Obama one year later: A little grayer

by Mark Silva

It was a year ago, on another Election Day, when President Barack Obama's senior political adviser shed some tears.

"When the network projection came up, I was standing with (campaign manager) David Plouffe and some people in the war room where they were getting returns,'' says Obama adviser David Axelrod. "And when the words were spoken I think we all were a little overcome... It was surreal, I mean, to hear the words that this fellow we'd worked for, who I began working for when he was a state senator, was now the president of the United States. And it was quite an emotional moment.''

Axelrod recalls this moment which he and another asscociate describe as "surreal'' in the second part of an interview with Obama's inner circle that CNN's Situation Room is airing as another election plays out, one year later, which carries some inevitable messages about where things stand for the president's party in some critical places: Virginia and New Jersey, where Democratic candidates appeared to be in trouble today, and a far-flung region of rural upstate New York where the Republicans are playing out their own modern-day version of a civil war between rival factions.

Wolf Blitzer, the CNN interviewer for the cable network's session with Axelrod, White House Communications Director Anita Dunn and Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, speaks of how many people have told him since last year's election that, when they saw that Obama had been elected president, they started to cry.

"Yes, I'm among them,'' Axelrod said. " I'm among them. I -- I mean that's not unusual, I'm an emotional gu,y but yes, I was -- I was really overwhelmed by that moment.''

"We'd been hearing reports all night about what a wonderful crowd it was down in Grant Park and -- and just it was an unusually balmy evening in Chicago,'' remembered Dunn. "We'd scheduled an outdoor event for early November which was risky but it was a beautiful day. It was like a festival all day with people on the streets wearing their Obama gear....''

"We were waiting for that 270 (electoral vote winning total)'' Axelrod said. " It was only going to happen in the West Coast, with California, Oregon and Washington State, when they closed their polls. And it was only then that we could go on the air and say what we knew was going to happen for the last several hours.''

" I was with him about 45 minutes before that when, as mentioned, there was that time lag when you knew we'd probably gotten 270 the minute the West Coast closed,'' Gibbs said. "And I remember talking to him. And it was a bit surreal because at that point we did know it, but we hadn't been told it officially, in a sense. And I remember I got the same chills watching that again that I had that night... And I remember walking across that hall and shaking the hand of a man we now called the president-elect.

" I had spoken to him earlier in the evening,'' Axelrod said. "After Ohio, it became clear that we were going to win Ohio. And he said, so, it looks pretty good. And I said, 'Yyeah, but I'm not going to make the same mistake others made. I'm not congratulating you until we absolutely are sure'. So when I saw him after you guys made your projection, he -- he said, 'Well, can you congratulate me now?'''

The president's advisers, one year later, were asked how the president has changed since then.

" He hasn't changed that much,'' Gibbs said. "He's still the same person that we went to work for. I'm now in the sixth year of working for him. But he's down to Earth. He asks you about your kids. He's concerned about your well being as much as he is everyday worried about the country's well being. And I think it's remarkable that all of what has transpired in our lives as a result of what's happened in the last year has done remarkably little to change the person that we went to work for...

"He's not that far removed from paying off student loans and understanding the day to day economic pressures that so many go through,'' Gibbs said. "And he used to say that, that that gave him that perspective if he ever got to this office. And I think that perspective serves him well everyday.''

Those loans were settled once the president's personal memoirs became a best-seller, after his keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in Boston in 2004. That and the best-selling The Audacity of Hope with which he launched his presidential campaign made Obama financially secure for life.

"All of you, I assume, call him now, Mr. President, right?'' Blitzer asked.

"Yes,'' Axelrod said. "Yes,'' Dunn said. "Yes,'' said Gibbs, adding, "The most awkward thing is when -- when he walks into a meeting... And David and I stand up and he sort of smirks at us like, 'yeah, yeah, you sit down. You don't really mean it.'

"Yeah. He's just happy we're getting exercise,'' Axelrod said. "You know, the significant quality, among many great qualities that he has, is consistency. I mean he's a very genuine person. He is who he is. He's got a very good perspective. He takes what he's doing very seriously. He doesn't take himself too seriously.

"And none of that has changed,' Axelrod said, one year after that "surreal'' election. "And I think the only manifestation that I've seen is that his hair is a little grayer. And maybe that's where he channels it...maybe that's where he channels the pressure.''