Tom Brokaw told Obama he had ducked answering questions

[ducks]

Obama says he won't be smoking in White House
Sun Dec 7, 2:50 pm ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President-elect Barack Obama failed to give a straight answer when asked on a U.S. talkshow on Sunday whether he had managed to quit smoking.

In a country where cigarettes are responsible for one in five deaths and smoking costs tens of billions of dollars in health care, Obama has been under pressure to set an example by giving up his reported two-decade-old habit.

Appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press" program, interviewer Tom Brokaw told Obama he had ducked answering the question during an interview last month with ABC's Barbara Walters.

Noting that the White House was a no-smoking zone, Brokaw asked Obama, "Have you stopped smoking?"

"I have," Obama replied, smiling broadly. "What I said was that there are times where I have fallen off the wagon."

"Wait a minute," Brokaw interjected, "that means you haven't stopped."

"Fair enough," Obama said. "What I would say is that I have done a terrific job under the circumstances of making myself much healthier. You will not see any violations of these rules in the White House."

Obama was often observed on the presidential campaign trail chewing Nicorette gum, which helps ease the craving for nicotine. He has tried several times to quit.

The 47-year-old president-elect, who takes office on January 20, works out daily at the gym and sometimes plays basketball. His doctor said in May he was in excellent health, often jogged 3 miles a day and was fit to serve as U.S. president.

Website www.cigaraficionado.com says Gerald Ford, who served from 1974-77, was the last U.S. president to use tobacco on a regular basis. The White House no-smoking rule was imposed by former First Lady Hillary Clinton, now Obama's nominee for secretary of state.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081207/pl_nm/us_usa_obama_smoking_3/print

[Anti.Hero]

I'd axe that rule day 1 and light it up just to get at Madam Clinton.

[ducks]

I'd axe that rule day 1 and light it up just to get at Madam Clinton.

because that is more important then anything elese in the usa right now:ihit:ihit

[E20]

because that is more important then anything elese in the usa right now:ihit:ihit

You're the one who made the thread and posted an article about it, so it must be important.

[balli]

Since I think this is a piece of shit topic, authored by a piece of shit poster, I'll just post this in order to make up for how much dumber we were all made by even opening said piece of shit's thread.


It has been 272 days since I gave up smoking. I think I'm used to it now. My anxiety has abated and I no longer feel as if part of my body has been amputated. No, correction: I have not stopped feeling the lack, I've not stopped feeling as I've been parted from the whole me, it's just that I'm accustomed now to feeling this way; to put it more accurately, I've accepted bitter reality.

I'm never going to smoke again, ever.

I say this and then I still have daydreams in which I'm smoking. If I say these are daydreams so secret, so dreadful, that we hide them even from ourselves... do you understand? Anyway, it will be right in the middle of one such daydream, and whatever I am contriving to do at that particular moment, as I watch the film that is my dream slowly approaching it's climax, I feel happy as if I had just lit a cigarette.

So this was the main purpose of cigarettes in my life: to slow the experience of pleasure and pain, desire and defeat, sadness and joy, the present and the future; and between each frame to find new roads and shortcuts. When these possibilities disappear, a person feels almost naked. Disarmed and helpless.

Once I got into a taxi, the driver was chain-smoking, and the inside of the car was thick with magnificent smoke. I began to breathe it in.
"I beg your pardon," the man said. He was opening the window.
"No," I said, "keep it closed. I've given up smoking."

I can go a long time without longing for a cigarette, but when I do, the longing comes from deep inside me.

I am reminded then of a forgotten self, a self occluded by medicines, fabrications and health warnings. I want to be that other man, the Orhan I once was, the smoking man, who was so much better at fighting the Devil.

The question when I remember my old self is not whether I should at once light up a cigarette. I no longer feel the chemical craving of the early days. I just miss my old self, the way I might miss a dear friend, a face; all I want is to return to the man I once was. I feel as if I've been forced to wear clothes I haven't chosen, as if they made me into a man I never wished to be. If I smoked, I would once again feel the intensity of the night, the terrors of the man I once thought I was.

When I long to return to my old self, I remember that in those days I had vague intimations of immortality. In the old days, time did not flow; at times when I smoked, I'd sometimes feel such happiness, or such intense despair, that I'd think everything would remain unchanged. As I blithely smoked my cigarette, the world stood in place.

Then I began to fear death. That smoking man could drop dead at any moment; the papers were entirely convincing on this point. To stay alive, I had to dismiss the smoker and become someone else. This I succeeded in doing. Now the self I abandoned has joined forces with the Devil to call me back to the days when time never moved and no one ever died.

His call does not frighten me.

Because as you can see, writing -if you're happy with it- undoes all sorrows.

-Orhan Pamuk

[tp2021]

ducks, if this isn't exactly what the people who coined the phrase "grasping at straws" were thinking of, I don't know what is.

[Gino]

Is anyone else missing the irony?

1) People were worried that McCain was too old but Im guessing Obama will die of cancer before McCain kicks the bucket.

2) HILLARY implemented the no-smoking rule? Thats awesome considering her own husband broke the rule when he smoked a cigar in the oval office shortly after........well....u know :lol

[ChumpDumper]

1) That's a very bad guess.

2) I don't remember his actually smoked it, but if you would like to claim yourself as the expert on the details of that matter, go ahead. With little of substance to complain about, board Republicans are now masters of the trivial.

[RandomGuy]

Meh.

I would guess the place probably still smells like smoke from the two centuries of smokers that inhabited the place before it became a no-smoking zone.

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

I thought this was pretty stupid when I heard about it. Somehow I figured either ducks or Yoni would post about it though.

We've got much more pressing shit to worry about than this.

[Wild Cobra]

I thought this was pretty stupid when I heard about it. Somehow I figured either ducks or Yoni would post about it though.

We've got much more pressing shit to worry about than this.

I think this is a stupid thread too. I may not like Obama, but that doesn't mean I'm going to nitpick any little thing. Smoking is legal. I will not resort to the pettiness of libtards in their obsession with president Bush. They post anything they can to promote Bush Bashing. How pathetic is that?

[ducks]

I guess he can duck questions but how dare a republican

[RandomGuy]

I may not like Obama, but that doesn't mean I'm going to nitpick any little thing.

Why do I not believe this? :p:

[101A]

Actually, in this day and age, although smoking is perfectly legal, actually practicing the habit shows a profound lack of self-control and selfishness; especially for a man with a wife and kids - not a hypocrite here, either; loved my old man to death, but called HIM selfish to his face the day he was diagnosed with cancer at 60. He died 6 weeks later, and left my mother a widow (been 4 years so far - probably gonna be AT LEAST 25). Also left 10 grandchildren without that voice of wisdom.

Dumb.

[8ft.tall.tejano]

could care less if he chases the dragon while eating trans-fats and getting it on w/clinton herself as long as he could help generate jobs and fix the economy..

[dg7md]

These petty "entertainment-politics" news bits are preferable when it's the only note of interest in a political spectrum going on in our country. Hate to remind the media but people are getting laid-off and there's a sort of recession going on about now.