Obama says he 'used to get into trouble' for being 'too professorial' while discussing policy matters as president: 'That's not how people think about these issues'
- Obama said he sometimes got into "trouble" for being "too professorial" while in the White House.
- The ex-president said on "Pod Save America" he was sometimes wordy when discussing policy matters.
Former President Barack Obama said on a recent podcast that he sometimes got into "trouble" for being "too professorial" during his days in the White House.
During an episode of "Pod Save America" released on Saturday, the former president said while it was important to explore policy matters, it was critical to do so in a way that would connect with ordinary people.
"Look, I used to get into trouble whenever I got a little too professorial and started ... when I was behind a podium as opposed to when I was in a crowd. There were times where I'd sound like I was giving a bunch of policy gobbledygook. And that's not how people think about these issues," Obama told hosts Jon Favreau, Dan Pfeiffer, Jon Lovett, and Tommy Vietor — all former staffers in his administration.
He continued: "They think about them in terms of, you know, the life I'm leading day to day. How does politics even, how is it relevant to the things that I care most deeply about? My family, my kids, you know, work that gives me satisfaction, having fun. Not being a buzzkill."
After one of the hosts said that Obama's messaging was "a lesson for the Democratic Party," the former president agreed with the sentiment.
"And sometimes Democrats are, right?" he said. "It's like sometimes people just want not to feel as if they are walking on eggshells and they want some acknowledgment that life is messy and that all of us at any given moment can say things the wrong way, you know, make mistakes."
Obama, a former president of the Harvard Law Review and a one-time constitutional law professor at the University of Chicago School of Law, has long had deep roots in academia.
While some observers chided Obama for his lofty rhetoric while in the White House, it was his keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston which catapulted him to national stardom.
At the time, he was the party's nominee for the United States Senate in Illinois.
But four years later, it was Obama himself who became the Democratic presidential nominee.
He went on to win the 2008 election — becoming the first Black president in the country's history — and was reelected in 2012.