Obama On The Late show with Letterman

All right. It's a genuine thrill for all of us and an honor to introduce our guest tonight. Please welcome the 44th president of the United States, Barack Obama, ladies and gentlemen. That's exciting. I'm excited. That's a nice rendition. Hey, thank you, Mr. President. We worked on it all day. It was terrific. Thank you very much. I've been here on the air almost 30 years. Never once had tympanis. Never? Never. This is the first time we've had tympanis. It was very nice. Yeah, it was moving, wasn't it? I was. Are you an elected official, Mr. Letterman? No, I'm certainly not. Thank goodness for that. I respect that. Yeah. I like the cup. It's good, isn't it? Yeah. Nice. A little craft project. How are you? I'm doing well. I'm doing well, Dave. I want you to know, though, that the main reason I'm here, not any of those top ten lists, but I want to see that heart-shaped potato. That's remarkable. Remarkable. This is remarkable. Thank you. Yeah, that's right. What's your name? Mary Apple. Mary? Is your real name Mary Apple? And you carry heart-shaped potatoes with you. Well, thank you so much for sharing. Yeah. A nice gift and a great way to put an end to this nonsense, if you just gave it to the president. Do you mind? Is it for me? Yes, it's all yours. Congratulations. If only the job was this easy, huh? Tell me about, I want to hear about the summer you and your family had. How was the family? I know good, but tell me about the summer. The family is doing wonderfully. You know, because the girls had to transfer halfway in the middle of the school year, they started a new school. Sasha, poor Sasha, she was in second grade, and this new school, she had homework suddenly. So that added a little stress. Kids love the idea of homework until they get homework. That's right. And then they realize it's not all it's cracked up to be. Right. So we decided there wasn't going to be any fancy camps during the summer or anything. They basically just goofed off all summer, which I couldn't do. Others have. You know, I think about your daughters, and I thought about them in particular with regard to the summer vacation and going to the beach up on Martha's Vineyard. What is that experience? Well, it's impossible to know what it's like for them. Right. But what do you think it is like for them to have their father be the president? What does that do to the kid experience? You know, so far, I think it's fine. This is seriously something Michelle and I think about all the time. They're young enough where they don't notice it that much. I mean, they go out with their friends or their mother, their grandma, my mother-in-law, and people don't really give them too much of a fuss. I worry a little bit when they get to be teenagers, right, because I suppose they'll want to go out on dates, and I'll have all these men with guns surrounding them. That may end up... So at that point, they may have a little stress. I heard that we were talking about it this afternoon on this topic, and that there was recently a kind of a weekend, I don't know if it was a slumber party or a birthday party. A bunch of kids went to Camp David. Went out to Camp David. Yeah, and that sounds, other than going to Camp David, that sounds pretty much like everybody's family. They come over. They actually go over to other kids' houses, and the parents get frisked. That happens at my house, too. They don't. You know, the thing that we are happiest about is that the girls just, they are wonderfully normal, happy kids so far, and knock on wood. And I give Michelle all the credit because she just doesn't take a lot of fuss from them. Others are delighted by the experience of your presidency, and I would assume that the kids are, too, right? I mean, they were happy before I was president. I think they're fine now that I am president. And I hope they'll be happy after I'm president. Could you get that potato in the Smithsonian? You know, I think I could. We'll be right back here with President Barack Obama. The Oval Office. I hope that's Sasha. Yes. Otherwise, there's been a breach of security that we did not know about. I have no idea who that is. Oh, how about that? This was... Screening Room. Screening Room 3-D. I'm trying to remember. It was one of the kids' movies. I don't remember. You guys know. Up. Up. It was Up. Thank you. I think that's what it was. How much of the budget went on those 3-D glasses? Now, this is... This picture just screams picnic to me. We're having... We're having a wonderful time. No potato salad. And here we go. This is what we like to see. There you go. That's me and Beau. You and Beau. Look at that. I was looking at your itinerary for the day and the activities and the stops and the visits and considering your day yesterday. It just makes me dizzy. When you wake up on a day like this, is this something you relish or is it something you say, Oh, for heaven's sakes, I've got to go see Letterman? That was unexpected. Seeing that appear on the schedule. That's one of those where, you know, you ask your advisors, Who's responsible for this? Yes, exactly right. And everybody kind of looks down. They pull out their blackberries. But I will say that... Nobody's accountable. When you were here during the campaign, we said when you're elected, please come back and see us. You did. I appreciate you honoring that. And you're going to the... Be at the U.N.? Is it tomorrow? The opening of the U.N.? The opening of the U.N. begins. And we are going to have a lot of activities taking place. World leaders from all around the world come. And I know traffic is bad for New Yorkers, so I apologize in advance for that. And then we have a G20, which is 20 of the largest economies we'll meet in Pittsburgh, to follow up on some meetings that we've had over the course of the year to make sure that all the economies are working in concert to get global growth back on track. And how is the economy? It is improving. We've seen some stabilizing. The financial markets aren't in meltdown. You've actually seen an uptick in investment and even manufacturing, which had been really getting battered, has started to improve. But we are not out of the woods yet. Things are still fragile. Most economists think that we'll start growing this quarter for the first time. But the