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Former President Barack Obama says Governor Scott Walker and other Republicans are lying when the say they support people with pre-existing medical conditions. Bill Schulz, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Former President Barack Obama speaks at a rally for Democratic candidates up and down the ticket with Sen. Tammy Baldwin (center) and gubernatorial candidate Tony Evers on Friday, Oct. 26, 2018, at North Division High School in Milwaukee.(Photo: Mark Hoffman / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

Former President Barack Obama, a campaign closer for Democrats, brought the political heat to Milwaukees North Division High School Friday.

Imploring Democrats to vote in the Nov. 6 election and excoriating Republicans for policies that he said favor the rich, Obama gave a stout defense of his eight years in office and took plenty of shots at Republicans who have controlled all levers of power in Washington over the last two years.

In his most animated speech on the campaign trail this year, heaccused Gov. Scott Walker and other Republicans oflying about their health care record and their claims that they'll support protections for those who have pre-existing medical conditions.

Obama said there has always been spin in politics, but"what we have not seen before in our recent public life is politicians just blatantly, repeatedly, baldly, shamelessly lying, making stuff up. Calling up down, calling black white."

Obama said of Walker's recent ad defending his record on pre-existing conditions:Your governor has been running an ad during election time saying he is going to protect pre-existing conditions when he is literally doing the opposite. That is some kind of gall. That is some kind of chutzpah. But lets also call it what it is. It is a lie.

Walker responded in a tweet that PolitiFact gave Obama a national lie of the year for saying,If you like your health care plan, you can keep it.

"It takes some kind of gall for him to come into Wisconsin and lie again about health care and about pre-existing conditions," said Walker, who promised to call a special session of the Legislature to deal with pre-existing conditions should Obamacarebe killed by the courts.

Obama said Republicans have cut taxes for the rich and corporations, stripped environmental rules and ran up the deficit just like they did last time.

He chargedRepublicans withpurging voter rolls to keep people from voting and trying to scare everyone else with whatever divisive social issues they can come up with, just like the last time.

They promised to take on corruption they have gone to Washington and just plundered away, he said. In Washington they have racked up enough indictments to field a football team. Nobody in my administration got indicted.

Spectators listen to former President Barack Obama speak at a rally for Democratic candidates.(Photo: Mark Hoffman / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

Obamaheadlined a rally for the entire state Democratic ticket, including state schools SuperintendentTony Evers, who is running for governor against Walker, and U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin, who faces Republican Leah Vukmir. At several points, Obama mispronounced Evers' name, whichrhymes with weavers, not endeavors.

It was nearly four years to the day of Obama's last rally at North Division when he came to Milwaukee to rev up support for a candidate for governor.

Obama couldn't get Mary Burke across the finish line first in 2014, as she lost to Walker.

On Friday, there were 3,500 people in the gymnasium and another 600 in an overflow room, according to a Milwaukee Fire Department official.

Former President Barack Obama talks about the good things going on in Wisconsin including "Giannis ballin'" Bill Schulz, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Obama was alsojoined by U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore, who attended North Division,congressional candidates Randy Bryce and Dan Kohl, and other officials and candidates.

The visit came in the wake of the discovery of more than a dozen suspicious packages sent to Obama and others through the mail. The packages contained pipe bombs.

A bombing suspect was arrested and identified as Cesar SayocJr.

Obama made no mention of the incident.

Obama arrivedtwo days after President Donald Trump rallied thousands of Republicans at an airport in Mosinee, south of Wausau. Former Vice President Joe Biden will attend Democratic events Tuesday in Madison and Milwaukee.

Obama did not mention Trump's name, but said: "I'm hoping you think it's wrong to hear people spend years, months, vilifying people, questioning their patriotism, calling them enemies of the people, and then suddenly you're concerned about civility. Please."

First District congressional candidate Randy Bryce (right) shares a smile with lieutenant governor candidate Mandela Barnes.(Photo: Mark Hoffman / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

Democrats are hoping that Obama's visit will boost turnout in Milwaukee during the midterm elections.

Turnout in Milwaukee dropped sharply from 2012, when Obama was on the ballot, to 2016, when Hillary Clinton lost to Trump.

Evers told the crowd:Were going to win this thing. Were fired up and were going to take back Wisconsin because it is time for a change."

