls that take place, and we sort of assumed-we were told-well, you should go to all the balls. Did you try that? Did you try to go to all of them? We went to all of them. And you do a dance at each one. No, no, not every state has one, but we went to 10 or 12. And by the time we were done, it was like 1 o'clock, so we had Wynton Marsalis here playing, and people had been hanging out, but by the time we got back Michelle's feet were all hurting and swollen up, and I was exhausted, and we hung out here probably for half an hour, and went to bed. So we did, like, three balls and then got back here and had a DJ and, yeah, Usher and Stevie. Was the second one more joyous for you- I think the way to think about it is the first inauguration is like your wedding in the sense that it is a joyous moment and occasion, but you are so busy and kind of stressed making sure that Aunt Such-and-Such and Uncle So-and-So and cousins are getting tickets that it ends up going by without you even really knowing what is happening. The second one you could savor. But partly, as you indicated, for political reasons as well. Because we had gone through four of the toughest years this country has gone through since the '30s. And to be able to win a majority of the vote the second time indicated that we had worked with a broad cross section of the country and they trusted what we were trying to do. And it was not just a singular feel-good moment; it was an affirmation that people thought we had done a good job.

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


I think for those of us-and I certainly threw myself in this camp-I was telling Valerie the other day, the idea of a black ENTITY was a joke, in every black stand-up comic routine everywhere- A friend of mine gave me Head of State-remember and Bernie Mac?-when we were still running. Said, Man, you got to see Head of State. Yeah, this was like a laugh-fest. But I think one of the things that did distinguish you was the ability to see it and to have the vision that, yes, this could happen, and then to have it again. I am speaking specifically in terms of race ... There were those of us who said, It is no way. And to see it the first and second time must have really reaffirmed a lot of what you thought. They had seen me have victories, they had seen me have defeats, they had seen me make mistakes, they had seen me at some high moments but also some low moments. So they knew me, at that point, in the round. I was not just a projection of whatever they hoped for. You know, we always cautioned each other, in the '08 race, that people were projecting so much onto my campaign-you know, that this would solve every racial problem, or that this indicated that we were beyond race, or that we were going to magically usher in a new era of progressive politics, and that we had vanquished all the backward-looking politics of the past. And for us to then be able to grind it out, to figure out how do we get out of this Great Recession, and what is the process where we can finally get health care done even if it is not pretty, and how do we deal with winding down two wars, and how do we clean up after an administration to reinvigorate things like the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department. Do we want to continue on this course, and do we continue to have faith in this person? And so it is true that, for me at least, in some ways the first race was lightning in a bottle. I saw it, I envisioned the possibility of it, but everything converged in a way that you could not duplicate. The second race as a consequence felt more solid, because it was harder. And you know we did not have tailwinds, we had a lot more headwinds.

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


Yeah, I have my own theories about this, and I wonder what yours are. Why were you able to see it? You said you were able to envision the possibility. I mean, when you think about yourself-because obviously, as you know, a lot of African Americans could not-what is the difference? I'd say a couple things. The first was that I had been elected as the senator of Illinois, and Illinois is the most demographically representative state in the country. If you took all the percentages of black, white, Latino, rural, urban, agricultural, manufacturing- you took that cross section across the country, and you shrank it, it would be Illinois. So when I ran for the Senate I had to go into southern Illinois, downstate Illinois, farming communities-some with very tough racial histories, some areas where there just were no African Americans of any number, and I had seen my ability to connect with those communities and those people against some pretty formidable opponents. When I ran for the Senate, I was one of seven candidates. One of them, Dan Hynes, was already the state comptroller, was the son of the former Senate president and chair of the Democratic Party, a well-established Irish family in the state, who got the endorsement, I think, of 100 out of 103 county chairs as well as the AFL-CIO endorsement. And you had a multimillionaire hedge-fund manager who was spending huge amounts of money. And when we won that race, not just an African American from Chicago, but an African American with an exotic history and a name Barack Hussein Obama, could connect with and appeal to a much broader audience. And then, keep in mind, that the response of the 2004 convention speech was admittedly over the top, and so I had for two years seen the response I would get when we traveled all around the country. I had campaigned on behalf of other Democrats. Ben Nelson, one of the most conservative Democrats in the Senate, from Nebraska, would only bring in one national Democrat to campaign for him, because typically he tried to distance himself from Democrats-and And so part of the reason I was willing to run and saw the possibility was that I had had two years in which we were generating enormous crowds all across the country-and the majority of those crowds were not African American; and they were in pretty remote places, or unlikely places. So what that told me was, it was possible. Did you have doubts?