problem that we've got, the biggest problem that we have right now, is that employment lags. So even when businesses start to invest, they don't start hiring people back right away. And obviously folks are going through incredible hardship because of that loss of employment. That means that the housing market is still weaker. It means that people are still having a tough time paying their bills. When we see that the recession might be ending a bit or modifying, and yet there's still 15 million people out of work in this country, and as you say, they don't hire back immediately, will these people be hired back at their old jobs or will they be hired back to new jobs or a combination of both? Even when the economy is going well, one of the great things about the U.S. economy is it's dynamic. And so people are starting their own businesses. They're moving to better jobs. They're deciding to move to another state in search of new opportunities. So there's always turnover in terms of employment. The problem right now is we lost so many jobs over the last year and a half. I mean, when I came into office, we were losing 700,000 jobs a month. And what ends up happening then is that trying to make up for all those losses over the last year, that's going to take some time. We're going to have to grow at a much faster clip. And the single most important task for my administration and my economic advisors is how do we make sure that we put people back to work? Now, there's some areas like, for example, clean energy that has huge potential. Every building all across the United States probably can use some retrofitting to make it much more energy efficient. Doing that one thing could put hundreds of thousands of people back to work, and that's why we've emphasized so much things like clean energy. We're guilty of that here. We have this enormous air conditioning system that could be replaced somehow. Are you guys cold, by the way? We don't want the produce to go bad. But when you were seeking the office, did you have any idea that somewhere across your desk would be the information that 700,000 jobs a month were disappearing? Not until I'd gotten the job, and then suddenly, yeah, they give you an envelope and say congratulations. No, I mean, I think that nobody realized up until Lehman Brothers collapsed last year that things could crash as badly as they could have. I won't say nobody realized it. There were some who were farsighted and recognized that the bubble was about to pop. But even before the crisis, I think what we knew was that not enough good-paying jobs were being produced, that the economy was growing at a real fast clip for people at the top 1 percent, but the other 99 percent, their wages and incomes were basically flat. And so part of what we have to do is not just recover the economy, but we've also got to put it on a firmer footing where ordinary folks are able to see their incomes improve, that they're able to send their kids to college, that they can make their house payments and their car payments. And that is something that over the last decade you've seen the economy not do. It's been a bubble economy that's good for the very wealthy, but not so good for ordinary people. And the stimulus, you're satisfied at the level, the degree that the stimulation has worked? Well, what we know is that if it hadn't been for the stimulus, you probably would have seen an additional, say, million and a half jobs to 2 million jobs lost, or possibly even worse. So it's definitely worked as a tourniquet to stop the bleeding. Now the next phase is to make sure that as we're rebuilding roads and bridges and hospitals and schools, as we're rebuilding and setting up a smart grid so that our electricity travels better, setting up broadband lines so that the Internet is penetrating more of the country, that all those things that we do now start putting us on the path of long-term sustained growth. And that's going to take some time. The one thing that I try to make sure the American people understand is that it took us years to get into the hole that we're in. We took a bad hit. We lost $5 trillion worth of wealth because of this crisis. We're not going to recover overnight. Unemployment is still going to be a big problem for at least another year. And if we are steady, we stay the course, we do what we need to do, then I'm confident that over time we're going to come back stronger than before. Stronger than before. We'll be right back with the president, ladies and gentlemen. I started noticing when they would have the town hall meetings and there was vitriol and general animosity and anger and shouting and pushing and just unsavory behavior reported. I don't know if it was generally speaking, but it would be reported here and there. And then within the last week, a couple of days ago, Jimmy Carter started talking about this behavior and was speculating that perhaps this unease or poor decorum was because people was rooted in racism. Is he onto something there or is that just something to talk about? Well, first of all, I think it's important to realize that I was... Really? This is true. This is true. How long have you been a black man? And so the American people, I think, gave me this extraordinary honor. And that tells you, I think, a lot about where the country's at. I actually think that what's happened is that whenever a president tries to bring about significant changes, particularly during times of economic unease, then there is a certain segment of the population that gets very riled up. And it happened. FDR was called a socialist and a communist. JFK, there were all kinds of names hurled at him. Ronald Reagan, when he came into office, he was moving in a different direction, and people were sure that he was bringing the country down. And so this is not untypical. One of the things you sign up for in politics is folks yell at you. But I think that what has been missing from the conversation is that the overwhelming majority of people, Republican or Democrat, I think they just want to see some common sense. They want to see some honesty and integrity. In Washington, I think they're turned off by the shouting and the yelling. And they expect more from their public elected officials. And so that's something that I want to— Well, I think you're being