Obama Claims He’d Beat Trump If Third Term Allowed, Yet Hillary Got Too Confident? (Opinion)


Barack Obama shared some of his most critical thoughts yet about Donald Trump winning the bid for the next president of the nation and he had a few left over for Hillary Clinton’s loss as well. Obama said in a recent interview that he would have beaten Trump if he had campaigned against him in a third term. That’s if there were such a thing as another term for the office of the president after you have two under your belt.

The president opened up to CNN analyst David Axelrod in this interview for his podcast, “The Axe Files,” which was released Monday. Axelrod was once Obama’s advisor and he considers him a long-time friend. This might explain why the tough questions weren’t asked of Obama. The Washington Post points out how Obama wasn’t asked about “not taking action to prevent the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in Syria.” They also report how these “friendly” type of interviews have become a “hallmark” of Obama’s presidency, citing past interviews with “friends, comedians and YouTube hosts.”

President Obama claims Hillary Clinton’s camp took victory for granted when they shouldn’t have and her election loss is in no way a reflection on his administration. [AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais]

President Obama sees the Trump win differently than a case of people wanting change and then flocking to the voting booths to cast their votes indicating change is needed. If there was another Democratic candidate instead of Hillary in the race, then Trump would not be on his way to the White House next month, which is pretty much the picture Obama is painting. He went further in detail with this picture. The person who would have cinched it for the Democrats is none other than Barack Obama himself, so claims the out-going president.

Hillary’s loss came as the result of her campaign’s ill-fated belief that the victory was all theirs, conveys Obama. He also added how her team was just too over cautious due to this belief, which eventually led to her loss. The president equated Hillary’s camp with a sports team that is winning. He said, “If you think you’re winning, then you have a tendency, just like in sports, maybe to play it safer.” He also said he believes Hillary was a victim of the media, but she “performed wonderfully under really tough circumstances.”

He was adamant when saying Hillary’s loss was in no way a refection of the voter’s disenchantment over the last eight years of his administration. This was not a rejection of his tenure in office, Obama was sure to note. He argued that if Hillary and the Democratic Party only had offered more of what he had offered, they might not be the losing party today.

Obama shared how he admired Hillary Clinton and stressed that she was a victim of attacks that were unfair to the Democratic candidate at the time. Defending both his popularity and what he had originally set out to do for the country, the out-going president said, “I am confident in this vision because I’m confident that if I — if I had run again and articulated it — I think I could’ve mobilized a majority of the American people to rally behind it.”

As Obama gets ready to exit the Oval Office, here is a look at the President and the First Lady dancing at the beginning of their years in the White House, taken on Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2009. [AP Photo/Charles Dharapak]

CNN reported that in Obama’s “exit interview,” President Obama did bring up how people have questioned him about his “hope-and-change” motto. He discussed how some people consider it a fantasy today, especially after Trump has won the election. Branding his vision as one of hope-and-change was done in 2008, but he argues that there was a “shift” in the culture since that time. Obama claims he has talked to people about this today and “even some people who disagreed with me, they would say the vision, the direction that you point towards is the right one.”

While his plans for the future are to follow in George W. Bush’s footsteps when it comes to politics. That would be to not get involved in the Trump presidency with a narration of his daily activities, much like how Bush stepped away when the Obama administration took over.

Besides writing a book, which is already in the works, he plans to make a difference with the younger generation of Democrats. Obama said he plans to “help mobilize and train” them as future Democratic leaders, according to the Washington Post. While he conveys that he will be striving to keep a lower self-profile than he has in the past, he will still speak up when his “core-beliefs are challenged.”

Obama plans on being “quiet for a while.” He explains this statement as “I have to still myself.” He doesn’t plan on being quiet when it comes politics, his quiet is coming from a place within. His game plan is simple, “You have to get back in tune with your center and process what’s happened before you make a bunch of good decisions.”

President Obama doesn’t exit the White House without some heart-felt reminiscing and he’s already had a teary-eyed moment with his senior aides. He refers to leaving this group of senior aides with the same type of feelings you might have if you were in a band that was breaking up. One has to wonder what the name of that band might be for Obama and his top aides?

[Featured Photo: AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster]

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