Former President Barack Obama spoke at the Obama Foundation summit in Chicago this week on a wide-ranging number of issues.
The president was asked about his post-White-House life and the Obama Foundation. The interviewer asked the former President about his foundation’s mission, which states that the foundation’s goal is “creating, fostering and supporting a new global class of leaders.”
“How did you settle on that?” the interviewer asked Obama.
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Obama then dove into a lengthy answer, touching on multiple problems in the world. “Most of the problems in the world do not exist because we don’t have solutions for them,” Obama said, naming problems like school quality, climate change and agricultural yields in Africa all have easy solutions, but “humans” stand in the way of progress.
Speaking globally, Obama explained, “What prevents us from implementing most of the things that we would probably collectively agree would make the world better is not a lack technical solutions but that there are humans involved.”
The former president also said there are “human elements” that prevent his version of global progress from coming true, “like racism and small-mindedness.”
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“The reason we don’t do it is because we are still confused, blind, shrouded in hate, anger, racism, mommy issues,” the former president said. (RELATED: Here’s How Trump-Endorsed Candidates Did On Election Night)
Obama concluded his answer by saying, “We have to figure out how to get people to work together.”
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