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Given the economic situation, the picture you've painted of '09, are there any taxes that can be raised in this environment?
Well, I have said that I will be providing a net tax cut. Ninety-five percent of working Americans will be getting a tax cut. In part to pay for the tax cut for people who desperately need it, I've proposed that people who are making more than a quarter-million dollars a year lose the tax cuts they received from George [W.] Bush and that we go back to the rates they had in the 1990s. And that is a pledge I intend to keep.
But is that by letting them expire in '10 or by repealing them in '09?
Well, one way or another, they are going to lose those tax breaks under my Administration. My economic team is reviewing right now what the best option is.
Considering the economic hole we're in, and particularly the joblessness crisis right now, does that move health care up or down on the agenda in terms of real structural reform of providing health care?
I think it keeps it right where it is, which is one of my top three domestic priorities. How we sequence a movement toward affordable, accessible health care may vary because of the current economic situation.
What is it about your executive style that makes you good at standing up to big organizations to meet unprecedented challenges — whether it's the way you ran your campaign or now — so quickly?
I don't think there's some magic trick here. I think I've got a good nose for talent, so I hire really good people. And I've got a pretty healthy ego, so I'm not scared of hiring
the smartest people, even when they're smarter than me. And I have a low tolerance of nonsense and turf battles and game-playing, and I send that message very clearly. And so over time, I think, people start trusting each other, and they stay focused on mission, as opposed to personal ambition or grievance. If you've got really smart people who are all focused on the same mission, then usually you can get some things done.
Do you ever get angry, and if you do, how would we know it?
If you want to tail me and [spokesman Robert] Gibbs for a few days, I could tell you, we've had it out a couple times. You know, my staff knows when I get angry. I'm not a shouter. I find that what was always effective with me as a kid, and Michelle and I find it effective with our kids, is just making people feel really guilty. Like "Boy, I am disappointed in you. I expected so much more." And I think people generally want to do the right thing, and if you're clear to them about what that right thing is, and if they see you doing the right thing, then that gives you some leverage. Hollering at people isn't usually that effective. Now, there are exceptions. There are times where guilt doesn't work, and then you have to use fear.
Now for a deeply personal question, which you may not feel comfortable answering. Did your grandmother die confident that you were going to be President?
You know, I don't know. But I know she voted for me. The last week of her life, she was in and out of consciousness. But I'd say three weeks before the election — or was it two weeks? About two weeks before the election, I think at that point, you know, the signs were that I might pull this off. (See pictures of Barack Obama's family tree.)
She was incredulous, I think, until the very end. I mentioned this in another interview. My grandmother would not have believed that this was possible. Not because of the race issues but because she was just a very Midwestern, steady person who generally was skeptical of these kinds of things and would have preferred I'd never gone into politics and done something sensible like try to become a judge or something after law school. My mother, on the other hand, I think would've never had a doubt because she was absolutely convinced that her son and her daughter were perfect. So it's a reflection more on their personalities.
But you think about my grandmother's life. I mean, here's a woman who was born in, let's see, 1912 or '22 — I've got to do my math — she was 86, so '22, rather. She really grew up in the Depression, in a small town in Kansas, and never got a college degree. Somehow found herself in Hawaii. Somehow found her daughter marrying an African guy. Raised this mixed kid who got in all kinds of trouble during his teenage years. You know, the likelihood of that little boy ending up President of the United States was pretty low.
So in some ways her life tracks this American — this remarkable American journey, where all of these different forces and cultures can come together and the possibility of upward mobility and opportunity for successive generations is a reality. Maybe not as much as we'd like it to be. Maybe not as fast as we'd like it to be. But it's there nonetheless.
All right?
See pictures of the Civil Rights movement from Emmett Till to Barack Obama.