Seal says America was “misled” before President Obama came into office.
“I think President Obama, I think he was kind of dealing with a ‘damned if you do, damned if you don’t’ situation,” the “Kissed by a Rose” singer says in an interview this week on Ora TV’s “Larry King Now.”
“I, personally, am one of those people who don’t suffer from amnesia. And when [Obama] came into power, he was called into office by an America that I felt had a few problems. It was in just the deepest economic turmoil that I can remember, a trillion-dollar deficit.”
The British entertainer says the cards were stacked against Obama in 2008: “How was anyone going to walk into that job and sort out that mess? It was just never going to happen. But I think he knew that to begin with.”
Seal told host Larry King, “I think that America was going through an identity crisis and I think that what it needed as much as a great president, to the same degree as a great president, was a great leader. I felt that the country had been misled before his tenure and I felt that by virtue of him coming into office, the way that America was seen in the eyes of the rest of the world completely changed.”
The multiple-Grammy winner, 52, says before 2008, America “was seen as a war-mongering, kind of self-elected police force by the rest of the world that put its nose into places that it perhaps shouldn’t have.”
“I didn’t necessarily agree with that sentiment because I lived here. I understand how difficult it is to do that job,” Seal said.
“Overnight” everything changed when Obama came into office, says Seal.
“I think Americans who were traveling were very proud to call themselves Americans. By him coming into power, it showed the progressive-mindedness and the forward-thinking nature of this country.”
Seal says while he hasn’t been keeping up with the 2016 presidential race “as much as perhaps I should be,” he noted with a laugh, “I know there’s a huge comedy aspect to it that is pretty difficult to miss.”
When asked by King if he was referring to GOP front-runner Donald Trump, Seal replied, “I’m referring to a few people actually. They all seem to be having quite a laugh at his expense.”
