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Face to face with Obama
Kerry O’Brien speaks exclusively to United States President Barack Obama at the White House in Washington. The President confirms plans to visit Australia in June with his family and offers insights about the war in Afghanistan, China’s emergence as an economic power and climate change.
Transcript
KERRY O’BRIEN: PRESIDENT OBAMA WELCOME TO AUSTRALIAN TELEVISION.PRESIDENT OBAMA:Thank you so much.
KERRY O’BRIEN: YOU’VE HAD SOME UNDERSTANDABLE HICCUPS TRYING TO GET TO OUR PART OF THE WORLD.
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Right.
KERRY O’BRIEN: IS JUNE LOCKED IN FOR YOUR FIRST VISIT, AND HOW LONG WILL YOU BE ABLE TO STAY?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well we are definitely looking at travelling in June and my hope is that we can stay at least a couple of days, I want to be able to take Michelle and hopefully the girls to Sydney as well as Canberra and...
KERRY O’BRIEN: BECAUSE YOU’VE GOT MEMORIES?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: I’ve got wonderful memories, I used to travel through Australia when my mother was living in Indonesia and my grandparents were living in Hawaii, and so we’d usually go through Sydney and memories I have not only of it being a beautiful country but of people being just wonderfully hospitable and kind to me are ones that I carry with me.
KERRY O’BRIEN: WELL WE’D SEE THAT AS A GREAT INVESTMENT
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Thank you.
KERRY O’BRIEN: PRESIDENTS AND PRIME MINISTERS ALWAYS TALK ABOUT A SPECIAL US-AUSTRALIAN RELATIONSHIP AND ONE OF YOUR SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIALS TALKED ABOUT A MEETING OF MINDS
PRESIDENT OBAMA:Yeah
KERRY O’BRIEN: BETWEEN YOU AND KEVIN RUDD. IS THERE A MEETING OF MINDS?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: I really do think there is, you know Kevin is somebody who I probably share as much of a world view as any world leader out there, I find him smart but humble, he works wonderfully well in multilateral settings, he’s always constructive, incisive. And, you know I think he is like me a pragmatic person, I think he comes to the job wanting to provide better opportunities not just for this generation but for the next but I think you know he’s somebody who isn’t an academic, or just thinking about abstract ideas, I think he’s constantly thinking in very practical terms about how to get something done.
KERRY O’BRIEN:AFGHANISTAN WILL OBVIOUSLY BE ON YOUR AGENDA WHEN YOU TWO MEET. YOU ONCE FAMOUSLY SAID OF THE WAR IN IRAQ: “I’M NOT OPPOSED TO ALL WARS. I’M OPPOSED TO DUMB WARS.”
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Right.
KERRY O’BRIEN:IS AFGHANISTAN NOW AT RISK OF BECOMING A DUMB WAR?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: No I think Afghanistan is a necessary mission. It’s a difficult one but it’s a necessary one. Obviously the reason we are there is very clearly defined, Al Qaeda used it as a launching point for an attack that killed 3000 Americans and persons of all nationalities and ethnicities. We have to root out the terrorist networks that are able to mount not just the sorts of attacks that we saw on 9/11 but also the sorts of attacks we saw on Bali that had such a devastating attack on Australian nationals. Australia is the largest non-NATO contributor to our efforts there, we are grateful for the sacrifice and Prime Minister Rudd and I are in constant consultation about how we move that effort forward in a way that stabilises Afghanistan, that trains up Afghan security forces so that we are able to remove our security forces but we have confidence that Afghan will not return to a launching point for Al Qaeda operations
KERRY O’BRIEN: SO YOUR OBJECTIVES ARE CLEAR
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Absolutely
KERRY O’BRIEN: WHICH IS WHAT COLIN POWELL SAID AFTER THE EVENT ABOUT VIETNAM. THE LESSON ABOUT VIETNAM WAS HAVE CLEAR OBJECTIVES AND KNOW THAT YOU CAN WIN, SO THE FIRST OF THAT IS CORRECT, BUT WHEN YOU STARTED CAMPAIGNING FOR THE PRESIDENCY, YOU TALKED OF THE WAR IN AFGHANISTAN BEING IN ITS SEVENTH YEAR. IT’S NOW IN ITS NINTH YEAR, AMERICA’S IN DEEPER, AND THE SITUATION DOESN’T APPEAR TO BE GETTING ANY BETTER. YOU’RE NOT HEARING THE ECHOES OF VIETNAM IN THAT ARE YOU?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, I would dispute the notion that it’s not getting better. I do think that what we’ve seen is a blunting of the momentum of the Taliban which had been building up in the year prior to me taking office. I think that you’ve seen actually some reforms in the Karzai government that allow us to then actually get civilian help to ordinary Afghans and that then builds trust in the government, so I think we’ve got some positive trends but there is no doubt that this is a difficult task, and what I have said is that we need to begin drawing down our troops in 2011, and start handing over more and more responsibility to the Afghans, we can’t be there in perpetuity neither the American people nor the Australian people should be asked to carry that burden any longer than it needs to be carried.
