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President Obama: Person of the Year

President Obama is Time Magazine's Person of the Year.

An excerpt from Time's managing editor Richard Stengel, White House correspondent Michael Scherer and executive editor Radhika Jones is below.  The trio ask the president about Lincoln, marijuana, the Middle East and Hawaii moments. View the full conversation here.



TIME: So we’ll start right in. In fact, we’re going to go so far ahead. If we were sitting here four years from now and you were looking back on what your legacy is as a two-term Democratic President — we know what Ronald Reagan did and we know what FDR did — what would you want people to say about your two terms?

THE PRESIDENT: I think what I’d want people to say is that having come in at a time when our economy was on the brink of collapse, when we had gone through a decade in which middle-class families were doing worse and worse, and the ladders of opportunity into the middle class for people who were willing to work hard had begun to deteriorate; at a time when, internationally, we were embroiled in two wars but our leadership around the world was being questioned, that we had steered this ship of state so that we once again had an economy that worked for everybody; that we had laid the foundation for broad-based prosperity; and that internationally we had created the framework for continued American leadership in the world throughout the 21st century, while recognizing that the world is changing and that we should encourage the kind of growth and development in other parts of the world, but over the long term will be good for us and good for the world.

It wouldn't be freedom of speech without the vitrolic rant of some people who oppose Time Magazine's decision.

On Twitter several people have expressed their 'dissapoint' over the news.




Congratulations President Obama.

PHOTOS:   Never seen before administration photos.

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