Are you gonna filibuster me
or, like-- -'Cause I don't have all the
time. -Do you want me to be... -You're very good at, like...
-So is this, like, a roundabout way of saying
you just want me to give short, uh,
pithy answers? -No, I don't want
short questions. -You want me -to speed up? You want me
to talk faster? -No, no, no. -No, please, Mr. President...
-I will not-- I will not purposely filibuster, but sometimes
I will have a pause -as I'm formulating my thoughts,
-(laughs) as you well know. -Okay. -Michelle-Michelle
has been speeding up my auto... uh, my-my audiobook. So, you know,
I guess you can press a button -so it plays, like, 1.5 times.
-Yeah, yeah. You can do, like, -1.25 or 1.5. Yeah.
-Yeah. Which... -Yeah, you are a 1.5 guy. You're
definitely a 1.5 guy. -Yeah. (chuckles) I was
a little offended by that, but that's okay.
That's fine. (laughs) It doesn't-- it doesn't
communicate the depth of feeling with which I'm doing
the reading. But it's okay. How do you like
being referred to, like, just as a human being? Do you like "Mr. President"? People call me Barack, but then sometimes, some folks
feel awkward doing it. Obviously, my...
that's what my friends call me. You... So, I-I consider you a friend, but
you may feel, you know, so... No, no, no, the people...
the people will feel like... They...
Like, even Africans, will... They'll write me letters saying,
"How dare you -refer to..."
-This is my point. -So I don't want
to get you in trouble. -Yeah. -So you can say,
"Mr. President." -I... -That makes sense.
-You can call me POTUS. My favorite one was "Obizal." -That was my favorite.
-Please call me that. (Noah laughs) Mr. President, welcome to The
Daily Social Distancing Show. -I am very happy to be here
with you. -You're out there promoting a brand-new book,
A Promised Land, a 700-page book,
if I may add. I love reading your stuff--
don't get me wrong-- but, like,
I would have liked 350, 350. Why 700 pages? You know, I would have... I would have broken it up
even more, but, uh, you know, the...
the publishers thought that breaking it up into two volumes
would be about right. And... Look, the goal of the book was
to give people a sense of what it's like
to be in the White House. -Right.
-Uh, as a normal person, finding themselves
in extraordinary circumstances. And I... and I think
part of the goal, particularly for young people-- uh, I wanted them
to-to get a sense that, you know, not everybody's
gonna end up being president. But if you decide that
your voice makes a difference, if you decide
that you can have an impact, then through the ups and downs, you will end up having some pretty
extraordinary experiences. And-and I want... I wanted
to be an encouragement, for people to say, "Ah, you
know, the guy, yeah, he's okay, "but he's-he's not a...
so special, "and look
what he ended up doing. Maybe I can do something...
uh, something, as well." It feels like
this book is Barack Obama convincing Barack Obama
to remain optimistic. -And what I mean by...
-Yeah. "convincing Barack Obama," I think of, like,
a young Barack Obama. I think of a fledgling
Barack Obama. -Not trying to emulate you
per se... -That's right. ...but rather, anyone
who's trying to make a change in the world or their world. -That's what... that's what
it feels like. -Yeah. If you... if you are writing
to young people to be optimistic in the book, what are some
of the frustrations that you understand
on their side that may hinder that optimism?
You know? Because if a young person says,
"Yeah, but this system "right now is crumbling
more and more," how-how do you... how do you
maintain that optimism? Or do you think
there has to be a point where they go, "I'm not
optimistic. I'm just fighting to break what it is
to create something new"? Part of the reason
that it's 700 pages long is because by reading the book,
they'll see, man, there are a lot of
structural problems or barriers -in making this place better.