KERRY O’BRIEN:HOW DID YOU REACT WHEN PRESIDENT KARZAI’S RECENTLY REPORTED COMMENTS WERE FIRST CONVEYED TO YOU, THAT IF HE WAS PUT UNDER MORE PRESSURE, HE MIGHT JOIN THE TALIBAN?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well you know I don’t take news reports of comments necessarily that seriously, I wait until I hear directly from a world leader, I know I’m misquoted a lot and you know what I do think is he’s a proud man, I think he has a strong sense of Afghan nationalism, and he’s under a very difficult circumstance. Look, this is a country that has gone through three decades of extraordinary turmoil, he is trying to rebuild a sense of a national government when that is not a tradition that’s been there for a long time and so he’s under enormous pressure, but what we have said is that we can’t succeed unless President Karzai moves forward on the reforms that are so necessary for Afghans to see a real investment in their lives day to day and improvement in their lives day to day
KERRY O’BRIEN:BUT OF COURSE, HE ALSO SAID JUST BEFORE THAT ATTRIBUTED COMMENT THAT FOREIGNERS WERE BEHIND THE FRAUD, BEHIND THE FRAUD IN LAST YEAR’S ELECTION, WHICH EVEN YOUR OWN PRESS SECRETARY HAS DESCRIBED AS UNTRUTHFUL, AS HE ALSO DESCRIBED THOSE OTHER COMMENTS AS TROUBLING. IS PRESIDENT KARZAI STABLE ENOUGH AND WORTHY ENOUGH TO DESERVE YOUR BACKING AT A COST OF AMERICAN AND COALITION LIVES?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well I think that President Karzai is capable of leading his country into the 21st Century and stabilising it. As I said he’s got a tough task but the reason we’re there ultimately is not to support one man. The reason we’re there is because it’s necessary for our national security, we think it’s necessary for the world’s security that we dismantle Al Qaeda and its affiliate networks, and we need a strong partner in that process, I think Karzai has the capacity to be that strong partner and I think that we’re going to have to keep on both respecting the sovereignty of Afghanistan and Karzai as the duly elected leader but continue to put pressure on him to make the kinds of reforms and improvements that will not only mean success for us but also ultimately success for him.
KERRY O’BRIEN: LAST QUESTION ON AFGHANISTAN. IT WAS REPORTED IN AUSTRALIA IN MARCH THAT GENERAL McCHRYSTAL IN A PHONE CONVERSATION WITH AUSTRALIA’S DEFENCE FORCE CHIEF, QUOTE: “WARNED THAT THE RUDD GOVERNMENT’S REFUSAL TO ALLOW AUSTRALIAN TROOPS TO TAKE THE FIGHT TO THE TALIBAN WAS IMPAIRING THE WAR EFFORT”. WERE YOU AWARE OF THE GENERAL’S FRUSTRATION AND WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE AUSTRALIA DOING MORE THAN IT IS?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: You know I won’t comment on the reports of this particular conversation it’s not one that came to me. I think that Australia has made enormous sacrifices and an enormous investment both on the military side and on the civilian side, they’ve been a very strong partner and America is grateful for that.
KERRY O’BRIEN: YOU’VE DESCRIBED NUCLEAR TERRORISM AS AMERICA’S GREATEST RISK IN THE SHORT AND LONG TERM, BUT CLIMATE CHANGE HAS ALSO BEEN DESCRIBED AS THE GREATEST SINGLE RISK TO HUMANITY. YOU MET CHINESE PRESIDENT HU ON MONDAY. DID YOU TWO MAKE ANY PROGRESS ON CLIMATE CHANGE, BECAUSE SURELY THE SOLUTION IS LARGELY IN THE END IN YOUR HANDS AND HIS?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well I would dispute that any two countries can dictate a solution here, we’re going to have to have an investment by all nations in dealing with what I think is a very real problem. Australia has a significant carbon footprint just like we do, and certainly per capita, our two countries have some of the biggest carbon footprints. So we’re going to have to make an effort, I think the Copenhagen accord was progress and by the way Kevin Rudd’s participation in that was critical in helping us move the ball down the field. What we have for the first time is all countries documenting the mitigation efforts that they’re willing to make and that’s extremely significant. We’re going to have to do more though, and I know that both in the United States and in Australia, there is a concern that somehow there is a conflict between economic growth on the one hand and dealing aggressively with climate change. What I’ve been trying to say here in the United States and I would say to the world is that if we focus our attention, our ingenuity, our innovative capacity on transforming from a fossil fuel based economy to a clean energy based economy then potentially we can not only solve the problem of climate change but unleash an enormous amount of economic growth for the future but it’s going to take some time, and there’s going to be some transition and people are understandably resistant. It is always difficult to make big changes like the ones required for climate change in the midst of a very bad economic crisis and we’ve had the worst one since the 1930s. So, I’m confident though that you know ultimately humanity has a way of responding not always as timely as, on as timely basis as we would like, but when we start facing down potential catastrophe, humanity adapts and I think we will this time as well.