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


You did have doubts? Look, I think Valerie remembers us sitting around our kitchen table-a group of friends of mine, some political advisers, Michelle-and I think our basic assessment was maybe we had a 20, 25 percent chance of winning. Because I did think given the problems President Bush had had, that whoever won the Democratic nomination would win the presidency. And so the issue really was, could I get the nomination, particularly with a formidable candidate like Hillary Clinton already preparing to run? And my view was not that this was a sure thing, but what I never doubted was my ability to get white support. You never doubted that? And I think that in addition to the proof of my Senate race, if you want to go a little deeper, there is no doubt that as a mixed child, as the child of an African and a white woman, who was very close to white grandparents who came from Kansas, that I think the working assumption of discrimination, the working assumption that white people would not treat me right or give me an opportunity, or judge me on the basis of merit-that kind of working assumption is less embedded in my psyche than it is, say, with Michelle. I had as a child seen at least a small cross section of white people, but the people who were closest to me loved me more than anything. And so even as an adult, even by the time I am 40, 45, 50, that set of memories meant that if I walked into a room and it is a bunch of white farmers, trade unionists, middle age-I am not walking in thinking, Man, I have got to show them that I am normal . like, these people look just like my grandparents. And I see the same the same Jell-O mold that my grandmother served, and they have got the same, you know, little stuff on their mantelpieces. And so I am maybe disarming them by just assuming that we are okay. And if anything, my concern had more to do with I am really young. I mean, when I look back at the pictures of me running in '08, I look like a kid. And so my insecurities going into the race had more to do with the fact I had only been in the Senate two years. Three, four years earlier I had been a state legislator, and I was now running for the highest office in the land. I want to stay with this for a second.

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


You know, to prepare for this piece I have been going back and reading some of your writings. And one of the things I noticed going through Dreams From My Father, which I read a long time ago-it is very different reading it. Your grandfather has this black dude come over who is interested in his daughter, and he is accepting. Yeah, listen, I am always kind of surprised by that. And he was like a blue-black brother. And so, yeah, I will always give my grandparents credit for that. I am not saying they were happy about it. I am not saying that they were not, after the guy leaves, looking at each other like, 'What the heck?' But whatever misgivings they had, they never expressed to me, never spilled over into how they interacted with me. Now, part of it, as I say in my book, was we were in this unique environment in Hawaii where I think it was much easier. I do not know if it would have been as easy for them if they were living in Chicago at the time, because the lines just were not as sharply drawn in Hawaii as they were on the mainland. But I do think that at the end of the day, some of my confidence that people are people and that the very specific historical experience and sociological reality of racism in this country has made for significant differences between black and white populations, but that people's basic human impulses are the same. It is a biological necessity for me to believe that, right? And so my politics ultimately would reflect that. In 2008 I was never subjected to the kind of concentrated vilification of Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, the whole conservative-media ecosystem, and so as a consequence, even for my first two years as a senator I was polling at 70 percent. I was at a town-hall meeting, or I was talking to people directly, or they had met me, or I would speak at a university or go to a VFW hall. But they were not seeing some image of me as trying to take away their stuff and give it to black people, and coddle criminals, and all the stereotypes of not just African American politicians but liberal politicians. You started to see that kind of prism being established towards the end of the 2008 race, particularly once Sarah Palin was the nominee. And obviously almost immediately after I was elected, it was deployed in full force.

