On December 16, 2016, President Barrack Obama took the podium for his final news conference of the year. POTUS addressed most of the things we as Americans were all wondering. A few things stood out to me, and I felt that it was important to share.
For starters, the message to Vladimir Putin really caught all of our attention. POTUS even said he confronted Putin about meddling in the US election and told him to “cut it out.” He also stated, ”I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections that we need to take action and we will at a time and place of our own choosing.”
POTUS even shared that he thought, “Ronald Reagan would roll over in his grave” if he knew Americans supported Putin.
POTUS continued to show his support to Hillary R. Clinton. "I've said before, I couldn't be prouder of Secretary Clinton. I think she worked tirelessly on behalf of the American people and I don't think she was treated fairly during the election."
Over the years we’ve all watched Obama as our POTUS grow. We have watched many of his speeches and news conferences to become aware of the grace and intellect he brings.
As a viewer one of my favorite parts in his final news conference of the year was when he mentioned and came for the defense of his wife, FLOTUS, Michelle Obama. “How is it that some voters or elected officials think Michelle Obama’s healthy eating initiative and school nutrition program is a greater threat to democracy than our government going after the press for issuing a story they don’t like?”
It was clear that POTUS was talking about the recent incident where Donald Trump took to his Twitter account to attack Vanity Fair for giving his restaurant an unfavorable review. If this doesn’t scream “bigot” I am not sure what ever will.
Lastly, I was happy to also see POTUS show he’s aware that although our founding fathers implemented great changes, we now live in a different time and a lot has changed since. Obama used Wyoming as an example for having half a million residents, where California has 33 million, yet both have 2 senators. Yes, let's allow that to sink in.
Obama ended by thanking those who worked with him to make the economy better than when he took office. He shared the great satisfaction he had for helping the people he did, along with accepting any and all blame for anything that went wrong, as a true President should.