Politics

Bob Woodward advises Obama to admit he ‘screwed up’

Jeff Poor Media Reporter
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On CBS’s “Face the Nation” Sunday, Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward suggested President Barack Obama take the same tack he took back in 2009 when he withdrew the nomination of former South Dakota Sen. Tom Daschle as the Health and Human Services secretary. Eventually the nomination was withdrawn and Obama had to admit he “screwed up” when it was revealed Daschle had failed to pay $128,000 in taxes on a limousine and driver lent to him.

Woodward said that when you put all of Obama’s current scandals together — IRS, Benghazi and the probe of journalists — and combine it with the public’s distrust in general, the need for Obama to act becomes evident.

“The New York Times this morning was quoting people from the White House saying they would really like [Attorney General Eric Holder] to resign,” Woodward said. “But then, on the other side of it they say, this is all politics. And you have to decide in this case. But it’s all very troubling and you lump all these things — the IRS, Benghazi, and this together — and what you’ve got is a feeling that no one’s coming clean, that we aren’t getting straight talk. And this goes to President Obama. He’s got to find a way to unravel this. We live in an age of distrust — I think it’s more severe now. And he has to find some way to clean this up and say, ‘This is what happened. this is what it means,’ so people will say ‘ah.’ Remember at the beginning of his administration, he got involved — a mistake with Sen. [Tom] Daschle, and Barack Obama as president came out and said, ‘I screwed up.’ If that’s happened, we need to hear it again.”

However later in the segment, Woodward admitted the “politicized environment” present problems in getting the clarity desired.

“We need facts,” Woodward said. “We need evidence, and this is not something that — I mean, in this politicized environment, people who don’t like Obama just jump on it and say, ‘This is the worst we’ve ever had.’ And people who like him say, ‘Oh, no, this is just politics, and this is just nonsense.’ What we need are facts and not political rhetoric on each side because these are serious issues, and I disagree with you that people aren’t tuned into the sense of: ‘Are we getting the truth from the White House and Washington?’”

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