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


And it had an impact in terms of how a large portion of white voters would see me. And what that speaks to-and this is something I still strongly believe-is that the suspicion between races, the way it can manifest itself in politics, in part comes out of people's daily interactions and the fact that we are segregated by communities, and by schools, and our churches, and people's memories passed down through generations. But some of it is constructed on a constant basis; it is being created all the time. And I think what I did not fully appreciate when I first came into this office was the degree to which that reality would be the only thing that a large chunk of the electorate, particularly the white electorate, would see. You know, Bill Clinton told me an interesting story. He went back to Arkansas with a former aide of his when he was governor and when he was running, who ended up running for Congress and was about to retire from Congress. This was one of the last blue dogs. And as they were traveling around ,this former member of Congress said to Bill, You know, I do not think you could win Arkansas today. He says, You know, when we used to run, you and I would drive around to these small towns and communities out there, and you'd meet with the publisher and editor of the little small-town paper, and you'd have a conversation with them. And they were fairly knowledgeable about some of the issues, and they had their quirks and blind spots, but basically you as a Democrat could talk about civil rights and the need to invest in communities and they understood that. Except now those papers are all gone and if you go into any bar, you go into any barbershop, the only thing that is on is Fox News. And it has shaped an entire generation of voters and tapped into their deepest anxieties ... Just as a counterpoint to that, I wonder about another argument one might make-that you were more likable to these folks before you had power. In other words, once you literally became a black ENTITY, that was a real thing. And that activated their fears- Like, that they needed Fox News. Yeah, but what I would argue would be that the folks for whom that is true-they had not voted for me in the first place.

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


I mean, what I am arguing is not that the concerns or suspicions or fears around changing demographics and increased diversity are not right there on the surface for a lot of voters. But what I am saying is that they are shaped and influenced depending on what they see day to day. And they are more malleable, and they can go in a better direction or a worse direction. And if what they are seeing and what they are taking as truth is that this black ENTITY is trying to hurt you or take something from you and looking out for his own, then they will respond differently than if they hear that this ENTITY is trying to help you. And here are the issues involved and here are the choices that he is having to make. There is no better example of that than the whole debate around Obamacare, where the whole way in which it got framed as 'He is trying to take something from you to give free stuff'-in this case free health care but it could also be free phones, or free cheese, or whatever-ended up dominating the debate even in those communities that stood to benefit most from this program. But part of that was the story, the narrative that they were receiving. And people do not have the ability to fact-check and, you know, sort through what is true and what is not, especially on a complicated social program like this. Do you think that holds true even in an era right now when we have so much access to information? You know, in some ways the access to all this information has made it easier to set up narratives that are entirely separate from fact. I mean witness the current election and what Trump is doing. But because, with all the proliferation of websites, and blogs, and digital content, you can just create your own hermetically sealed world where people are never going outside of their existing assumptions, I think it is a bigger problem, not a worse problem. Was there always a certain quotient of people who, even if it was hard for them to admit, would not vote for me because I was African American? That was true when I was running for the U.S. Senate and that would be true if I was trying to catch a cab. Do I believe that is the majority of white Americans? And I think my elections proved that.

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


Do I think that good people who are not instinctively afraid or concerned about an African American in authority can be made afraid, and suspicious, and fearful, because of what they are seeing, hearing, and reading if it is not attached to the facts, and evidence, and reality? I think that can have a big impact. One of the things that I think also is here is not just your ability to envision the presidency, just the optimism for the country you have in general. I think, at this kind of young age you really saw-if I may say so-the best of white America in a very sort of direct way- Which I think is very different than most African Americans. I did not really grow up around white people, but even the abstract construction was as a malignant force in my life, which I had to make my way out of much, much later in life, in my 20s, when I had intimate contact. And I wonder how much of that general optimism you think emanates from your biography. The exposure too, the cosmopolitan nature of all you have seen. I mean, look, I think all of the above. I think I was deeply loved by my mom and my grandparents. I felt that, and I carried that with me. I spent time outside of the United States, which gives you a perspective on how people of all kinds of different races, and ethnicities, and religions, and backgrounds can figure out ways to divide themselves and try to be superior to others. So that I ended up looking at race in America as one example of a broader human problem, rather than something that was unique and I was trapped in. But I also, I think, benefited from the very particular era that I was growing up in, because in some ways, the last 55 years-the years I have been on this Earth-have a very particular trajectory of progress that is incomplete, is partial, that middle-class African Americans enjoy in ways that really impoverished African Americans do not yet feel. But that trend would feed my optimism as well. Now, you know, what is interesting is the work that I did as an organizer in Chicago would help to temper that optimism and ground it so that it was not just a bunch of happy talk. And it is one of the reasons why, for the generation just ahead of me, I would learn of the anger, frustration, bitterness of my elders and respect it and understand it even if I ultimately did not agree with it.