KERRY O’BRIEN: DO YOU FEEL THAT YOU ARE MAKING HEADWAY WITH PRESIDENT HU ON THIS FRONT?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well you know I think China has an enormous interest in solving this problem. You know if you talk to Chinese leaders I think they will acknowledge immediately that if over a billion Chinese citizens have the same living patterns as Australians and Americans do right now then all of us are in for a very miserable time, the planet just can’t sustain it, so they understand that they’ve got to make a decision about a new model that is more sustainable that allows them to pursue the economic growth that they’re pursuing while at the same time dealing with these environmental consequences. So I think they understand intellectually. Right now though they’re understandable impulse is to say well let’s let the developed countries, the Australias, and the Americas deal with this problem first and we’ll get to it when we’ve caught up a little bit in terms of our standard of living. The point we’ve tried to make is we can’t, we can’t allow China to wait. We have to take responsibility and do what needs to be done, but if emerging countries not just China but also India, Brazil and others are pursuing a path in which they replace us as the largest carbon emitters, that’s not a sustainable practical approach, so we’re going to have to have everybody moving on the same track at the same time.
KERRY O’BRIEN: ARE AS YOU AS WEDDED TO, ARE YOU AS CONVINCED THAT A CARBON TRADING SCHEME IS THE BEST WAY TO GO, THE BEST WAY TO GET EMISSIONS DOWN AS KEVIN RUDD IS?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: I think that, I am absolutely convinced you have to put a price on carbon of some sort, so there are a number of ways of doing that, you could do a carbon tax, you can do a cap and trade system which is what originally I had suggested, very similar to the program that Kevin Rudd has proposed, but the key is to change incentives for the market place, where we are actually pricing these pollutants that are going into our atmosphere, if a price is placed on them, if industry has to take them into account then we can count on the market place responding effectively. If it’s free to pollute then you’re never going to have a, companies making all the myriad decisions that are required in order for the entire system to move in a better direction, and it’s never sufficient for a command and control system in which government is trying to chase down every single polluter. What you have to do is have a market mechanism to make it work more efficiently.
KERRY O’BRIEN: TO COME BACK TO CHINA, AMERICA HAS BEEN THE WORLD’S MOST POWERFUL NATION FOR A CENTURY. BUT GIVEN THE PROJECTIONS THAT CHINA IS WELL ON THE WAY TO BECOMING THE WORLD’S BIGGEST ECONOMY, WITH ALL THAT THAT POTENTIALLY DELIVERS INCLUDING GREATER POLITICAL MUSCLE, HOW HARD IS IT GOING TO BE FOR AMERICANS TO ADJUST IN A MATURE WAY TO THE INCREASING PROSPECT THAT YOU CAN’T BE NUMBER ONE FOREVER?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Oh you know I don’t think about this as a zero sum gain, I actually think that America can be number one for a very very long time but we think that there can be a whole host of countries that are prospering and doing well. Here’s one way to think about it. The Chinese standard of living and industrial output per capita is about where the United States was back in 1910, I mean they’ve got a lot of catching up to do.
KERRY O’BRIEN:THEY DO
PRESIDENT OBAMA: It is in our interests, both of our countries interests for China to be successful, for China to be prosperous, because that means they’re more likely to be stable, that means they’re more likely to be able to deal with issues like the energy efficiency of their industries, and reduce pollution, and so we’re not interested in constraining China, we want China to do well. The only thing we want to make sure of is that a country like China as it is growing and inevitably will end up being the largest economy just because of the enormous size of their population, that they are also taking their international responsibilities seriously and that they recognise that with great power comes great responsibility.