Evers said Walker has waged war on working people and put special interests and his donors ahead of the people of Wisconsin. He addedWalker has been against women, and has done everything he could to gut the Affordable Care Act and the pre-existing conditions that exist for 2.4 million people in Wisconsin.

Baldwin said she recalled that as a member of the House she had an opportunity to be at the White House when Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law.

I felt that a lot of work that I had engaged in for many, many years was being seen through, Baldwin said, detailing her story of being a child with a pre-existing health condition.

In that grand room in the White House as the president signed that law, I realized we had crossed an incredibly important milestone. That protection (on pre-existing conditions) was now in that law, she said.

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Baldwin criticized "special interest" funded adsthat began running against her last year, and said she was "going to wear this like a badge of courage."

"I don't work for them," she said. "I work for you."

Without mentioning Vukmir by name, Obama said that if she were elected, she would be a deciding vote on gutting protections on pre-existing conditions. Vukmir has said she supports such protections.

Vukmir tweeted that Obama "lied to you when he said 'if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor.'He's lying again now ... and he won't even acknowledge that (Baldwin, who supports Medicare-for-all), wants to boot 3.4 MILLION Wisconsinites off employer insurance and destroy Medicare."

Baldwin has denied Vukmir's accusations.

The latest Marquette University Law School Poll showed Walker and Evers in a virtual tie while Baldwin held a 10-point lead over Vukmir.

"I find it very interesting that Tammy Baldwin feels the need to bring Barack Obama if she is so confident about her lead," Vukmir told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. "Meanwhile, we had President Trump here in the central part of the state, Mosinee. He flew Air Force Two right in the middle of our state, didn't go to one of the big cities. Wants to meet with the people, middle class, hard-working folks of our state."

"That's what the message of my campaign is all about. Tammy Baldwin has really lost touch with that," Vukmir added.

A Milwaukee voter, Jerry Harris, said: "I feel a sense of urgency" about the election.

"We got kind of kicked in the head" during the last two years, he said, adding that race relations and gender issues had taken a step backward with Trump in the White House.

He made me want to vote but Im too young, said 15-year-old A.J. Petty, a student at Milwaukee Collegiate Academy.

Caitlyn McGeary, a 19-year-old Cudahy resident, said it was "really amazing" to be at the school for Obama's speech.

McGeary said she was excited to vote for the first time, and plans to vote for everyone who joined Obama onstage.

"Vote," she said after his speech. "Everybody vote."

The rally began with speeches from a slew of Democratic candidates.

Josh Kaul,running for attorney general against Republican incumbent Brad Schimel, said new leadership is needed to fighting crime and getting justice for Wisconsinites.

Mandela Barnes, running for lieutenant governor, told the crowd, We have 11 days to go before we send Scott Walker packing.

Barnes said an Evers-Barnes administration will "prioritize education over incarceration."

He urged the crowd to "vote like you want Barack Obama to be president again."

Moore saidWisconsin is going to "repeal and replace" Walker. She led a rendition of a song she called "The Scott Kevin Walker Blues."

RELATED: GOP's fate in Wisconsin this fall is tied to the widening gender gap over Trump

RELATED: Wisconsin U.S. Senate race: Leah Vukmir, Tammy Baldwin open final stretch of campaignin

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Originally posted here:
Barack Obama goes after Donald Trump in Milwaukee speech

ANAHEIM, Calif. Former President Barack Obama said Saturday that November midterm elections would give Americans "a chance to restore some sanity in our politics," taking another swipe at his successor as he raises his profile campaigning for fellow Democrats to regain control of the House.

Obama didn't mention President Donald Trump by name during a 20-minute speech in the key Southern California battleground of Orange County but the allusions were clear.

"We're in a challenging moment because, when you look at the arc of American history, there's always been a push and pull between those who want to go forward and those who want to look back, between those who want to divide and those are seeking to bring people together, between those who promote the politics of hope and those who exploit the politics of fear," he said.

His appearance one day after a strongly worded critique of Trump at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign touched on themes of retirement security, climate change and education.

"If we don't step up, things can get worse," the former president told the audience at the Anaheim Convention Center. "In two months, we have the chance to restore some sanity to our politics. We have the chance to flip the House of Representatives and make sure there are real checks and balances in Washington."

