{UAH} President Obama’s last press conference of the year was his best press conference of the year - The Washington Post
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President Obama's last press conference of the year was his best press conference of the year
U.S. President Barack Obama departs at the conclusion of his end of the year press conference in the briefing room of the White House in Washington, December 19, 2014. REUTERS/Larry Downing
President Obama delivered a tour-de-force press conference on Friday,ending an extremely difficult year for his administration and his party on a strong note and giving his supporters hope that the final two years of his term in office won't be spent in lame duckery.
Obama took questions on topics as far ranging as the North Korea hacking of Sony (he said the company had made a mistake in canceling its plan to release "The Interview" on Christmas Day), the recently-announced move to normalize relations with Cuba and race in America. He even snuck in an Ebola mention.
Throughout the nearly-hour-long press conference, Obama was in command -- displaying little of the disconnectedness and listlessness that had crept into many of his public pronouncements over the past year. (He was also considerably more concise in his answers than he often has been.) He went off script -- to great effect -- several times, cracked a few jokes and, generally, appeared entirely comfortable in his own skin.
"I'm energized. I'm excited," Obama said at one point and, for the first time, in a while, you could actually believe him.
It was a striking change in tone -- and demeanor -- for Obama from just six weeks prior when he last took the podium in the wake of election losses that will put Republicans in charge of both houses of Congress when official Washington returns in 2015. In the immediate aftermath of that across-the-board election defeat, Obama was defiant, unapologetic and quite clearly annoyed and frustrated. He came across as someone who, unhappy with how the game was going, wanted to take his ball and go home.
Now, context matters when it comes to understanding the change in Obama's demeanor. The last few weeks have been very kind to him. He negotiated a climate deal with China. He helped shepherd a $1.1 trillion spending bill to passage. He signed an executive order halting the deportations of more than four million people in the U.S. illegally. And, just this week, he stunned the world with his announcement regarding the change in the U.S.'s relationship with Cuba. (Less important on the national stage but probably also a factor: Obama is headed on a several-week vacation to Hawaii tonight. Who doesn't get happy right before a vacation?)
What the last month affirmed for Obama is that he still has the capacity to significantly influence the policy direction of this country on a number of fronts. And the CRomnibus deal -- as hard won as it was -- seemed to also affirm, at least for the moment, that genuine compromise is possible between the parties. The last month has been the presidency as Obama imagined it might be -- doing big things and striking deals. (His critics will note that Obama's ideal presidency is built on executive orders and unilateral actions.)
"America knows how to solve problems," Obama said at the close of the press conference. "When we work together we can't be stopped."
That, in two sentences, is why Obama ran for president six years ago -- animated by a belief that he was uniquely positioned to unite the country and, in doing so, harness America's strengths here and abroad. The intervening six years have proven the difficulty of that challenge but for an hour on a Friday in December he found a way to believe in it again.
Chris Cillizza writes "The Fix," a politics blog for the Washington Post. He also covers the White House.
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