Since last November’s midterm elections, many commentators have suggested that President Barack Obama has shifted to the center and away from his core values for the sake of political expediency, particularly after the deal he made to extend the Bush-era tax cuts late last year. However, that’s a charge Obama denies.
In an interview with Fox News Channel’s Bill O’Reilly prior to Sunday night’s Super Bowl, Obama said he is in the same place politically that he has always been when asked whether the impression that he has moved toward the center was accurate.
“No, here’s what I think is true – over the first two years of my presidency, we had a complete disaster, right?” Obama said. “We had a complete crisis. The financial markets were breaking down. We were slipping into a great depression. We had to take extraordinary steps in order to make sure that the economy was growing again, which it is now growing, making sure that the private sector was creating jobs. It is now our focus is not the battle of the last two years.”
The bottom line – Obama said he believes he is the same guy and explained his focus now was putting American on a path to remain the world’s leading country.
“I’m the same guy,” he said. “And my practical focus, my common sense focus right now is how do we out-innovate, out-educate, out-build, out-compete the rest of the world. How do we create jobs here in the United States of America? How do we make sure that businesses are thriving, but how do we make sure that ordinary Americans can live out the American dream because right now they don’t feel like they are.”
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