-Right. We're-we're learning right now
in vivid... uh... a vivid example
of the fact that our democracy is not, uh, the way we would
imagine it to be, right? There are all kinds
of elements to it where the most votes
don't necessarily translate into, uh,
the equivalent amount of power. Uh, very popular proposals
can whither on the vine -because of a filibuster
in the Senate. -Mm-hmm. And-and so, I don't try
to gloss those over. You know, the Paris Accord
did not solve climate change, but it created
the first global framework, whereby all countries agreed we
have to do something about this, -and here's a mechanism
to do it. -Right. You can still be terrified about the pace at which
we are burning up the planet, and yet, think,
that was a worthwhile endeavor, because it gives us at least
the opportunity maybe three, four, five years down the
road to keep building on that. So, that is the kind
of mentality I want young people to have. Um, a certain impatience,
a certain frustration, a certain anger
about the status quo. There are times now where,
you know, you have younger activists
criticizing me for... "Obama, why didn't you take care
of this or that or the other?" And... I... I welcome them feeling
frustrated and impatient... -Mm-hmm. -...because that's how
I was before I got started. And then they'll get
their own knocks on the head, and, uh, you know, uh, some stuff won't work out
exactly the way they want. But the impulse... is-is the one
that I want to encourage. Because it's-it's
as a consequence of that-that constant striving and imagining something better that things don't get exactly as
we want it, but they get better. You're a very serious person
because, I mean, you're a president
of the United States, but at the same time,
you're a lot more fun than a lot of people think,
you know? I-I'm constantly trying
to explain to people I'm a funny guy, but...
but, I don't know. They... But you real...
but you really are. You really, really are.
And what I liked in the book is, there are moments
where there's just, like, a roasting of people
or life. Like the G20.
I've never... I've never heard a world leader describe the G20
the way you do in the book. The high school of it all. I wondered on a personal level, have you maintained connections
with those world leaders? As, like... for, like...
Do you...? Do you send Angela Merkel memes?
Do you...? Like, Who are you still close
with, just as a human being? You know, I don't send
Angela Merkel memes, but I talk to her sometimes. Sometimes, you know,
she'll give me a call, I'll give her a call,
and, uh, we'll trade notes. Um, you know, there are
a hand full of folks, uh, who, uh, you've been in the foxhole with. -Right? I...
-Right. You've-you've done some good,
important work. Um, some of them are still
in power, so I don't want to mention
that, you know... uh, that I'm giving them a call
because, you know, who knows? That might give 'em...
get 'em in trouble. You mentioned somebody
like an Angela Merkel. Look, uh, you know,
the stance she took in Europe relative to immigration and the enormous political cost
she paid for that. And yet, there was something
inside her that said, "Look, I'm not going
to, uh, simply abandon, uh, a million people
who are in desperate need." You know, you see that
in somebody, uh, and-and you say, "I..." It-it... it encourages you that for all the, uh, cruelty and-and venality and corruption
around the world, there are a lot of good people
doing good work. And some of them actually rise to significant positions
of power, and, uh, uh, in that sense, democracy can work
the way it's supposed to if, you know,
we have a-a vigilant citizenry, and-and, uh,
that's not always the case. You started
leadership programs, not just in South Africa,
but all over the world. The Obama Foundation has
set about on a journey to inspire young people
to grow up to become leaders. Growing up in South Africa,
I was taught about the different levels of
what a struggle is going to be. You know, the freedom fighters may not necessarily be
the best politicians. The best politicians may not
necessarily be the best leaders. -Right. -The best activists may
not be the best organizers, -and so on and so forth.
-Right. Everyone has a role to play -in trying to get
to a certain place. -Right. And so, I wonder,
when you set up these... you know, this...
this leadership academy that's-that's all over
the globe, you know, you're clearly trying to
create mini Obamas everywhere, um, which is probably like
a fever dream of the right. But what you...
what you're trying to do is create something specific. And I would like
to know what that is. What do you...
what do you believe a leader is? Not just somebody
who's in power, but a leader? The program we did in, uh,
uh, Johannesburg. We gathered up
200 young leaders from 50 countries
on the continent of Africa. And it was as varied... You had young women who had
started rural health clinics. -Yeah.
