Obama Allegedly Calls Kanye West a 'Jackass' in Off-Record Portion of Interview

Kanye West's rude behavior at the VMAs met with presidential ire, according to Terry Moran of ABC news. Now retracted, but still viewable on Twitter, Moran tweeted what President Obama allegedly thought of Kanye West: that Kanye West was a jackass for his poor manners in taking the microphone away from Taylor Swift to state that Beyonce should have won instead. The tweet was deleted and it was later revealed that Barack Obama calling Kanye West a 'jackass' happened after a CNBC interview and was supposedly said off the record.

Bush and Cheney caught calling a journalist a crude name back in 2000

Upon hearing that President Obama allegedly called Kanye West a jackass, my mind returned to a previous gaffe involving then candidate George Bush. Back in 2000, Bush and Cheney were caught on live mics discussing a New York Times political reporter named Adam Clymer. Bush, sharing what he thought was a private conversation with Cheney, pointed out Adam Clymer and called him a "major league a____" to which Cheney agreed wholeheartedly. Bush refused to apologize for this off the record, hot microphone remark. Bush's people even defended the crude remark stating that it was due to what Bush deemed was an unfair reporting of him while he was the Governor of Texas.

If President Obama did state, albeit off the record, that Kanye West was a "jackass" for interrupting Taylor Swift's acceptance speech at the VMAs to extol Beyonce, thus diminishing Taylor Swift's hard won award, then he is entitled to his opinion, just as Bush felt entitled to his own opinion of Adam Clymer. Obama should not apologize for his remark and quite honestly, most Americans, particularly Taylor Swift fans, likely agree with Obama's estimation of Kanye West's behavior at the VMAs.

The technology helped get Obama elected also spreads his Kanye West "jackass" comments around the world

Twitter is new on the scene, having been incorporated just two years ago in 2007. Even Facebook, MySpace and YouTube were all founded after the 2000 Bush gaffe. The past decade has brought social networking into America's homes and work places in ways that were not possible previously. While President Obama seems to embrace technology (he did, after all, help secure his victory via text messages and other social media), he may not be enthused with the utter lack of privacy that our world now offers because of the explosion of social media sites in the past few years. Open mics are just as bad as open ears, and, in a matter of minutes, private remarks can go viral. Twitter and other social networking sites virtually assure that no comments are ever truly off the record.

Sources:

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2172815/kanye_westtaylor_swift_controversry.html?cat=33
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2009/09/obama-calls-kanye-west-jackass.html
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/09/15/obama-calls-kanye-west-jackass/
http://search.twitter.com/search?q=&ands=obama&phrase=&ors=¬s=&tag=〈=all&from=terrymoran&to=&ref=&near=&within=15&units=mi&since=&until=&rpp=15
http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/bushcuss.asp