David Axelrod: Auto-Bailout, Torture Memos Among Obama's Toughest Decisions

George Tiller, a doctor who performed abortions in Kansas, was murdered last month. How will this affect the abortion debate?
Obviously it was a tragic thing, and the president spoke to it yesterday. This runs completely counter to the thrust of his speech at Notre Dame. His feeling is we have to lower our voices and engage in constructive dialogue to the degree we can. Wanton acts of violence are not the way to solve this. Will it reignite the debate? I don't know. As of yesterday, I think people on both sides of the debate were expressing their shock and chagrin about what happened.

Why is it that President Obama has settled into office with such a preternatural sense of confidence?
I wish I could answer that question. It's a great mystery to me. It wasn't that way in the campaign. He had a very, I think, pronounced adjustment period as a candidate. He wasn't comfortable as a candidate from the beginning, and he had to learn how to be an effective candidate. There was no such run-up to this job. The day he sat down in that chair in the Oval Office, it was as if he had been there forever. He's very comfortable working through difficult issues and making decisions. And you know, to be fair, during the campaign, privately, he said a lot, "I really know I can do this job. I like working through complicated issues. I like making decisions and I'm looking forward to that, and I think it will be easier for me than it has been to be a candidate." As much as I know him, love him, appreciate him, I mean, it's been a revelation to watch, because he hasn't skipped a beat.

What was the president's toughest decision so far?
There have been a lot of tough calls. I do think any time you commit young people to war, it's a difficult and agonizing decision, and that's certainly true for him. But there have been other tough decisions. [Releasing] the documents [regarding the Bush administration's authorization of harsh interrogations of suspected terrorists] was one because there were competing cases, and he listened carefully and gave it a lot of thought. It was not a slam-dunk to help the auto companies. I mean, there's a real question as to whether, given their own complicity in their decline, it was appropriate to intervene. Ultimately, he decided that there was enough at stake for people in communities and the economy as a whole that he had to act, but it was a hard one.

President Obama seems to feel that it's important to tell the public, often at great length, about the difficult choices the country faces on the economy, national security, and other issues. Why?
The American people are basically very common-sensical. They are not ideological. They are pragmatic. And he reflects that thinking. He is also not averse to laying it on the line with people. He has this expression that's pretty familiar around here—"Let's try the truth." And he always jokes, "We've gotten this far being honest with people, let's keep going." One of the things people appreciate about him is that he's not always going to tell you what you want to hear, but he'll always explain why he's doing what he's doing and why he thinks it's important.

• Read 10 Things You Didn't Know About David Axelrod.
• See Obama's 12 Most Important Decisions
• See other members of Obama's Inner Circle.
• See photos of Obama abroad.