During a sold-out appearance in London, former President Barack Obama delivered sharp commentary on political power, warning that the world’s biggest issues often stem from leaders who refuse to move on.
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“It’s fair to say that 80 percent of the world’s problems involve old men hanging on who are afraid of death and insignificance, and they won’t let go,” Obama said on stage at the O2 Arena, where he was interviewed by British historian David Olusoga. “They build pyramids, and they put their names on everything and they get very anxious about it.”
Olusoga replied, “History is not short of those figures. Neither is the present.”
The message echoed previous remarks from Obama. In 2019, he told a Singapore audience that global dysfunction is “usually old people, usually old men, not getting out of the way.” In London, he emphasized that leadership should never be about ego, saying, “You are not there for life, you are not there in order to prop up your own sense of self-importance or your own power.”
The remarks followed Donald Trump’s debut of a “Presidential Walk of Fame” in the White House Rose Garden, which oddly included a plaque for Obama and a printed photo of Joe Biden.
Obama also slammed Trump’s false claim linking Tylenol use during pregnancy to autism, calling it dangerous misinformation that spreads “violence against the truth.”
He closed with a warning about the rise of authoritarianism and the shrinking vision of “we the people,” saying democracy weakens when only a few are seen as fully American.