eloquent and generous, but I think when people show up to voice their opinion, there is a certain expectation of behavior that— Well, look, I will say that you can have a difference with me about how we should provide health care to the millions of people in America who don't have it. I think suggesting that somehow that's fascist, that you want to help people make sure that they're not going bankrupt when they get sick, I think probably misreads the situation. And I also think that some of the anger is misplaced. What people should really be angry about is the fact that because of the lack of regulation, for example, we ended up having to pony up hundreds of billions of dollars to banks and that if we had had some good regulations in place, we wouldn't have had to do that. The last thing I wanted to sign up for was having to get involved in helping out Wall Street. The last thing I wanted to do was to have to get involved in dealing with the auto industry. The reason that we had to make some of the decisions that we've had over the last several months is because we got in a situation, ironically, that we had too little government, too little regulation, people were taking wild risks, expecting that maybe taxpayers would come back and bail them out after the fact because we couldn't afford the whole financial system to go under. And so people are justifiably, I think, frustrated and angry right now. They've gotten a raw deal, but they need to understand the source of it. It arises because we have not had the kind of serious reforms in Washington that we've needed for a long time. In terms of the health care, what is it I don't understand about this? Why don't you help me through, Dave, what's been puzzling you lately? If I'm not feeling well, I go to the CBS nurse. Everybody should have a CBS nurse, and I'm sure the nurse is a wonderful person. Unfortunately, what we have right now are about at least 30 million Americans who don't have health insurance. So that's a big problem. Heartbreaking stories that I get every day. People are working, but they don't get health insurance on the job. They're small businesses. They're self-employed. They can't afford to go into the private marketplace because typically those folks get charged three times as much as somebody who gets health insurance on the job. So that's one group of folks. Then you've got everybody else, 90 percent, who have health insurance. The vast majority of the audience has health insurance. Except here's the problem. Your premiums last year alone went up 5.5 percent, even though inflation was negative. Everything else actually cost less. Health care went up 5.5 percent. So over the last 10 years, your premiums have gone up 130 percent. Now, a lot of folks don't notice it as much because your employer is picking up a big chunk of the tab, but your employers are noticing it. So what they're starting to do is to drop more people from coverage. They're saying you've got to pay a bigger share of your health care. Insurance companies, meanwhile, are spending all their time trying to figure out how do we drop the people who are sick and might actually need insurance, and let's keep the healthy ones who we're not going to have to pay out for. And so over time, the people who have insurance right now are probably less secure, their insurance is less stable than it's ever been, and employers are getting hammered, and so they're starting to make decisions. We just can't cover people. If we're on the same path that we're on right now, if we don't do anything about it, then five years from now, 10 years from now, far more Americans are not going to have health insurance, far more businesses are going to say I can't afford to deal with my employees, and in the meantime, those government programs like Medicare, Medicaid, the VA, Bill Gates, or Bob Gates, my secretary of defense, he spends a huge amount of the Pentagon budget just on health care. So if we don't bend the curve overall, we're going to go bankrupt. And the idea behind reform is let's give people who don't have health insurance the chance to buy it, and they can form a big pool so they can get a better deal on it. If you do have health insurance, let's set some rules of the road so insurance companies can't drop you because you have a preexisting condition or charge you out-of-pocket expenses that are exorbitant. Let's make sure that we are making the overall system more efficient so that, for example, we've set up electronic medical records. You don't have to fill out forms nine times when you go for one visit to the hospital. And let's do it in a deficit-neutral way. That can be accomplished. We're closer than we've ever been. But, look, people, this has been one of those things that is symbolic of a lot of ideological arguments. There are a lot of folks in Washington who've got a stake in seeing the status quo stay as it is. And the one thing that I've said is the status quo is unacceptable. We're going to bring about change on this. And when it gets done, just like when Social Security got done or when Medicare got done, people are going to realize this was the right way to go. But it's hard to get there. If it had been easy, it would have been done 40 years ago. Your job is more difficult than my job. That's what I've learned here tonight. I know whenever you invoke Great Britain or Canada, people start to shudder because, oh, my God, it's socialized medicine. Oh, my God, it's socialized medicine. And I'm not a socialist, but it don't sound that bad to me. Well, it doesn't sound that bad. It doesn't sound bad to Canadians. They're perfectly happy with their system. But look, each country is different. It's not just the Canadians and the English. They've got their own systems. You've got every other advanced nation provides coverage for all of its folks. Some of them do it through the kind of plan we're proposing, which is we help people buy insurance in the private marketplace. Some folks, like Great Britain, they actually control the entire system. Some folks, like the Canadians, they basically run it like a Medicare for all system so that government pays, but it's still private doctors and hospitals. So there are a whole bunch of different ways you can still have millions of people, hardworking folks, who, when they get sick, they