After following Democratic Presidential candidates during the nearly two year 2008 election season, CNN Senior Political Correspondent Candy Crowley got up close and personal with President-elect Barack Obama. “He knows me and I know him,” she says.
As for predicting how the President-elect will perform during his first year in office, Crowley says Obama has been forthright with the public that there will be some highs and lows. She finds Obama an instinctively cautious man and believes he will receive a fairly high approval rating the first six months of his administration.
But she was not as sure about the Obama’s performance rating at the end of his first year. “I think by the end of the year, he owns the economy and if nothing has happened to change things, his numbers will fall.”
Crowley specializes in politics. She’s reported on Gubernatorial, Senate and Presidential races for two decades. The Missouri native has covered all but one national political convention since the nomination of Jimmy Carter and served as the White House correspondent for the Associated Press during President Ronald Reagan’s era.
CNN’s Candy Crowley Crowley then worked for NBC News before heading to CNN in 1987. The roster of Presidents and politicians she’s covered is extensive but even she admits Obama is the one she knows least.
“I did several interviews and travelled with him but the enormity of his debut on the presidential scene and his guarded approach to the media immediately threw up the kinds of barriers not usually there when you cover other candidates who historically draw smaller crowds and less media attention in the early months.” She adds, “I know the least (about Obama) in teams of the sorts of small things you gather over the course of a couple years to paint a broader picture of who is this candidate.”
She recalls Former President Bill Clinton who had a similar effect as Obama on the public but a much different relationship with the press. “Bill Clinton, who drew enormous crowds in the general election, was readily accessible and media friendly through the primary process,” she says. “Admittedly,” Crowley points out, “Clinton has a more expansive personality.”
Crowley believes Obama first showed signs of the weight of his new position the night he was elected to be the 44th President of the United States. She notes the way the he walked onto the stage at Grant Park to declare victory was different from that moment on. “Much of what the President-elect said that night were things from the campaign trail,” Crowley adds, “but delivered entirely differently. It was sober and presidential.” Asked if she thinks Obama will try to keep a casual side to his Presidency, much like his recent outing to Ben’s Chili to meet with Washington, D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty, Crowley says yes. She points to Obama’s promise to get outside the White House bubble.
When Obama seemed frustrated by the constant media coverage, which took away his ability to wander Chicago virtually unnoticed, Crowley says he drew energy from his family. Off-camera conversations he initiated were almost always about his wife Michelle or his two daughters, 10 year old Malia and 7 year old Sasha. Crowley remembers there was “a lengthy discussion the day Sasha lost a tooth and how much the tooth fairy was paying in his Chicago neighborhood.” She also points to a letter Obama wrote to his daughter’s which will be published in Parade magazine January 18th. The President-elect writes, “A new puppy won’t make up for the time I spent away from you. But I ran for the White House because of what I want for you and for every child in this nation.” He ended the letter, “I love you more than you can ever know.”
Obama will take office on January 20th and his first 100 days will start clicking away. Crowley says the time period is an artificial deadline, but a target for new presidents to get their footing. She says by then, “We will know something about his (Obama’s) style, and his ability to maneuver his way through the Washington puzzle palace.”