-You had MPs, uh, you know, who-who had taken a more
conventional political route. Uh, you had entrepreneurs. The thing they all in common,
though, was this... this sense not only
that the world could be better and that they had a role
to play in it, but also, the belief that they
couldn't do it by themselves, and that they had to,
in some ways, unlock the potential
and power of other people. A speech I gave in Johannesburg
in conjunction with that-- it was for the anniversary
of Mandela's 100th anniversary-- um, where I-I contrasted that... sort of Democratic
inclusive leadership to the strongman leadership,
that in some ways, we've seen ascendant
in certain parts of the world, um, in some ways has... was ascendant, uh,
here in the United States. Um, and-and those are
two different stories of what it means
to be a leader and-and power. And that conflict, that battle between a more
Democratic, inclusive vision, and one that's top-down,
dominant-subordinate, uh, yeah, that's a contest
that's taking place here in the United States
and around the world. And, uh,
it's not gonna be finished just because the election's over
and Donald Trump was defeated, because you see examples of this
in the Philippines, in Hungary, uh, in-in a variety
of countries, uh, in Africa and Asia. And-and so that-that contest
is gonna continue. What I find fascinating
about the conversation that a lot of Americans
are having now-- and you-you talk about this
in the book as well-- is how America's influence
in the world has diminished over the past few years. You know, how countries around
the world have no longer said: "What is America doing?
We'll work with them." It's been more like: "No, guys,
we can't wait for America. We're doing our own thing." But I wonder,
as somebody who has grown up in other parts of the world,
as someone who has family in other parts of the world,
is there an argument that maybe that's a good thing that world
doesn't follow America anymore? Or what-what would the... what would the inverse
of that argument be? Like, should the world
follow America? Or is it time for the world
to start doing its own thing and America to be less
the world police? I think... it is a good thing
that other countries catch up and have their own capabilities
and their own agency. -Yeah.
-That's not something that I think America
should fear. My argument would be that, uh, even in a more multipolar world, where you don't have
just one big power, but you have other countries
who are coming into their own. Uh, the principles that America
articulated at its best, about rule of law, human rights, uh, freedom of speech,
democracy, those values,
at least I choose to believe are not exclusively American. -Yeah. -You as somebody
who lived in South Africa, know the-the... the play that
in other countries sometimes you hear where
somebody who's doing something entirely for power,
uh, and-and money and influence will say-- if they're criticized
they'll say, "Ah, you know, "you've been just influenced
by Western thinking. That's colonial thinking." No, no, no, no. You are stealing
from your people. Don't... And when we criticize you,
don't-don't claim that somehow, uh... this is
some American hegemony being asserted against you. We're calling you on the fact
that you're a thief. Uh... I think it's important for us
to-to-to... to recognize that
for all its failings, the-the values that America
has often articulated on the world stage
have been ones that I would still believe in and that a lot of people
took comfort from. And when we
are not asserting them, oftentimes they don't, uh... they don't play out
on the world stage. I sometimes wondered if you ever
grappled with the difficulty of the paradox
that America was creating in what it was trying to do
in the world and then what its actions were
sometimes creating in the world. You know? I mean, I think
about that in the Middle East. You know, wars that have been
started under false pretenses. People who have been killed who
had nothing to do... You know? And so I wonder, as someone
who had to make decisions, someone who was
in that leadership position, do you sometimes grapple
with how America did or did not help itself
in how it acted with the world? 'Cause in the world--
like, I'll tell you as an international person--
we would oftentimes go like, "Man, yes, America's great and
it's doing wonderful things," but then you'd be like,
"But also, man, "sometimes they
just break the rules, and, uh, no one can say anything
about it." Absolutely. And I record
examples in the book of where I'm grappling
with this, right? And one of
the interesting challenges of... being President
of the United States-- but I think head of government
or state in any country-- is, uh,
you inherit a legacy, right? So... if I come in as president and...
I-I can't undo the Iraq War, the decision to go into Iraq. -Right.
-Now, I-I can... manage as best I can how we can wind down that war, mitigate some of the damage
that's been done, but I can't reverse it. Did you ever... did you
ever envy, though, how, like, Trump just came in and
basically broke shit, though? 'Cause, I mean, he didn't care. Uh... no, I didn't envy it,
because I do care. And I... and I... I-I do not think
that is an option, to-to simply pretend that... that the legacy of problems
or issues that you inherit are somehow things
you can just brush aside. Um, so the answer is yes. I... I would struggle with the fact
that any action I took, particularly when
you're talking about, um... -you know, counterterrorism.
