During a tense White House press briefing Wednesday, Jay Carney had a long exchange with Fox News reporter Ed Henry about what President Obama really meant when he said the Supreme Court would be engaging in activism should ObamaCare be struck down. Carney's response to the outrage? Americans just didn't "understand" what President Obama said because he is a "law professor."
Henry: The president is a former constitutional law professor. One of his professors is Laurence Tribe. He now says, in his words, the president “obviously misspoke earlier this week”, quote “he didn’t say what he meant and having said that in order to avoid misleading anyone, he had to clarify it.” I thought yesterday you were saying repeatedly that he did not misspeak. What do you make of the president’s former law professor saying he did?
Carney: The premise of your question suggests that the president of the United States in the comments he made Monday, did not believe in the constitutionality of legislation, which is a preposterous premise and I know you don’t believe that.
Henry: Except this is from Laurence Tribe, who knows a lot more than you and I about constitutional law.
Carney: What I acknowledged yesterday is that speaking on Monday the president was not clearly understood by some people because he is a law professor, he spoke in shorthand.
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