KERRY O’BRIEN: IN YOUR LANDMARK SPEECH IN 2004 YOU SAID AMERICA’S GENIUS WAS ITS FAITH IN SIMPLE DREAMS. AS YOU LOOK ACROSS THE LANDSCAPE OF AMERICA’S WORKING FAMILIES TODAY FOR MANY OF THEM THERE’S NOT A LOT TO DREAM ABOUT; STILL NEARLY 10 PERCENT UNEMPLOYMENT; A LOT OF UNDER-EMPLOYMENT; A BIG ARMY OF WORKING POOR. WITH THE HEALTH BILL BEHIND YOU NOW, IS THAT YOUR BIGGEST CHALLENGE FOR THE REST OF THIS TERM?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Making sure that not only we’re dealing with the short term problems in the economy that come out of the financial crisis but laying the foundation for long term economic growth is absolutely our biggest challenge. I’m optimistic that we can do it, but there are some legs to the stool that have to be put in place. Having a reformed health care system was one of them, having a strong financial regulatory system so that we never have the kind of financial crisis on Wall Street that we saw again that’s a second component. A third component is what we just talked about in respect to energy, having a shift from the old energy models to a new energy model that’s more efficient and more self sustaining, that’s a third leg. Improving our education system which historically has always been the driver of extraordinary economic growth but frankly you know if you compare the per capita performance of kids in Singapore at this point to kids in the United States when it comes to things like Math and Science, we haven’t been doing as well as we have historically. So those are the kinds of big structural shifts that we’re going to have to make. We’re not going to be able to make them all overnight but one of the things that I’m pleased about is given the history of financial crisis we have actually managed this and rebounded much more quickly than I think anybody anticipated and we’re in a strong position with strong growth rates to move in a very positive direction but we have to tend to these long term problems.
KERRY O’BRIEN:AT THE SAME TIME AS THESE FAMILIES ARE STRUGGLING, THE WALL STREET SYNDROME LIVES ON, IF I COULD PUT IT THAT WAY – BANKERS BACK FEEDING AT THE TROUGH WHILE MUCH OF THE REST OF AMERICA PAYS. DO YOU FEEL STRONG ENOUGH – IN A STRONG ENOUGH POSITION, A STRONG ENOUGH PLACE, DO YOU HAVE NOW THAT YOU HAVE THE MOMENTUM BACK -- TO WITHSTAND THE POWER OF THE WALL STREET LOBBY AND SERIOUSLY REGULATE THE FINANCIAL SYSTEM THE WAY YOU WANT TO. I KNOW WHAT YOUR PLANS ARE BUT THAT LOBBY IS A VERY POWERFUL VERY RESISTENT LOBBY
PRESIDENT OBAMA: I think we’re going to get this done, and the reason is because the American people understand that what happened in 2008 cannot be repeated and so lobbies operate well under the cover of darkness when you have the disinfectant of sunlight on the process and what it is that we’re trying to push for, then I think we’re going to get a very strong financial regulatory reform bill and as part of the G20 we’ll be coordinating with Australia and other countries to make sure that these reforms are not just taking place on Wall Street but they’re taking place in London, they’re taking place in Hong Kong, all across, all around the world we’ve got to recognise that capitalism is absolutely the best system for producing wealth but there’s got to be a regulatory framework put in place to make sure that excessive risks don’t end up bringing the entire system down.
KERRY O’BRIEN: SO WHY ARE YOU SO CONFIDENT THAT YOU WILL BE ABLE TO GET YOUR REGULATORY SYSTEM THROUGH CONGRESS?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: I’m always confident.
KERRY O’BRIEN: WELL IT WORKED ON HEALTH EVENTUALLY.
PRESIDENT OBAMA: Yes.
KERRY O’BRIEN:ON YOUR PATH TO THE WHITE HOUSE, YOU INSPIRED GREAT HOPE AROUND THE WORLD, NOT JUST IN AMERICA BUT AROUND MUCH OF THE REST OF THE WORLD. HOW WILL YOU MEASURE THE WORTH OF YOUR PRESIDENCY?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: You know if looking back on my Presidency whether it’s one term or two, I can say that I was able to wind down the war in Iraq successfully, I was able to stabilise Afghanistan in a way that keeps the American people safe. That we were able to create an economy that works for all Americans and not just some Americans and that we’ve provided a little more security with respect to having a healthcare system that works. You know I think those would be goals that I came into office espousing and being able to deliver on my promises I think is the best thing that a politician can do.
KERRY O’BRIEN: AND LAST QUESTION, WHAT WILL IT MEAN TO YOU, WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO YOU TO BE SEEN AS A TRANSFORMATIONAL PRESIDENT?
PRESIDENT OBAMA: You know I don’t tend to think of myself in those terms. What I tend to think about is the job in front of me, what I need to do today, tomorrow, the next day. I assume that I’ll have a lot of leisurely time after the Presidency to look back and see what kind of impact I had.
KERRY O’BRIEN: BARACK OBAMA, THANKS YOU VERY MUCH FOR TAKING THIS OPPORTUNITY TO TALK WITH US.
PRESIDENT OBAMA:I enjoyed it, thank you very much.