-Right. That's probably the area
where I wrestled with this most. Because my obligation,
first and foremost, in the United States, was to make sure
that people didn't get hurt. Uh, that's sort of
the bare minimum that you expect out of a nation-state
that you're living in, is that you can defend
against harm. Because you're dealing
with non-state actors, that meant that
by the time I took office you had networks that
were embedded in societies, uh, not necessarily supported
by those societies, but they're there, and they are
plotting and they're planning. And that wasn't made up. Uh, and there were organizations
that, if they could blow up the New York subway system,
they would. Uh, if they could get their
hands on a biological weapon, they would use it. You then are wrestling with:
how do I protect... the American people
from those actors... but do it in a way that is
morally and ethically justified? -Right.
-Uh, and war is madness. Kinetic action of any sort,
military action of any sort that results
in death and destruction, at a certain level is not the thing
I would want humanity to do. And what happens to people
is tragic. It is not, uh, it is not
something you gloss over. What-what... what it does
to our soldiers and our troops, you know,
as I talk about in the book. Uh, it's not just the harm that
our young men and women suffer, that I would witness
in Walter Reed, but it's also, uh,
how it changes them internally when they have engaged
in violence, -even if necessary and justified
against others. -Right. So, uh, the best
I could come up with was... to never, uh, glorify it, to never pretend
like it isn't a dilemma. And so those kinds of,
um, questions, I think are ones that, uh... not only should America leaders
have to grapple with, but I think the American people
have to be aware. And sometimes the media
does not do a very good job. It's a very binary... You know, the Iraq War, it's glorious
for the first year and a half, -and then suddenly it's not.
-Yes. Yes. And we're shocked that
us invading another country might turn out to be messy. Hopefully that's not a lesson
we have to repeatedly relearn. 2020 was a year for many
of racial reckoning. You know? It was the year
when people of all ages took to the streets,
black and white alike, and said: "We need to change "the way the police deal
with people in this country, predominantly
black people in this country." It was an interesting time,
as well, because, I mean, your presidency--
as you know better than anyone-- people thought:
"Well, that is it. "We're now
in a post-racial utopia. "Barack Obama's
in the White House. "We have half black, half white,
all black, good times. Let's have a good one."
And then people saw that there was still a lot
of work to be done. Let's talk a little bit about... the movement as you see it. The problem I have with
headlines sometimes is, like, people take things
out of context, et cetera. But... some activists
criticize you for saying they've got to be careful
of snappy slogans. You know,
like "Defund the Police," because it loses people. But I-I-I wonder,
do you think that the slogan is of... is the thing that
makes people for against you, or do you think people are just
gonna be for or against you, and then the slogan
doesn't really mean as much? And what I mean by that is, like, Donald Trump's
"Make America Great Again," it's not a...
it's not a very divisive slogan if you look at it
on the face of it. It's a great slogan--
why would anyone not want to make America great again? But the subtext said
something else. When you're thinking of that, as someone who's great
at slogans, by the way-=- I mean, "Yes We Can."
It's snappy. It worked. Although, as I said,
uh, in the book, I actually thought it was corny. I didn't...
I didn't like it that much... when, uh, when my team
came up with it. Um, and then they went
to ask Michelle, and Michelle said,
"No, it's not corny, it's fine." So clearly she had
a better political brain than I did on this. Hey, I... I'm glad
you actually brought this up, because... you know,
what's been fascinating while I've been
on this book tour is, you know, people have asked
me what's my source of optimism, and uniformly
what I have said is-- nothing made me more optimistic
during a very difficult year than the activism that we saw in the wake
of George Floyd's murder, and Black Lives Matter. And I have consistently believed that, uh, their courage, uh, activism, media savvy, uh, strategic resolve, uh, far exceeds anything that I could have done
at-at their age and, I-I think,
has shifted the conversation in ways that, uh, I-I would not even have imagined
a couple of years ago. So, throughout th-this, uh, slew of-of compliments, I then said, "Well, what do you think
about the particular slogan 'defund the police'?" And I said,
"Well, that particular slogan, "I think the concern is that there may be potential
allies out there that you lose." And the issue always is, uh, how do you... get, uh, enough people to support your cause that it... you can actually
institutionalize it and translate it into laws, -structures and so forth?
