Barack Obama Regrets Kids on TV and Much More.

Barack Obama says that he got “carried away in the moment” for allowing Access Hollywood reporter Maria Menounos to interview his young daughters (ages 10 and 7) on television. The program is usually known for reports on Hollywood sleaze, adulterer celebrities, and other decadence rather than presidential candidates. He now says that he had poor judgment with his children and regrets the decision.

Obama Regrets Kids
Obama’s Regrets




Many analysts are questioning Obama’s veracity for this apology (see here and here), because the event was planned for days. He did not find himself suddenly in front of the cameras, but carefully planned the interview just like all campaigns do. Then he apologized immediately before anyone complained which also felt orchestrated.

Nobody knows for sure why Obama did it so let us give him the benefit of the doubt. Barack Obama simply made a mistake. It seems to me the real campaign issue is that Obama is suddenly admitting to a lot of poor judgments.

Luke Boggs has done a good job of chronicling several of Obama’s recent regrets over at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He makes the interesting point that there over 1,000,000 search engine results for “Obama regrets.”

We all know the big ones.

Obama first expressed regret for Jeremiah Wright’s controversial comments, and then expressed regrets for his 20-year affiliation with the church.

Earlier in the campaign Obama regretted calling rural Americans “bitter” for “clinging to guns and religion.” Those controversial comments came in progressive San Francisco when Obama thought he was out of the camera’’s eye.

At the same time, Obama said that he regretted intervening to save Teri Schiavo, the brain-dead woman in Florida who captured the public attention in 2005. In a case of remarkable political theater (and I think an extraordinarily embarrassing moment in our history) an emergency session of Congress was held on the woman’s behalf. Obama voted for Congress to override the constitutional processes in the State of Florida.

Still earlier he regretted saying that the lives of American military were “wasted” away in Iraq. This inflammatory comment was apparently part of Obama’s ultimately successful strategy of attacking Hillary Clinton from her left flank.

The biggest regret is that Obama was closely tied to Tony Rezko, the felon who was convicted for money laundering, political bribery, and organized crime in Chicago. Obama later “regretted” his association when it was discovered. He had purchased property in a below-market loan on the same day Rezko purchased the vacant lot next door. Neighbors report that Obama fenced in both properties when he had only purchased one, the details of which are still entangling. When the arrangement was discovered by local reporters, Obama paid Rezko for a part of the property he was using. He still lives there and his gardener may still be mowing two lawns. Obama regrets the Rezko deal, which was inarguably poor judgment since Rezko was already indicted.

The many Obama regrets are giving voters reason to pause. He has made judgment the cornerstone of his campaign rather than experience for obvious reasons. He successfully banked that anti-war voters in his party would value his singular vote against the Iraq War before he voted to fund it. That is all the “judgment” he needed and it worked.

But can judgment on only one issue be enough to predict good judgment in the Oval Office, while Obama regrets all of the other things? It is hard to say at this point in the campaign but admitting poor judgment on so many issues will be used against him before the election runs its course.


Obama Regrets Interview