Former President Barack Obama speaks as he campaigns in support of California congressional candidates, Saturday, Sept. 8, 2018, in Anaheim, Calif. (AP Photo/Ringo H.W. Chiu)

Obama gave shout-outs to seven Democratic candidates in competitive House districts across California that are considered crucial to the party's efforts to oust Republicans from control. Four of those districts are at least partly in Orange County, a formerly reliable GOP bastion that went for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election.

"We're going to put on our marching shoes, we're going to start knocking on some doors, we're going to start making some calls," he said to cheers.

Clinton trounced Trump by more than 4 million votes in California in 2016 and carried Orange County by 9 percentage points. A surge in immigrants has transformed California and its voting patterns. The number of Hispanics, blacks and Asians combined has outnumbered whites in the state since 1998. Meanwhile, new voters, largely Latinos and Asians, lean Democratic.

In Orange County, Republicans held a 13-point edge in voter registration 10 years ago but that has shrunk to 3 points while independents, who tend to vote like Democrats in California, have climbed to 25 percent.

Democrats, hoping to build on their 39-14 advantage in the state's congressional delegation, are eyeing Republican seats in districts that Clinton won in 2016. Each of the seven candidates that Obama campaigned for on Saturday fit that description.

In Orange County, GOP Rep. Mimi Walters faces a challenge from Katie Porter, a law professor at University of California at Irvine. Environmental lawyer Mike Levin is seeking an open seat to replace retiring GOP Rep. Darrell Issa in a district that includes part of Orange County.

Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, whose district encompasses part of Orange County, is fending off a challenge from Democratic real estate investor Harley Rouda to secure a 16th term in Congress despite barely winning 30 percent of the primary vote. In the other Orange County race, Gil Cisneros, a Democratic philanthropist and Navy veteran, is vying for an open seat created by retiring Republican Ed Royce.

Obama also highlighted two races in the state's Central Valley, praising venture capitalist Josh Harder in his bid to unseat four-term Republican Jeff Denham, and T.J. Cox, who is challenging David Valadao in a district where Democrats hold a 17-point advantage in voter registration.

He also made a plug for nonprofit executive Katie Hill in her Los Angeles-area race to unseat sophomore Republican Steve Knight, who won an underwhelming 53 percent of the vote in 2016.

California Republicans said Obama's appearance would have little impact and may even help their party.

"I wish he would come more often because he reminds Republicans of eight years of misery," said Republican National Committeeman Shawn Steel, who lives in Orange County. "It reminds the Republicans why these midterms are important."

Obama is expected to deliver a similar message in Cleveland on Thursday, when he campaigns on behalf of Richard Cordray, the Democratic nominee for Ohio governor, and other Democrats.

___

Associated Press writers Tom Strong and Jeff Horwitz in Washington contributed to this report.

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Obama, on campaign swing, urges 'sanity in our politics'

The speech before more than a thousand students at the University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign was a preview of the message Obama will carry into the midterm elections. But it also represented the former President's most comprehensive condemnation of Republicans in Washington and the first time he has publicly criticized Trump by name in a speech.

"You happen to be coming of age" amid backlash to progress, Obama told the students. "It did not start with Donald Trump, he is a symptom, not the cause. He is just capitalizing on resentment that politicians have been fanning for years. A fear, an anger that is rooted in our past but is also borne in our enormous upheavals that have taken place in your brief lifetimes."

Obama spent a sizable portion of his remarks criticizing Republicans in Congress, saying "the politics of resentment and paranoia has unfortunately found a home in the Republican Party" over the last few decades and argued that the policies GOP leaders are pursuing aren't conservative.

The Republican National Committee responded to Obama's criticism by saying "President Obama stepped back into the spotlight to make the case that our country is on the wrong track."

"2016 is over, but President Obama is still dismissing the millions of voters across the country who rejected a continuation of his policies in favor of President Trump's plan for historic tax cuts, new jobs and economic growth," RNC spokesperson Ellie Hockenbury said in a statement. "Democrats may have a new resistor-in-chief on the campaign trail, but they'll need more than a message of resist and obstruct to win this November."

Trump responded to Obama's speech by telling a crowd in North Dakota "I watched it, but I fell asleep. I've found he's very good for sleeping."

Obama questions Republicans around Trump

While Obama only mentioned Trump by name twice in the speech, it was clear that the remarks were aimed squarely at the man he handed power to in 2017.

"It shouldn't be Democratic or Republican to say that we don't target groups of people because of what they look like or how they pray. ... We are supposed to stand up to discrimination and we are sure as heck to stand up clearly and unequivocally to Nazi sympathizers," Obama said, an apparent rebuke of Trump telling reporters after the deadly white supremacist protests in Charlottesville, Virginia that there was good "fine people on both sides."

"How hard can that be, saying that Nazis are bad?" Obama said.

And he slammed Trump for his treatment of the Department of Justice and FBI.

"It should not be Democratic or Republican, it should not be partisan to say that we don't pressure the Department of Justice or the FBI to use the criminal justice system as a cudgel to punish our political opponents," he said. "Or to explicitly call for the attorney general to protect members of own party from prosecution because elections happen to be coming up. I am not making that up. That is not hypothetical."

Trump blasted his Attorney General Jeff Sessions earlier this week, lamenting the separate indictments of two GOP lawmakers who were his earliest supporters in Congress during the 2016 election, suggesting they should not have been charged because they are Republicans.

At one point, a seemingly exasperated Obama openly questioned what happened with the Republican Party, noting that one of their early organizing principles was standing up to communism.

"What happened to the Republican Party?" he said. "Its central organizing principle in foreign policy was the fight against communism and now they are cozying up to the former head of the KGB, actively blocking legislation that would defend our elections from Russia attack. What happened?"

He added: "I don't mean to pretend I am channeling Abraham Lincoln, but that is not what he had in mind, I think, when he helped form the Republican Party. It is not conservative, it sure isn't normal. It is radical. It is a vision that says the protection of our power and those that back us is all the matters even when it hurts the country."

Obama pushes audience to vote

The remarks, Obama said, were not meant to depress the young voters in the audience, but instead inspire them to understand that their voice matters.

"Don't tell me your vote doesn't matter," he said, referring to voting as the "antidote" to all that ails Washington. "And if you thought elections don't matter, I hope these last two years have corrected the impression."

He acknowledged that politicians -- including himself -- had said similar messages about the importance of upcoming elections, but he added, "just a glance at recent headlines should tell you that this moment really is different, the stakes really are higher, the consequences of any of us sitting on the sidelines are more dire."

The speech ended Obama's lengthy reprieve from political public life, one that has annoyed some Democrats who believed he was sitting on on a what they call a generational fight against Trump. Obama joked at the outset of the speech that he needed time away to stay married to his wife, Michelle Obama, and to spend time with his daughters. But his decision to step back into the political fray also comes at a time when Democrats, through the midterm elections, could deliver their most potent referendum on Trump to date.

Obama viewed the speech as arguably his most important of the year, his aides said, and was editing the remarks up until he touched down in Illinois.

Obama will soon take the remarks on the road, too. On Saturday, he will headline a rally for a handful of Democratic congressional candidates in California and next Thursday an event for Richard Cordray, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate in Ohio.

A complicated relationship

Obama has made some appearances since Trump took office -- including headlining a fundraiser for the Democratic National Committee earlier this year -- but the Trump era has complicated Obama's post-presidency. A series of former presidents have avoided critiquing their successors, and Obama has attempted to keep that tradition since he left office in January 2017.

Trump has not honored that tradition and has shown little to no regard for his predecessors, regularly bashing them on Twitter, to the media and at rallies. And the two have not talked since the inauguration in 2017, sources told CNN.

Obama's remarks represented that nonexistent relationship and while he focused some of his ire on Democrats -- arguing that the party cannot embrace the tactics of Trump as a way to get back at him -- Obama's speech seethed with his view that the Trump administration is not the new normal.

"And by the way the idea that everything will turn out OK because there are people inside the White House who secretly aren't following the President's orders," Obama said of the anonymous op-ed in The New York Times this week, published by a Senior Administration Official. "That is not a check. I am being serious here. That is not how our democracy is supposed to work."

Democrats, especially those in the room, welcomed Obama's decision to step back into the fray. The speech in the university's 1,300-person auditorium has seen sizable interest from the school's student body, according to university spokesman Jon Davis, who said they had received around 22,000 requests for tickets from students.

But Republicans also said they were eager to see Obama back in the news, arguing he is the best weapon they have to motivate their base.

"For three cycles (2010, 2012, 2014) President Obama fired up Republicans like nobody," Rep. Steve Stivers, the head of the National Republican Congressional Committee, told reporters on Friday. "And I'm happy he wants to do it again."

But Obama showed on Friday that he has a potent critique for those Republicans: Mocking them for ignoring the principles they touted during his presidency.

"Suddenly deficits do not matter, even though two years ago, when the deficit was lower, they said I couldn't afford to help working families or seniors on Medicare because the deficit was an existential crisis," he said. "What changed? What changed?"

And on jobs, he sought to remind those in the room - but more directly Republicans back in Washington - that his last two years were times of economic growth.

"I mention all of this because when you hear how great the economy is doing right now, let's just remember when this recovery started," he said, subtly knocking Trump, a president who often cites jobs numbers. "I am glad it has continued but when you hear about his economic miracle that has been going on, when the job number comes out, monthly job numbers and suddenly Republicans say it is a miracle, I have to kind of remind them, actually those job numbers were the same they were in 2015, in 2016. Anyway, I digress."

Obama out of the spotlight until now

Obama has spent much of 2018 away from the political fray, focusing on writing his book and raising money for his post-presidency foundation.

And he never said Trump's name during his fundraising speech for the DNC and instead urged Democrats to stop "moping" and get to work for candidates.

That speech, in the eyes of Obama's team, was not a preview of the former President's midterm message. Instead, Obama's advisers believe his midterm message will more closely resemble the remarks the former President delivered in South Africa as part of an event honoring the late Nelson Mandela.

That speech looked to be more inspiring, and that is exactly what Obama tried to do at the close of his remarks on Friday.

"You can be the generation that at a critical moment, stood up and reminded us just how precious this experiment in democracy really is, just how powerful it can be when we fight for it, when we believe in it," he said. "I believe in you. I believe you will help lead us in the right direction and I will be right there with you every step of the way."

CNN's Jeff Zeleny and Allie Malloy contributed to this report.

Originally posted here:
Obama: Trump is 'capitalizing on resentment'

Meghan McCain and President Barack Obama took apparent swipes at President Trump on Saturday in a eulogy for John McCain -- who sparred with Trump on a number of occasions before his death last week of brain cancer.

"The America of John McCain has no need to be made great again because America was always great,' McCain's daughter said, in what appeared to be a reference to Trump's presidential campaign slogan: "Make America Great Again."

The remarks were made during a funeral service at Washington National Cathedral for the Arizona Republican, who died last week of brain cancer.

Obama's jabs were more subtle but still appeared to be directed at the current occupant of the White House. He derided those in politics who traffic in "bombast and insult and phony controversies and manufactured outrage."

He also attacked "a politics that pretends to be brave and tough but in fact is born of fear."

"John called on us to be bigger than that. He called on us to be better than that, he said.

It was Meghan McCain who had the most searing swipes at the president however. Notably she said that her father's passing represented the passing of "American greatness. The real thing, not cheap rhetoric from men who will never come near the sacrifice he gave so willingly, nor the opportunistic appropriation of those who lived lives of comfort and privilege while he suffered and served."

Former presidents will be among those paying tribute to John McCain.(AP)

Former President George W. Bush also paid tribute to McCain.

"John as he was the first to tell you was not a perfect man. But he dedicated his life to national ideals that are as perfect as men and women have yet conceived," he said. "He was motivated by a vision of America carried ever forward, ever upward, on the strength of its principles."

The funeral service notably did not feature President Trump, who had feuded with McCain, particularly during the presidential campaign. In 2015, after McCain had said Trump's platform had "fired up the crazies," Trump had mocked McCain's imprisonment in the Vietnam War, saying: "I like people that weren't captured." Trump has also fumed about McCain's vote last year to kill off a bill to reform ObamaCare.

Both Trump's daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner were in attendance. Trump, meanwhile, went to the Trump National Golf Club in Virginia. He also tweeted about subjects including the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the Russian investigation.

A six-term senator and a Vietnam veteran who was held as a prisoner of war for more than five years, McCain pushed for bipartisanship on the Hill. He ran against Bush for the Republican presidential nomination in 2000. He clinched the nomination in 2008 but was defeated in the presidential election by Obama.

FAREWELL STATEMENT FROM JOHN MCCAIN

Other notable speakers included former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and former Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman.

"His death seems to have reminded the American people that these values are what makes us a great nation, not the tribal partisanship and personal attack politics that have recently characterized our life, " Lieberman, who McCain considered for his vice-presidential nominee, said.

McCains pallbearers included actor Warren Beatty and Russian dissident Vladimir Kara-Murza, as well as former Vice President Joe Biden and former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Earlier Saturday, his casket traveled to the cathedral after stopping at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, where McCains wife Cindy laid a wreath. Defense Secretary James Mattis and White House Chief of Staff John Kelly accompanied her.

On Friday colleagues, family and friends paid tribute to his service both in the military and the Congress as he lay in state underneath the Capitol rotunda.

JOHN MCCAIN HONORED AT US CAPITOL, LAWMAKERS PAY TRIBUTE TO 'GENERATIONAL LEADER'

With members of McCains family in attendance, Vice President Mike Pence said Americans marveled at the iron will of John McCain and praised him for holding fast to his faith in America through six decades of service.

Generations of Americans will continue to marvel at the man who lies before us, the cocky, handsome naval aviator who barely scraped through school, and then fought for freedom in the skies; who witnessed to our highest values, even through terrible torture; and who became a generational leader in the United States Senate, where our nation airs its great debates, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said.

Tributes have poured in from both sides of the aisle for the Republican senator and 2008 presidential nominee. On Thursday, former Vice President Joe Biden remembered McCain as a brother, and said the two were cockeyed optimists in a memorial service for McCain at a church in Phoenix.

Biden, a Democrat, declared that McCains legacy is going to continue to inspire generations.

McCain is to be buried Sunday at his alma mater, the U.S. Naval Academy, next to his best friend from the Class of 1958, Adm. Chuck Larson.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Adam Shaw is a reporter covering U.S. and European politics for Fox News.. He can be reached here.

Originally posted here:
Meghan McCain, Obama knock Trump at John McCain's funeral ...

John understood, as JFK understood, as Ronald Reagan understood, that part of what makes our country great is that our membership is based not on our bloodline, not on what we look like, what our last names are, its not based on where our parents or grandparents came from, or how recently they arrived, but on adherence to a common creed: that all of us are created equal, endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights. It has been mentioned today, and weve seen footage this week John pushing back against supporters who challenged my patriotism during the 2008 campaign. I was grateful, but I wasn't surprised. As Joe Lieberman said, that was John's instinct. I never saw John treat anyone differently because of their race or religion or gender. And Im certain that in those moments that have been referred to during the campaign, he saw himself as defending America's character, not just mine. For he considered it the imperative of every citizen who loves this country to treat all people fairly.

And finally, while John and I disagreed on all kinds of foreign-policy issues, we stood together on America's role as the one indispensible nation, believing that with great power and great blessings comes great responsibility. That burden is borne most heavily by our men and women in uniform, service members like Doug, Jimmy, and Jack who followed their father's footsteps, as well as the families who serve alongside our troops. But John understood that our security and our influence was won not just by our military might, not just by our wealth, not just by our ability to bend others to our will, but from our capacity to inspire others with our adherence to a set of universal values, like rule of law and human rights, and an insistence on the God-given dignity of every human being.

John McCains final letter to America

Of course, John was the first to tell us that he was not perfect. Like all of us who go into public service, he did have an ego. Like all of us, there was no doubt some votes he cast, some compromises he struck, some decisions he made that he wished he could have back. Its no secretits been mentionedthat he had a temper, and when it flared up, it was a force of nature, a wonder to behold. His jaw grinding, his face reddening, his eyes boring a hole right through younot that I ever experienced it firsthand, mind you. But to know John was to know that as quick as his passions might flare, he was just as quick to forgive and ask for forgiveness. He knew more than most his own flaws, and his blind spots, and he knew how to laugh at himself. And that self-awareness made him all the more compelling.

We didn't advertise it, but every so often over the course of my presidency, John would come over to the White House and we'd just sit and talk in the Oval Office, just the two of us. And wed talk about policy and we'd talk about family and we'd talk about the state of our politics. And our disagreements didn't go away during these private conversations. Those were real and they were often deep. But we enjoyed the time we shared away from the bright lights. And we laughed with each other. And we learned from each other. And we never doubted the other man's sincerity or the other mans patriotism, or that when all was said and done, we were on the same team. We never doubted we were on the same team. For all of our differences, we shared a fidelity to the ideals for which generations of Americans have marched and fought and sacrificed and given their lives. We considered our political battles a privilege, an opportunity to serve as stewards of those ideals here at home and to do our best to advance them around the world. We saw this country as a place where anything is possible, and citizenship is an obligation to ensure it forever remains that way.

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Barack Obama's Eulogy for John McCain