-Right, yeah. There were two or three writers
who I admire who wrote,
"Obama's making it a mission to chastise Black Lives Matter." And you go,
"What? Hold on a second. "I-I just spent "the-the whole summer
complimenting them. What are you talking about?" The reason, uh,
it caught attention, I suspect, is there were some
in the Democratic party who suggested the reason
we didn't do better in, uh,
the congressional elections -this time around was because
of this phrase. -Yes. Yes. -Right.
-And I think that people assumed that somehow
I was making an argument that that's why we didn't get, you know, uh, a bigger Democratic majority. That actually was not
the point I was making. I was making
a very particular point around if we, in fact,
want to translate the-the-the... the very legitimate belief that how we do policing
needs to change and that if there is,
for example, uh, a homeless guy ranting and railing
in the middle of the street, sending a-a... a mental health worker rather than an armed,
untrained police officer to deal with that person might be a better outcome
for all of us -and make us safer.
-Right. Right? That if we describe that to not just white folks but, let's say, Michelle's mom, that makes sense to them. But if we say
"defund the police," not just white folks
but Michelle's mom might say, "If I'm getting robbed,
who am I gonna call, and is somebody gonna show up?" -Right?
-Right. So, the issue here becomes, you know, at any given time, how are we translating and using language not to make people
more "comfortable," right? Because that's
always a strain and... Historically, right? The concern in these debates
is also... is often, uh, oh, are we just trying
to make white people comfortable rather than speaking truth
to power, right? That's the framework we tend
to think about these things. -Right. Yeah. -The issue, to me,
is not making them comfortable. It is can we be precise
with our language enough that people
who might be persuaded around that particular issue
to make a particular change that gets a particular result
that we want... What's the best way
for us to describe that? -And... -So,
what you're basically saying is we should workshop all
of our slogans with Michelle. -(laughs)
-That's what I hear you saying. That probably would be wise. Uh, i-it would...
it would probably work. But I want to go back
to something you said earlier which I think
is-is really important. Um, and I... and I-I said this in the wake
of-of some of this criticism. Uh, I said, "Look, "part of this is also everybody has different roles
to play." An activist, a movement leader is-is gonna provide
a prophetic voice and speak certain truths that somebody who is going to be elected
into office will not be able to say. I-I reread James Baldwin's
The Fire Next Time this summer. How is it that something
written 50 years ago, -55 years ago...
-Right. Yeah. Yeah. ...applies directly today,
right? Despite
everything that's happened. To-to me, that is as searing
and as honest a-a portrayal of the-the... the gaping wound
of race in America. But, of course, James Baldwin can't be elected to the U.S. Senate or unlikely that he would want
to be the mayor of a city who's responsible
for figuring out, "How do I deal
with the police union?" Right?
That's somebody else's role. And-and all these roles
are important. Uh, and, so, you know... Why do you think--
if I may interrupt-- why do you think, though,
that Republicans or right-wingers now do that,
though? That's something that I-I've
struggled to-to understand. You see now,
even in this election, I mean, some of the Republicans
who were running were QAnon supporters, and they were going,
"We're running, and this is what..."
And some of them were winning. Some of them are so extreme,
and they're winning. And, so, I sometimes wonder if
there's this... there's this... Is it just a political thing
in America where if you're... if you're
in the Republican party, you can be completely bombastic
in what you believe in, and then as a Democrat,
you're trying to toe the line between centrist
and-and left-leaning? -Or...