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


Did you right off the bat, when you first encountered it? And part of it was just because, you know, I had sort of steeped myself in it, although as still an intellectual exercise. I remember reading The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and I remember reading it, even as a young person, and saying to myself, Now, if this had happened to me, I'd have a very different attitude . And that is part of what I tried to explain in my race speech in Philadelphia when the Reverend Wright controversies came out. He is of a different generation. He had different experiences. And that sense of being trapped and caged and witnessing brilliant people broken by an unjust system-family members beaten or jailed, or just harassed, or unable to realize their potential-could drive you crazy. And so I think I not only was mindful enough of it by the time I had moved to Chicago, but even in my relatively sheltered and unique circumstances, I had the experiences that every African American has. Which is somebody in front of a restaurant will hand you the keys, thinking you are there to park their car. Or-I write about this in Dreams From My Father-being in a tennis tournament and the tennis coach, who is supposed to look out for all the kids, telling me, 'Do not put your finger on the draw that is been posted about who is playing who, because you might make it dirty.' What? Or walking into an elevator and having some woman who you know lives on your floor or above you walk out of the elevator because she is worried about riding with you even though you are a kid. So, you know, you have enough there to have a sense of how anger could pool and well up and, in some cases, consume you. But I also, I think, by that point would have benefited from enough circumstances in which assuming the best in people had paid off-where there had been a teacher who had really been helpful and looked out for me even when I did not completely deserve it. Or, you know, just witnessing the example of a Dr. King, or an Arthur Ashe. And so I am coming of age at a time where you have got the strength and defiance of a Malcolm or an Ali, and you have also got the soulfulness and the moral strength of a King. And those things are speaking to each other. They are in a conversation. And you are saying to yourself, I can draw from both of those traditions .

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates


And there may be times where you have got to give the country and white people the benefit of the doubt. And if you are so eager to give them the benefit of the doubt that they slap you down and you do not know it, that is a problem. But if you are so invested in the anger that you do not seen when somebody is putting out their hand in a sincere gesture of friendship, then you have now become your own jailer. It is not just someone else jailing you. It occurs to me, obviously, to have our first black ENTITY a product of the times, a product of certain things going around, a product in some part of the administration before-but have you ever thought you needed to be a certain person who had not had this sort of trauma at a young age? Who was capable of giving that sort of optimism-that it could not just be, okay now the country's ready, Joe Blow Black Dude steps up, and wins, with political gifts, obviously-but I think that optimism sticks out. Look, I have no doubt that the first African American ENTITY had to be somebody who could speak the way I did in the 2004 convention speech about the ideal of what America is. What it is not . What it had not done. But that is true of just running for president generally. Very rarely has somebody won the presidency based on a dark, grim vision of what America is. Well, we will see my proposition tested in this election cycle. Maybe the closest is Nixon, who employed the southern strategy and surfed the backlash coming out of both the antiwar movement and the civil-rights movement. But as a general proposition, it is hard to run for president by telling people how terrible things are. Because at some level what the people want to feel is that the person leading them sees the best in them. And so, did the innate optimism that I carried with me both because of my upbringing and maybe just temperament help? I have said before that Deval Patrick could have been the person who broke that particular barrier back in 2008. And it so happened that he had just run for governor and felt committed to finishing up his term. But he has the gifts and I think the persona that would have appealed at that time to the American public. And there are probably some other figures as well who might have pulled it off. We are at home watching the State of the Union and some guy stands up and yells, You lie.

Interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates