Barack Obama
The 44th president of the United States, now running the Obama Foundation and opening his presidential center in Chicago this summer.
Circuit updated February 14, 2026
On Brian Tyler Cohen's show, Obama makes something closer to a diagnosis than a pep talk: Democrats have the harder job, not temporarily but by design, because governing requires persuasion and majorities and a basic concern for consequences while the other side gets to break things and call it a mandate. He refuses to take the bait on Trump posting his face on an ape, pivoting instead to a street band playing in subzero Minneapolis and to Bad Bunny's halftime show, which he treats as an actual argument for the beloved community rather than a metaphor for one. The revealing part is how candidly he names his own expiration date, admitting half his daughters' TikTok references mean nothing to him, a quiet way of conceding he is not the answer to the question everyone keeps asking him to solve.
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“There's this sort of clown show that's happening in social media and on television. And what is true is that there doesn't seem to be any shame about this among people who used to feel like you had to have some sort of decorum.”
Barack Obama · Brian Tyler Cohen -
“It was smart because it wasn't preaching. It was showing. It was demonstrating and displaying this is what a community is.”
Barack Obama · Brian Tyler Cohen -
“If that's how we fight, then we lose what we're fighting for. But that doesn't mean we have to get punked or be saps.”
Barack Obama · Brian Tyler Cohen
