I have posted below President Barack Obama's complete interview with the Tonight Show host, Jay Leno. Now some people have written that Barack Obama is struggling as a "communicator." Others talked as if Barack Obama laid a big gaffe-filled egg. Really? I didn't see either. Just look at Barack Obama for this 24-minute interview. The president sits there and explains, in detail, what happened with our financial meltdown. He explains about AIG and the hedge fund that they developed. He talks about the relationships between this hedge fund and the rest of the financial network. He's giving an extraordinary amount of detail and shows that he has an incredible amount of knowledge about this subject. Basically he's explaining to us, the American people, that he understands what is going on. This is an amazing performance.

Let's think about this. We have an American president sitting on the Tonight Show trading jokes with Jay Leno. He is relaxed. He is confident. He is comfortable. He is able to mix jokes with issues of substance. Watch carefully how he takes responsibility for the AIG bonuses and then pivots towards where we need to go as a country. We need to regulate the financial industry so that something like this does not happen again. It is hard to stress how important this interview and this performance are. Barack Obama is bypassing the traditional media and talking straight to the American people. He's coming in our living rooms and sitting down and having a conversation. This is truly an amazing interview to watch.(I need to give a high five to Leno for being a good host and asking good questions.)