-No. Well, because I think, in fact, uh,
the Republican party is the minority party
in this country. The only reason that it doesn't look like
they're the minority party is because of structures
like the U.S. Senate, uh, and the electoral college that don't render them
the majority party. So, they have
certain built-in advantages around power given
their population distribution and how, uh,
our government works. But the truth of the matter is
is that 60% of the people are-are occupying
what I would consider a more reality-based,
uh, universe, and those are the... those are the constituents
we're speaking to. And that is
a more diverse group. You know,
I describe, uh, in the book the first time I go to the, uh, to the Republican House caucus
to speak to them. And I think there was an Asian guy or gal and maybe a couple of Hispanics, um, and that was it. Uh, I... It is much more homogeneous, which means that, yes,
they have to do less work, but it also, uh, means that they're... they can talk to themselves and, as a consequence of the way our, uh, democracy, our republic is structured, they don't have to appeal
to as broad of a base. Um, that's not fair. But, you know,
I, at least, would prefer not having the progressives
model ourselves out of... uh, or-or model ourselves on-on, uh,
the current Republican party. I... That doesn't feel like
a good strategy to me, uh, to get the outcomes
that we want. Let's talk a little bit about...
Let's loosen things up. Uh, let's unbutton
one of those, uh, one of those buttons
on the shirt there. (laughs) Um, as someone
who I consider to be one of the best deliverers of jokes and, uh, and roasts, are you gonna be
more careful going forward about who you roast? And I say this because
you roasted Donald Trump. He ran for president. You roasted Kanye West.
He ran for president. So, I don't know
if you've noticed, but you have an ability
to inspire people to run for the highest office
in the land with some of the jokes
that you tell about them. Well, I-I should... I should roast people, uh, people I admire more. -I-I'll start roasting you, man.
-(laughing) Who knows? Although,
you weren't born here, so... You know. But, look, I was able
to get away with it, apparently. I was born in Hawaii.
I'll be fine. (laughing) -Who knows?
-Um, before I let you go, I wanted to know one last thing,
and that is being president
of the United States is arguably the toughest job
in the world. When you transition
back to personal life, I-I wonder what that is like. Because, unlike you,
I don't have that power. I've never been able to, like,
just change a thing in the world or do something about it. But now, in many ways,
you are like me in that you see the thing
on the TV, and then you get angry or sad, but you cannot really do
anything about it. And, so, I wonder, as-as
former President Barack Obama, have you transitioned
into that completely? Or do you find different ways to try to fix the problems
that you see in the world? Well, first of all,
I'm not anything like you. -Uh, I still have a lot more
influence and clout. -(laughing) So, let's just be clear. Come on, man. Let's try to keep things
in perspective. I was hoping you-- I was hoping
you'd just let that one slide. I was hoping you'd just be like,
"Yeah, you know, Trevor, -in many ways..."
-Look... (stammers) The truth is that, um... I-I did not have
those kinds of withdraws. And I know that there-there
are people who, uh, I know who've had them
when they leave public life. Uh, and-and very visibly,
you know? They're... they want
to get back on stage. Yeah. Michelle and I,
that's something we share. Um, we feel good
about the work we did. We don't feel anxiety about not
being the center of attention. Um, we get frustrated
like I think citizens around the world and here
in the country do, uh, when we see
something unjust or-or, uh, unfair and, yes, the goal
I think for us is to find new ways, uh, to... have that same impact. Understanding that we'll never
have the exact same impact -as you have in the Oval Office.
-Yeah, of course. But, you know, a lot of
the work around the foundation is... You know, you said create
a lot of Obamas. I'm not sure that's the goal. But to, you know,
if-if ten years, 20 years down the road,
there are 1,000, 10,000, 100,000 young people who are now moving
into positions of authority and power, and in some ways, uh, have been shaped by our
example in a positive way, you know, that-that, uh, that's a legacy that may exceed
anything that we did, uh, you know, while we were
in-in, uh, in-in our formal positions. And-and, uh,
that feels pretty good. Well, I could take
to you for hours, but luckily I have
a 700-page book to answer the rest of my questions. Um, thank you for joining me. Thank you for taking
the time, um... and, uh, yeah. -Thank you for being you,
Mr., Mr. President. -Hey. Aka O-bizzle. Thank you for joining me on The
Daily Social Distancing Show. I enjoyed it, man.
We'll do it again. -Volume 2.