go to the emergency room or they just don't go to the doctor. And if their child gets sick, they are looking at losing their home or losing their business because they can't afford it. It baffles the mind to other countries. And when I talk to other world leaders who are paying attention to this argument and they hear some of this stuff, and these are, in some cases, conservative leaders. They're heads of center-right governments. And they don't understand why it is that Americans would not want to set up a system that would save them money over time, would work better, would make people healthier. And I think the vast majority of Americans, they want to see change. But look, let's face it, they're a little scared about the devil they don't know. And there's an awful lot of misinformation out there that gets floated around, and that's what we have to fight through. That's why I end up having to be on The Dave Letterman Show, too. That's right. But I tell you, the one idea I'd like to see right away are these death panels. If we could get them in place immediately, we'll be right back with President Barack Obama. So men and women, American troops coming out of Iraq after a long, difficult struggle. And now people suggesting more and more American men and women going to Afghanistan. What is that? Well, first of all, I think that our troops are performing at an extraordinary level in both Afghanistan and Iraq. And Iraq, we are on pace to draw down our troops so that by the end of 2011, we will have our combat troops out of Iraq. And that is an extraordinary topic. And look, Iraq will not be perfect, but thanks to the sacrifices of those who fought, the Iraqis will have an opportunity to create the kind of functioning democracy that I think can end up being a real positive in the region. Now, Afghanistan is a real difficult situation. Here's what we know. The folks who killed 3,000 Americans, they were based in Afghanistan. They've been driven into the foothills and the mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan. But they're still there, and they're still plotting, and they're still training folks, and they're trying to penetrate U.S. defenses. And although they're weakened from where they were in 2001, they're still there. My central objective is making sure that we take those folks out, that they cannot cause harm to the United States. And so the question is, how best do we do that? Unfortunately, over the last eight years, or last seven years, seven and a half years, after we went in, in Afghanistan, our strategy drifted, and we didn't have a clear sense of what it was that we were trying to accomplish. And so understandably, the country is weary of the war. The Afghan people are frustrated that they haven't seen more concrete improvements in their own lives. And what I'm trying to do at this point is to make sure that both on the military front, on the diplomatic front, on the civilian front, training Afghan military and police, that on all these elements that we've got a coherent strategy that can work, because the most important duty I've got is before I send some young man and woman in uniform over there, and I'm answerable to their parents, that if they don't come back, I've got to write a letter to them saying that their child has sacrificed on behalf of America. Before I make those decisions, I've got to make sure that the policy in place is worthy of their sacrifice. And that's something that we're going to take. That's something that we're going to work through systematically in the coming weeks and months. We're not going to make a decision about any further troop deployments until we know what exactly is our strategy, what are the tactics, how would troops be used. Can we justify taking those steps? And I'm going to be asking some very hard questions. It's a pointless exercise, but if the same effort had been applied eight years ago in Afghanistan that is being considered now, I think we would have been better off. And for our gallant effort and struggle in Iraq, did that activity make the world safer from terrorism, or was that a wholly independent exercise? I think because Saddam Hussein is not there, that's a good thing. He was somebody who certainly had aspirations to cause a lot of trouble. I think that given the enormous stakes that we had in Afghanistan, we should have finished the job there. That's my strong opinion. I've voiced it before, but as you said, it doesn't make much sense at this point for us to look backwards. Moving forward, we're not going to have easy decisions. And I don't want Americans to be under illusions that we will. There are those who argue that now is the time to completely pull out of Afghanistan. There are coherent arguments for that, but there are enormous risks involved in that. There are those who say let's double down and put more troops in Afghanistan. There are good arguments for that, but also enormous risks. So one of the things that I discovered about being president is that if there was an easy answer, then somebody would have solved it and it wouldn't get to your desk. And the only things that arrive on my desk are the things that basically nobody could figure out a perfect solution to, and then we've just got to apply good judgment and try to make the best decisions we can. But what we can't lose sight of is the fact that the reason we went there in the first place and the number one threat that we continue to face is that you've got a group of extremists who are willing to slaughter innocents and are targeting this country. And my job as commander in chief is to make sure that they are destroyed, their networks are dismantled, and that they can't pose a threat to the United States of the sort that we saw here in New York. That's my number one job. We'll be right back with the president, ladies and gentlemen. Ladies and gentlemen, have a good day at the United Nations tomorrow and a good day in Pittsburgh. Please give my best to your family. Thank you for everything. I can't tell you how satisfying it is to watch you work. And remember, when things get tough, as things tend to do going forward, you, sir, are in possession of a heart-shaped potato. I'm very happy about it. President Obama, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much. Good night, everybody.